What kind of an idiot takes an 8X10 and a Petzval to a wedding?

[Jim Galli]

Marky mud face.

My brother's middle boy. Technically not his, but
he has been dad since Mark was very small. He came
in the bargain when Jeff married his childhood
sweetheart, Donna.


Mr. & Mrs. Mark Kirkland

Mark swore marriage was not in the cards for him.
And we sort of believed him. Then he met Sandy
and his world changed.


Sandy & Mark

Ours too. What a treat for us to meet and mingle
with her beautiful family! I wish I could have
photgraphed them ALL. I settled for
Hazel & George, Sandy's grandparents.


Hazel & George

These wedding portraits are becoming somewhat
of a tradition for my extended family. My gift to
the bride and groom.


Technical crap: I used the ancient Kodak 2D 8X10 camera with an
1872 Darlot Petzval lens. Exposures of 1/25th second on Efke 100
film were handled by a Packard shutter. The Petzval is about 12 1/2
inch focal length and was of course, shot wide open.

[nelsonfotodotcom]

Those are quite good, Jim. I knew I was up at the long end of the day for some darned reason.

[Capocheny]

Hi Jim,

One who is "smart like a fox!"

Liked the top and bottom shots the most...

Keep up the good work... and please keep posting the results.

Cheers

[walter23]

How do you keep the people cemented in place while you insert the film, remove the darkslide, set the shutter, and shoot? Wow.

I love looking at these 8x10 portraits with old brass lenses.

[Rory_5244]

How on earth did you take the first picture?! Fantastic!

[Greg Lockrey]

"What kind of an idiot takes an 8X10 and a Petzval to a wedding?"

At one time in my carreer I had this bright idea of shooting weddings with an 8x10 and Polaroids to have the images delivered at the end of the service. I just couldn't find anyone willing to pay the frieght on a 50 or so Polaroids.

[Wilbur Wong]

Geeez Jim. You make me want to get serious about shooting something other than rocks.

[Ash]

Jim,

*grumble*

........show off.

[C. D. Keth]

Looks like you found the one situation where stopping a petzval down a stop would have been a good thing.

I love the first one. I hate to say it but the second and third look like single portraits of the men with the women thrown in. The degree of out of focus of the bride and her grandmother bugs me.

[Vaughn]

What kind of an idiot takes an 8X10 and a Petzval to a wedding?

Someone who is smart enough to know how to get out of taking 437 photos during the whole event!

But I must agree with Christopher. The top image is great. The other two just do not work for me at all. Having a person's face go from sharp to very soft focus looks very odd in the way you have done it. Normally such a lens would draw the viewer to the sharp eyes of the person and one would naturally ignore the out of focus/unsharp ears. You used a very un-classical way to use a classic lens in a classic situation. I am afraid the original owner(s) of that lens would shake their heads and say, "Nice try, but..."

As portraits, the bottom two are very unkind to the women...distortions that do not flatter, but do the opposite.

Vaughn