As far as I am concerned, large format photography is for anyone who wants to "m ake" photographs, as opposed to "taking" them. A large format camera is about as simple, basic and "classic" an instrument ar you are going to find. You open up the lens and look at your image -- all of it -- big enough to see clearly and c ompose precisely.

You work with that image until it is exactly the way you want it. At that point, loading a film holder and exposing a sheet of film becomes a convenient way to take that image that you felt and interacted with home with you so you can enjoy that feeling again, and share it with others.

To me it offers the "cleanest" way of making photographs. I don't like some chip designer's interpretation of light and shade to get between my ideas and my vis ion, and the means to reproduce what I saw and felt that prompted me to stop and make the photograph in the first place.

A Navy Chief Photographers Mate in the photo lab where I was stationed said some thing that has always stuck in my mind. "If you get paid for it, then you are a professional." Kind of makes you think about it a bit differently.

Do it because you love it. Someone above pointed out that that is what an amateu r is. If you can make some money that's great. It lets do more of what you love. But by all means do it.