Digital BW, The Print

YES - I didn't want to get into it earlier -- but
working with view cameras especially 8x10" and larger
- and to a lesser extent waist level ground glass
finders on MF - certainly influenced my vision and I
would expect many from this tradition have had similar
experience. There is an incredible look to a ground
glass image 8 x 10 or larger - it just looks
"photographic".  And so hard to explain to someone
that looking at the image upside-down is actually an
advantage for composition as it frees one at least to
some degree from preconception and allows better
appreciation of form.

As the view-screens on digital cameras get larger
there is some crossover with this 'viewing tradition'
- but it's just not quite the same. Not better or
worse - just different. I wish my present digital
camera (Olympus 8mp SP-350) would allow viewing in
B&W.  It will do an in-camera conversion which I
occasionally use for preview only (I usually save RAW
except when I need rapid acquisition in which case I
use SHQ JPEG)- but not real-time B&W viewing - at
least as far as I have been able to figure out. If
anyone has a suggestion for this other than the
obvious filter, I would be interested.

So the basic design of the cameras and not just the
recording media have an effect on ones vision.  Again,
not better or worse - just different.

Yes, boring is boring no matter what the medium - but
to state the obvious: stunning is stunning as well.

I'm a fairly young 54&11/12 and could, if I wanted to,
use the 8x10, but just can't seem to get up the
enthusiasm for lugging it and tripod around anymore -
not to mention loading the holders and developing the
sheets one at a time.  And, as Peter pointed out,
view-camera on tripod does confine one to certain
types of subjects and situations for which I've "paid
my dues" but my interests lie mainly elsewhere now.

As far as image quality is concerned, I'm very happy
with Pentax 6 x 7 cm negs on slow film such as TP and
Agfapan 25 scanned with a Nikon 9000 and digitally
printed.  Now that TP and Agfapan 25 are no more, I've
begun to experiment with ADOX and a few others
available from J & C and Freestyle.  If any of you are
ahead of me on this, I would be very interested as I
have only so much time to devote to such things.

Respectfully,
 
Michael Vendrell 

--- Clayton Price <clay@...> wrote:

> Hello All -
> Now these are the kinds of discussions that I find
> personally, most 
> interesting. After all, one can only go so far with
> technical 
> discussion (as important as that is), before you
> have to look at the 
> photograph itself - the emotional content, subject,
> light - all that 
> and more that creates the impact of how we see and
> translate to the 
> printed image. When all is said and done, the method
> - digital, film, 
> format doesn't matter if the photo is boring.  This
> is something I try 
> to think about whenever
> I plan, shoot, and especially when editing. And
> since I teach as an 
> adjunct, variations of this is what I try to impress
> upon students.
> 
> Since Michael and Peter were talking about large
> format, I'm wondering 
> how many of you had similar experience to this:  As
> a student, we were 
> all required
> to own and shoot only with 4X5 or 8X10 camera.  I
> always enjoyed doing 
> so, and only realized many years later, how that
> "forced" slow down of 
> composing [upside down :-)] had such a strong impact
> on my entire 
> career, even as I became a working photojournalist
> by my senior year in 
> college -- of course working only
> in 35 mm.  What I learned from large format, was how
> to compose a 
> photograph, and working in fast moving journalistic
> situations, at 
> least for me, enabled
> me to get a pretty high percentage of interesting
> and/or unusual 
> compositions to my work. I'd like to say developed a
> style, but 
> hesitate, because I'm not sure, even after so many
> years, that I have 
> that!  But I do feel that the large format 
> discipline was invaluable.
> 
> And yes - Kertesz, Frank and Weston, among others
> are my all time 
> favorites along with John Heartfield (for his
> content).
> 
> Now 40 years later, I find myself shooting a lot of
> material on 6X9 (as 
> large a format as I care to carry around to
> locations). So that means 
> scanning and
> printing with MK7 inks on a 2200. My darkroom seems
> to have disappeared 
> about 3 years ago.
> 
> What experiences others have about all this?
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Clay Price
> 
> Michael Vendrell wrote:
> >   ... As to how
> > one best finds the tools and methods that work
> best
> > for them in the evolution of their vision - that
> is
> > something only personal experience (including
> > listening and looking at the work of others) can
> > answer....
> > and Peter Marshall wrote:
> >> I've used 8x10 and I have to say it was never a
> >> match for 35mm for most
> >> of the things I wanted to do as a photographer.
> It
> >> depends what you
> >> want. There isn't a single path. My vote for the
> >> greatest photographer
> >> of the 20th century would quite probably go
> either
> >> to Andre Kertesz or
> >> Robert Frank or Walker Evans depending which side
> of
> >> the bed I got out
> >> of this morning. 
> 
> 


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