The lure of large format: MF shooter needs advise

[alois_lazecky1]

Hello David ! Are you trying to brake your back climbing mountains with medium format and large format ? Why don't you get digital back for your Rollei ? I have reentered large format strictly because I love to work with it and yes, I missed it very much very shortly after I sold all my 8x10 gear ten years ago. Now it is Canon 20D with couple of L lenses and Arca Swiss C. I'm very happy, but I still miss my 8x10.

[david_simonds]

Gentlemen, many thanks for your replies. You have encouraged me think about my own approach to photography, which is really what this discussion is about, and whether LF would benefit my work. In the final analysis it seems to me that, in large part, the lessons to be learned from using this equipment is what attracted many of you to LF and keep you at it. If MF gives good results to 16x20 or beyond, perhaps there is little technical necessity to move to LF. Certainly, there are some among you who regularly make prints in the range of 30x40 which can not be duplicated by a 2 1/4" negative. For you, LF is a necessity. But does that describe most of you? What percent of your images shot with LF do you enlarge to an extent that would outshine a well done MF chrome. Perhaps the cost of LF is an attraction. Frankly, my Rollei 90mm Apo Schneider, which retails for around $3600 costs about twice what I would pay for a used Horseman and Nikkor 90mm. But I did not see anyone suggest that economy was the impetus for moving to LF. And it surely can not be said that it is more convenient to shoot this format. My sense is that those of you who have become committed to this format do so for visceral rather than fully pragmatic reasons. Most describe the process as nearly Zen like. A total experience, to the extent, as a writer remarked, that pressing the shutter is anticlimactic. Truly, that is not the case with smaller formats, though I have had a taste of that with my Rollei. And therein lies the hook. Perhaps 35mm is like dating, MF is an engagement and LF is marriage, or the equivalent. And you know what indiscriminate digital is....After all your kind help, I have decided to step into the frey. Not because I think the images, photo for photo will necessarily be superior than those from my Rollei, but because I believe it will give me more of what has made shooting MF such a pleasurable and fulfilling experience. It will become a tool for learning not just for capturing a slice of time. And, surely, this forum with your collective generosity and support will give me a place to whine when that shot of a life time comes back with a big thumb in the middle of it. Best regards for a safe holiday.

[alois_lazecky1]

I realy can't see why everyone is so concern about the degree or size of enlargement, the smoothness and quality of tones of an images photographed on 4x5", 5x7 or 8x10 are quite noticable even on 8x10" print and I'm not even talking about contact prints from 8x10" negs.

[david_simonds]

Alois, a digital back for the Rollei is the Holy Grail. But the last time I looked into it, the Imacon was going for something in the range of $20k or more. That is a lot of money to spend for a device that will be obsolete well before you finish paying for it. Just look at two to three year old Imacon scanners that currently bring little more than a third their cost. I bought (used) into the Rollei system in the hopes that a capable and affordable digital back will be produced before I wear it out.

[david_senesac]

alois lazecky >>> "I realy can't see why everyone is so concern about the degree or size of enlargement, the smoothness and quality of tones of an images photographed on 4x5", 5x7 or 8x10 are quite noticable even on 8x10" print and I'm not even talking about contact prints from 8x10" negs."

 

That was true in the not so distant past before scanners, when optical enlargement was it. Long ago I'd look at my projected 35mm slides and sweared there was much more detail observable than I ever seem to get out of ordinary optically enlarged prints. Drum scanners considerably flattened the playing field making credible enlargements from even 35mm.

[perry_cas]

Good question it brought up a lot of good information. A quick note scanners - I bought an E3200 to scan my MF its a dog. The one up I thnk is a 4870. Also not much chop for MF. I am thinking about LF myself and am just finding out that 'some' second hand drum scanners arent that expensive. well they arent that cheap either, but I do regret the money i shelled out on the E3200, the quality v poor.

[peter_galea]

There is nothing that compares to composing on a 4x5 or 8x10

groundglass. You get to step back and really see the image with

eyes wide open. That alone, was an exponential jump from

smaller formats for me.

[moophoto]

I realize that (by internet standards!) this discussion is pretty old just now. But I thought it useful to comment on just on aspect of your question. I shoot both Canon 20D 35mm. digital and LF (Crown Graphic with a 135mm. Fujinon lens); I scan the 4x5 transparencies on an Epson 2450 flatbed (an earlier generation of the scanner you mention). I then print on an Epson 2200. I have just run some side-by-side tests and -- at "normal" viewing distance -- it is almost impossible to tell the difference between the 20D and the CG prints at 18x12. A 4x loupe will reveal better edge sharpness. (I should also note that my old Mamiya 7 6x7 transparencies produce comparable prints to my 35mm. digital set up.) Now of course the CG allows me to send the occasional "winner" off for a drum scan and larger print; and, of course, a full-featured LF camera with movements adds a whole other dimension. But as far as final image quality with a flatbed scanner and 2200, I doubt if you will see any difference worth mentioning between your Rollei and LF.