Large Format Photography
What is Large format?
Large format describes large photographic films, large cameras, view cameras (including pinhole cameras) and processes that use a film or digital sensor, generally 4 x 5 inches or larger. The most common large formats are 4×5 and 8×10 inches. Less common formats include quarter-plate, 5×7 inches, 11×14 inches, 16x20 inches, 20x24 inches, various panoramic or "banquet" formats (such as 4x10 and 8x20 inches), as well as some metric formats, such as 9x12 cm.
Large format, whether film-based or with a digital back, is often used for landscape photography, advertising photos of high value consumer items, fine-art photography, images that will be enlarged to a high magnification, or demanding scientific applications will benefit from the very high quality of the prints or transparencies produced.
With a few notable exceptions, these cameras share the following characteristics:
- Large image size: 4x5 inches (10x12cm), the most popular format by far, up to 20x24 inches (the Polaroid camera, which can be rented on-site for a reasonable fee). The film comes in separate sheets rather than rolls, but see below.
- Flexible bellows connecting the front and back: they allow the use of a range of focal lengths (with different lenses. there are no zooms in such formats) and focusing distances, as well as providing for lateral adjustments and angular adjustments between film plane and lens plane.
- Ground glass viewing: makes it possible to assess the image with great accuracy once you get used to the dimness and inversion.
- Interchangeable lenses: you are not limited to a particular mount.
By contrast, Medium format cameras use roll-film which is 6cm wide so that the format available on those cameras are (all in cm) 4.5x6, 6x6, 6x7, 6x9, 6x12, 6x17. Therefore they produce image whose size is less than that produced by large format cameras (hence the name). The vast majority of medium format cameras operate a bit like 35mm cameras ("small format") and in particular don't have features 2,3,4. However, a few medium format cameras share these features, and are also considered on this web site, since they actually operate like large format cameras. On the other hand, with almost all the large format cameras it is possible to use roll-film holders of various sizes and to therefore produce medium-format images.
What are the main benefits of the large format camera?
- Larger image size. Results are sharper, have a better tonality, and are grain-free. A 4x5 has 13 times the area of a 35mm frame. A 5x7 has 25 times that area. Contact printing gives an image whose delicacy cannot be matched by any enlargement, and allow a number of "alternative" processes.
- Camera movements. You have more control on the final geometry of the photographed objects and of the perspective as well as on the areas of sharpness.
- Individual sheets of film. You can use as many types of film as you like easily, easily, including Polaroid, and process each sheet of film individually for optimum results. The latter point makes it possible to use Ansel Adams Zone System for black and white film.
- Contemplative approach. You take your time for each image This is the flip-side of the drawbacks: you spend so much time on a single exposure, and invest so much effort in it that you're compelled to think it through carefully and do it right.
What are the main drawbacks of the large format camera?
- Everything is manual. Most other cameras do some things automatically for us that we take for granted -- like preventing fogged film, double-exposures, non-exposures and so on. You need to remember to do things that were never an issue even with the most manual 35mm camera. As a result, there are more ways to make mistakes than you could ever imagine.
- Equipment and film: the equipment is bulky, heavy (a good tripod is necessary) and relatively expensive. The cost per photograph is considerably higher than the same image in smaller format. Think of it as being proportional to the film area.
- Larger magnification: longer focals are needed for the same angle of view: The equivalent of a 24mm in 35mm is a 75/90 lens in 4x5, a 120mm lens in 5x7. Depth of field is a serious problem. The cameras movements become necessary to put everything in focus, even though some subjects cannot be focused entirely. Start thinking f32 where you thought f5.6 ! As a result you often get very long exposures, so wind shake (esp. with vegetation) and reciprocity failure begin to take their toll. Work which requires naturally a high degree of magnification, ie macro and telephoto, is particularly impractical, the former because of the depth of field limitations, the second because lenses would have to be insanely long.
- Everything takes a long time:
- loading/unloading your holders at home
- moving around your heavy backpack or case and tripod
- setting your camera
- composing, esp. in low light with slow / wide-angle lenses (f8 max aperture is common)
- focusing: tricks are necessary to overcome the depth of field problem
- exposing: long exposures are quite common.
It is impractical to photograph quick action or candid's, and even in landscape you'll end up missing optimal conditions. Your productivity in terms of number of images (but not necessarily in terms of number of great images) will be very reduced. Think a dozen shots or less when you thought a few rolls. Even though your friends/spouse will complain about the waiting.
Besides, you'll discover by yourself many quirks of Large format photography, like the fact that the dark cloth sometimes tend to fly.
What is the real gain compared to other formats?
The consensus seems to be that as far as enlargements are concerned, the difference between 4x5 and 35mm is huge, but that the difference between 4x5 and 6x7 will show up only in big enlargements, 16x20 or larger. At 16x20 modern LF lenses have a slight edge due to reduced granularity and high contrast, above that, modern 4x5 wins due to granularity. However, you will see a bigger difference with format for B&W prints than with color prints. On the other hand, a contact print has a special quality that some feel cannot be obtained by an enlargement. Contact printing is also the only way to work with some alternative process such as palladium/platinum, carbon, etc.