Why do you like Large Format photography? (Philosophy Talk Time)

[cobalt]

I like it because it is better than digital capture.
Sorry, cap'n... that last photon torepedo completely took out are poliitical correction shields! She'll be down for at least 4 hours!

[Brian_A]

I like it because it makes me think more about what I'm shooting. I don't just point, click and, hope for a decent shot. Since I generally shoot things that don't move nor speak back to me, it works for what I want. Plus I can use it to shoot 6x17 instead of having to spend $10k on a Linhof. Multiple formats for one price is nice. I do use my digital for specific things, but I enjoy my 4x5 far more. I find it's a bit more relaxing going through the steps to make a photograph.

[sgelb]

taking portraits with an 8x10 involves the subject more than any other camera.. thats why I love it.

I also think the depth is unmatched by anything digital.

also, certain films, I just love to work with.. I think they produce amazing results.. better than any digital could do:

160 VC and NC
TXP 320 (sick range of black to white)
Ektachrome 64 and 64 x (i especially love 64x when I can find it, I think it beats velvia hands down)
EPP
provia 100

[Marko]

Life is fast. It's nice to have something to slow it down, occasionally.

But as all things in life, LF can have many faces - I am fairly certain that a 100-meter-long print took long enough to create and should qualify as LF regardless of the type of camera he used.

[Kirk Gittings]

At the risk of sounding like a complete nut....... I have always found it very similar to a religious experience (when things are really clicking). It is a very similar experience to deep meditative prayer, like performing Gregorian Chants in a monastery (something I was into a lifetime ago). It makes you present and aware....exhilarating. The aesthetic revelations are as personally profound as any religious revelation.

[Michael Wynd]

I agree with everything Walter said
Mike

[Tony Karnezis]

At the risk of sounding like a complete nut....... I have always found it very similar to a religious experience (when things are really clicking). It is a very similar experience to deep meditative prayer, like performing Gregorian Chants in a monastery (something I was into a lifetime ago). It makes you present and aware....exhilarating. The aesthetic revelations are as personally profound as any religious revelation.

Nuts love company Kirk. I feel more alive when I'm making a photograph with the 8x10. For me, it's also about the purity of the experience. It's like the difference between hunting with a shotgun or a bow and arrow. Playing music on a synthesizer or a grand piano. And then there's the result--there's nothing like the sharpness and smooth tones that a large negative affords. Once I saw some 8x10 contact prints I was hooked. When it all comes together there's simply nothing like it.

[joolsb]

It's funny, I can go out with my digital compact and take a few, carefully-composed frames but I don't derive anything like the pleasure from the results that I do with my LF images. It's the same on the odd occcasion I take the 645 Mamiya out for a spin - even though the trusty Mamiya has helped me create some of my all-time favourite images. And then there's the sad fact that I start to have cravings for LF if I haven't done any for a while....

As for what I like about it: it's the process, the detail you can achieve, the fact that DoF is no longer simply a function of aperture and focal-length but also depends on the ability to place a plane of focus. All these things and the thrill of seeing an image snap into focus on the ground glass, knowing that what you are seeing is precisely what is going to be recorded on the film. Nothing else in photography comes close.

[ljsegil]

I think the above sentiments capture it nicely. We are the farthest fringe (nut cases, perhaps) on the very large tapestry of photography, almost secretly and obsessively deriving a special pleasure, unknown to most who photograph, from using the most difficult but rewarding processes to obtain images that could not exist without the quantitatively and qualitatively greater time and effort invested in the craft and forced on us by our format choices. We have basically chosen to forgo the technical advances of the last century or so to achieve images subtly finer (to our eyes, hopefully also to those of others), requiring the greatest rigor to capture and choosing not to avail ourselves of the greater ease of capture that modern technology can provide.

I guess that is saying that we are all a bit nuts, but hopefully happily so. At least I know I am, having been thoroughly captivated by my new found passion for the challenges and possibilities of ever eventually achieving any degree of mastery of large format photography.

It's just fun out here on the edge (hopefully of better art and the greater joy of trying to achieve it, though the edge might perhaps be just of the abyss).

Once more yours in verbose redundancy,
Larry

I should probably make a policy for myself never to write at this hour and before the first cup of coffee. I'm sure the forum would agree with so sensible a resolution, but unfortunately sense has never been my long suit (hence LF, I guess, just another symptom of the greater malady).
LJS

[cobalt]

At the risk of sounding like a complete nut....... I have always found it very similar to a religious experience (when things are really clicking). It is a very similar experience to deep meditative prayer, like performing Gregorian Chants in a monastery (something I was into a lifetime ago). It makes you present and aware....exhilarating. The aesthetic revelations are as personally profound as any religious revelation.

Aaahhhhmm naaahhmm nobius copus largugious formatusssss......

Aaahhhhmm naaahhmm nobius copus largugious formatusssss......

Aaahhhhmm naaahhmm nobius copus largugious formatusssss......