Shooting portraits with 8x10

I want to shoot some portraits and print them out in 40 x 60. I

have heard that 8x10 cameras are used mainly for still lifes and

4x5 for portraits, since it is more difficult to get the model to be

completely still and shoot with a high speed and at the same

time get enought depth of field with 8x10 cameras. Can anybody

advice me on that?

Karsh and Avedon both managed to do pretty well with their 8X10s

 

You need to know you craft.

 

www.doncameron.com

You need to use enough strobe power to get around f64 with a 300 if

you want to get a pretty tight view. For whole body with a 300mm,

maybe f32-f22. Keep in mind the extension factor for a closeup. If

you want the "classic" portrait longer lens, you need a 450-500/19" or

even 600.

 

This would require maybe 2400ws strobes or a bit more. If you yse

antural light, you would be outside with reflectors on a light

overcast day, and that should work

And others , like Nicholas Nixon, do too.<P> Timothy Greenfield

-Sanders does pretty well with a 20x24 Polaroid as does <A

HREF = http://elsa.photo.net> Elsa Dorfman</A> and Neil

Slavin</A>

How are you going to print such large images?<P>Electronic

flash and working at f/32 and f/45 will give you depth of ield and

athe ability to stop motion.

With respect, the above responses are getting this discussion off on the usual wrong foot. That is, the question is posed as, "What do we do to solve the problem of long exposure and/or big aperture and resulting short depth of field?" etc., in other words, How do we deal with the fact that 810 (or LF in general) is unsuited for portraiture? The usual "good" solution is offered: Hot strobes.... Now then: Nadar, Julia Margaret Cameron, early (pictorialist) Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, and others created many great portraits with BIG cameras and WITHOUT artificial light.... The long development times ARE NOT ALL BAD (don't know how many times I've said so on this forum): Artificial "mugging" is almost eliminated, as are the consequences of momentary, meaningless movement (blinks, etc.). In EXAMPLES, AA speaks of the efforts he made with portrait subjects simply to cause them to be in as complete a state of repose as possible, because he felt this was the surest means of capturing character, and he observed that this was the technological necessity of much great early portraiture. The long exposure can appear quite stilted (my wastebasket is full of many such) but it can also show character and genuine expression in a way that is extremely elusive to the instanteous strobe-snap. That is why commercial portrait studio photographers take so many exposures. As for the thin depth of focus: Look at the beauty the above-noted masters made by means of this "limitation." Look at their pictures. Finally, throw away your modern sharp lens. Get a classic, soft-focus portrait lens (Rodenstock Imagon, Wollensak Verito or Vitax, Kodak Portrait Lens, others). And think about getting a 5x7 reducing back for that 8x10; many, including me, think it is a better shape than 8x10 for portraiture. -jeff buckels

I agree with two of the posters here. I shoot 8x10 portraits and I feel the easiest and least problematic method of portraiture w/8x10 is to get some studio lights. Available light is fine but I feel why waste the film with the subject moving or blinking when a nice pop of flash and some reflectors will shorten the time of exposure enough to allow the model to relax and get some good expressive images. Remember that the camera will be imposing to the sitter. Karsch and GreenfieldSaunders and the others used some form of studio lighting. As we all know the lenses for 8x10 are slow so it is easier to just use some flash. It doesn't take much. Ellis can steer you there. james

Hi jose.

I don't see much difference between 4x5 poirtrature and 810

except for the size of the negative ( and camera ).

It all depends what kind of lens you are going to use.

 

My 810 lenses max apertures range from 3.8 to 5.5 and almost

all of them are faster than my lenses for my 4 x 5 gear.

 

For poirtrature usually you will be using a lens that tends to have

a largeer than usual aperture to achieve smoother tones without

going necessarily in the soft focus realm.

Do not get intimidated by 810 poirtrature, inform your sitter

about the depth of field issue. Explain what are the risks if he or

she moves forward or backward. Make him partecipant of the

session and you will be amazed at how helpful they will get.

The succesful outcome of an image is given by the equipment ,

and by the working together of the sitter and the photographer

Thank you all for your responses, but I think you might have

taken my question wrong, or possibly I didn't express myself

properly.

 

I think it is much easier than all this. Let me try again:

 

As you might have noticed I am a novice in this matter. The

whole history is very long, but I will give you the important details:

 

I am an artist who is going to hire a photographer to do some

pictures for me. It is going to be full body and half body nude

shoots.

 

I had someone telling me that for printing at 40 x 60 I should use

8 x 10, so I did and was awful. I spend a lot of money in renting

all the equipment and buying film, but none of the pictures turn

out OK.

 

I know the photographer wasn't probably too good, but I also

learned that 8 x10 is a difficult thing to do.

 

So I contacted another photographer who told me 4 x 5 should

be enough, and someother people who confirm so.

 

Now I am wondering since I got different opinions, what should I

use ( 8 x 10 versus 4x5). Basically, if I can go for 4 x5 I rather do it

since it seems to be much easier and cheaper.

 

Is my question clearer now?

 

Thanks

Again, I have to disagree w/ James. I don't think the popping strobe and the razor thin exposure (razor thin slice of expression) are a prescription for natural expression or relaxation on the part of the sitter. That's why the portraiture of today is in general such crap compared to that of long bygone times. Try this test: Go into a courthouse in your area. A county courthouse or, if you live near a capital city, the state supreme court building. Somewhere in the courthouse you're likely to find a "rogue's gallery" of framed photographic portraits of judges of that court -- typically the sitting judges and past judges well back into the Nineteenth Century. Notice how the portraits are better and better as you go back in time till finally, around the 1890s to around 1920s, you'll start seeing some truly fine pictures. They were all almost all made with soft-focus lenses, big cameras, natural light (and reflectors) and were probably printed on store-bought platinum paper. -jeff buckels

Jose.....are you shooting this, or is someone else shooting it for you, with you renting the gear? If you are shooting this and renting the gear, and please correct me if I'm misunderstanding, you're at the beginning of the learning curve and you'll be doing this project with unfamiliar gear.

 

You might bring a new wrinkle(couldn't resist it) to a nude study, but don't jump in before you're ready and only you can know when that is.

 

If it's someone else doing it, I would think that you would want to check out their work, their vision, before getting into whether they're using a 8x10 or 4x5 or MF.

 

Telling somebody how to pose gets you something that is forced and hard to hold up, coming up with general feelings, and scenarios, moods, past feelings, past emotions, and letting the subject/sitter react under those situations with something that they come up with themselves, gives you something legit.

 

If it's legit, it looks legit. I don't think you can categorize the expected result from a portrait session by era, Edward Westons 'Summer Sunshine', has energy that wouldn't have been caught any better by using a motor driven 35mm.

 

The look and whether there is something legit there, something that touches the viewer, sucks him into the world of the a two dimensional print, doesn't have anything to do with whether he is using strobes or natural light, but with people skills. It has to do with getting people to feel relaxed and focused in on whatever you want to focus them in on.

 

A portrait is not a candid, or street scene, it is a complete set-up, and you need to get the subject to come up with something(which only they can do), that slides you past the technique into the picture and so for seconds(or for more hopefully) at a time you're completely sucked into the artists vision.

I've shot a number of portraits with 8x10 using both existing light in the field and strobes in the studio. Overall I've found that while there are indeed some unique problems to be solved when shooting portraits with 8x10+, it's not nearly as bad as some would make it out to be. <a href="http://www.photo.net/photo/909407&size=sm">This</a> particular portrait was shot in the studio with a 240mm lens at f/45, with 800ws bounced into an umbrella just above and to the left of the subject. Film was HP5+ developed in PMK. The scan doesn't do it justice, but there's a lot more shadow detail than you might suspect based on this. Depth of field was quite shallow even at f/45, extending maybe two inches total at this range. I'll try to get a scan or two more in the next few days to show some others from the series.

The only thing the sitter/subject sees in the studio is you the photographer 'ogling' him/her intently, maybe some seamless, bright/hot lights/intense strobes going off/cameras/tripods/reflectors/cables, a lot of technical stuff.

 

You have to relax him/her past what they are looking at in the present by giving them of a 'piece' of yourself, and by gently guiding the subject/sitters mindset into a vision that you have in your head that hasn't happened yet, and then you make the picture you've got in your head come true.

Jonathan Brewer,

 

Thanks for your advices. Somebody is shooting and I am renting

the equipment.

 

I am totally novice with large format photography, but I am not

with photography and definetely not with "nude portraits", which I

have been doing in different media (sculpture, drawing,

photography and video) for the last 10 years. I think I know how to

deal with models, specially for the ones I have for this project.

 

As we might agree it will all depend on the purpose of the foto.

For the ones regarding now, I am quite positive I can do them in

the way I am now, I mean, using a photographer with more

experience than me in large photography. It might be difficult to

explain you why, so I will be more than happy to send you a link

when I finish them, if you wish so.

 

Anyway, I agree with all your comments.

 

Thanks again.

 

Jose Carlos Casado

I have just spent an hour reviewing Elsa's site and analysing her technique,it is very simple and basic so that the person is the subject and is fully revealed. The 600 lense on that 20x24 is like shooting an 8x10 with either a 155 or 120, you can see that in the size of the knees adn feet of people sitting. So if you use a 240 or 250 you will not have such a distortion, a 300 will give minimal distortion, But you need light. People today do not sit still. they just can't do it. So she bllasts them with alot of loight in soft boxes and the big roundels, like 22 inchers and the background has some sahdaows, so what! I shoot indoor portriats and I have 3000 WS in tow heads adn then two more 500 in high efficiency heads for wiping out the background shadows or to cahng or intensify the background with gels or to give a hair light, It's alot of light. I usually get into the f32 or 45 range so i get the detail. If you want soft focus adn then print digitally you can use 2 1/4 and get fleibility, but if you want astounding detail then stick with 8x10 . I am next going to get the negs scanned and blown up. each 30x40 will run me about 300. allowing 120 for the scan. But then I get archival. If you are doing the shadow play of light and shadows on a nude and the artistic body part kind of shooting then you can use tri-x or hp5 at 400 or so and get great results. Good luck!

Jose......yes I would appreciate that, thank you.

I have often wonder about optimum (portrait) focal length for 8x10. Since the face is almost 1:1, your bellows will be extended to almost 600mm (if using a 300mm lens). This is why you don't see wide angle distortion with 8x10 and ULF cameras using a 'normal' lens.

It sounds like the problem is with your photographer and not the format of choice. If your having to rent equipment for the photographer to use then he's not very familar with 8x10 and it's nuances. Just because someone shoots LF doesn't mean that they can jump from 4x5 to 8x10. I believe 8x10 was the correct choice of format for your project, but I would find someone who is a better photographer. Tell them what you want and let them decide what is best way to get the shot.

I'd say a lot depends on how close you are going to look at your pictures. Medium format can be enlarged to 40x60 with very good results using good technique and slow film. I would get someone with a Mamiya, Pentax, Fuji or Bronica 6x7, 6x8 or 6x9 to do it. It is a lot easier to get good portaits with these cameras than 4x5 or 8x10.

It can be done, but it is a lot easier with 6x7. And if I was paying for the photographer's time... If it is your own project, sure you can spend the time to fiddle with the big camera and eventually will get superior results. But only if you look close.

Hi Jose,

learning, your'e renting the equipment, someone else is doing the shooting sounds somewhat strange.

For good results the one who does the shooting should be very familiar with the format. I went into large format after long experience with 35mm and MF, and had just to learn new. Not really the technical things. LFs are rather easy to understand. judging perspective and composition is totally different. Getting a feeling for the different "flow" the work needs. Even between the different LFs the one who shoots needs to readapt. Just only the vision through a viewfinder compared to a large groundglass (and upside down...). Might be easy for a street racing motorbike pro to ride a cross bike, but he wont check in for competition at the first day (and I assume, you want prime results).

My recommendation would be: You want to print 40x50 inches. The difference between MF and 4x5 is really notable here.

If your photographer is familiar with 4x5 but not with 8x10, rely on his experience and stay with 4x5. The difference in workflow will easyly outbeat the difference in printing!

If he`s not familiar with 4x5 too...

Didn't Playboy mag use a Deardorff 8X10 for about 49 years. They seemed to have found the combination more than a few times. Is there a page that goes into some detail about the photography behind those shots? Seems like that would be helpful for Jose. And Jeff, not to disagree with much that you've said, but Ansel, and portraits?? His are the worst I've ever seen. OK mine are worse, but his are bad.

Photo magazine did an article on Playboy's centerfold photography within the last year. I can't remember exactly which issue. They still use 8x10 chromes, and the Camera looks like a modern monorail, maybe a sinar. As I remember they shoot about 50 a day and take 3 to 5 days. They talk about having to use movements to overcome the limited d.o.f. They mask the ground glass to get the centerfold proportions.

 

Neal