August Sanders - Tech Style?

Was reading August Sander's "Twentieth Century Portraits, 1882-1952"

and I could not extract what kind of equipment he used. Mostly,

according to the book he used an old Voightlander f/6.3 lens, but did

not mention the focal length. I understand he preferred older equip

and was proud of that fact. The book also said the he used a "small

view camera," which to me equates as 4x5? I admire his portraits and

I'm trying to understand what he did from a technical side. I was a

little surprised because given the equip widely used at the time I

would have thought he employed an 8x10.

 

Can anyone shed more light on the equip he used? Thank you. Paul

I don't mean to sound like a jerk, but I look at his photos and never once thought about the camera/film/etc.<BR><BR>He was a God.

I think you can use the lense to get a fair idea of the format.<BR><BR>I'm thinking of about 2x3" or 3x4" format, whatever the exact sizes were.

I think a 9x12 cm Voigtlander, with a 135mm or 150mm lens. Notice that most of his portraits were made from below eye level -- there was a reflex finder on most of these old folders.

Thats very interesting, Bill, thanks. I'm always curious how these masters work. I wondered if he schlept a 8x10 around like Adget.

 

Investigation sometimes yields interesting data and gives new respect for their work - both esthetically as well as technically. Who would have imagined for instance that Skrebneski's choice is a 120mm Makro-Planar or the HCB loved the 50mm standard?

 

Regards

According to a letter Sander wrote in 1925 to Prof. Dr. Erich Stenger, "I use Zeiss lenses, an orthochromatic plate with corresponding light filter , and clear fine grained glossy paper. I make my photos on 12x161/2 or 13x18 plates, enlarging them to 18x24." quoted on p. 108 in Sander, publ. by Taschen

About 20 years ago I saw a show of original Sanders prints and was struck about something unusual that I never detected in offset reproductions of his work. The lighter areas looked "porcelain" and I wondered what caused that effect.

 

I've pondered this frequently over the years, and the only explanation I can muster is that he used an enlarging lens with some abberations that spread a little light from adjacent dark areas into the highlight areas. It darkened the edges of the lighter areas very slightly, but enough to give my the sensation of a glassy porcelain. For all I know, he may have even used his camera lens as an enlarging lens. That was more common then.

 

All this is conjecture, but someone investigating his work should look into what gave his prints that different appearance. I'd love to hear of anyone's actual research into this to satisfy my own curiosity.

 

This shows how important it is to view original prints when trying to determine working methods.

 

Bill Schneider

Wow, a Skrebneski fan...here I thought that his only fan was himslef.

Not necessarily, although he does make my long list. I have many books of photog of note and I try to study what they did, when, and how they may have accomplished their goals.

 

Skrebneski has done some great work. No one can take that away. But IMO the out-of-focus stuff is over-rated.

 

Victor Skrebneski wouldn't be the first photog / artist with an ego by any means.