What is large format?

[Bill_1856]

“You approach with camera and tripod, and ask permission to photograph, and set up. “First you must focus through the camera’s ground-glass back, using a small pocket magnifier. Then, put in the metal plate holder with its glass plate, and remove the slide. Next you have to watch very closely. Click-click – about a half-second exposure.. Replace the slide, remove the plate and holder. ONE shot! You want another? Then you must repeat the whole procedure.
“Our formal clothes were specially tailored with reinforced pockets for the heavy metal holders and glass plates we used. I learned to follow an unvarying routine in the respect – unexposed film in my left pocket, exposed in my right so I couldn’t make a mistake.
“Needless to say, we didn’t tend to overshoot in those days.
“I developed the film myself, later that evening, in my hotel room,. I was using Ilford-Zenith glass plates, rated about the equivalent of ISO=32. They had a green antihalation backing that came off in the developer and turned it black. Terribly dirty and messy to work with, but I was delighted that the pictures had turned out.”

(The Eye of Eisenstaedt, The Viking Press, NY, 1969, quotation paraphrased.)

He was using an Ermanox, which produced negatives 4.5x6 cm!

[Sevo]

“
He was using an Ermanox, which produced negatives 4.5x6 cm!

It was indeed a intermediate between strut folders and the roll film/35mm cameras to come. It certainly was not large format in terms of its time, when even 9x12cm/4x5"/quarter plate folders and strut folders were not considered LF. But times do change, and given its handling, it would better be discussed along with LF nowadays, as it shares nothing beyond the image size with anything which Joe Average would today recognize as medium format.

Sevo

[rdenney]

Anything shot with a view camera? Just to play Devil's advocate... If I use an adapter to shoot 35mm with a view camera, I'm shooting on large format?

What if the 35mm camera is on a sliding mount and you make a series of images for later stitching? How many of those images does it require to make it "large format"?

But in any case, I asked the wrong question, partly on purpose as a means of invoking what has proved to be a worthy discussion. The real question was: What can I display on this forum without running afoul of unwritten rules? That has been answered by a moderator, fortunately in a way that doesn't preclude my intentions. The troll question was: What is large format? For that one, everyone has their own boundaries. And this discussion has revealed that all of those boundaries are arbitrary and can cause us to wish for a different definition in some specific circumstance.

Rick "content with no clear answer to the second question" Denney

[Chris Strobel]

With processes like gigapan, traditional large format ain't looking so large anymore

http://www.gigapan.org/index.php

[Sevo]

Traditionally on this forum, large format has been defined as 4x5 or larger film or anything shot in a view camera.

Which has not yet caused any Europeans (where 9x12cm used to be the traditional 4x5" equivalent) to be banned...

Sevo

[Ole Tjugen]

To me, it's anything with an image area of 100 cm^2 or larger. That covers 4x5" and 9x12cm. 6x17 is just a hair too small.

[Donald Miller]

Sorry, but I have to jump in again. I have never met anyone other than a photographer who even knows that there is such a thing as 'format' Mention 'large format' to a client and you'll get the blank stare to end all blank stares.

It's a male ego thing...well endowed male photographers don't find it particularly necessary to tell another how large the film is that they shoot. Less well endowed photographers engage in those inane discussions of the focal lengths of their longest lens. Those who are least endowed get into discussions about sizes of film...and last but certainly not least...but on second thought maybe so... those who have the greatest doubts about their manhood get into discussions of film and developer combinations.

[jb7]

Well in that case,
I'm really quite glad I never contributed a reply to the question...

[Ben Syverson]

To me, it's anything with an image area of 100 cm^2 or larger. That covers 4x5" and 9x12cm. 6x17 is just a hair too small.

I like that, Ole. Nice and metric.

To extend it, maybe we can agree that 1000 cm^2 and beyond is "Ultra Large Format." 11x14 is 993.5 cm^2, so we would just round it up and include it with ULF.

Somebody call the ISO and get them on this!

[Ben Syverson]

It's a male ego thing...well endowed male photographers don't find it particularly necessary to tell another how large the film is that they shoot.

You should work for the Leica marketing department!