The View Camera
This year the I've decided to change up the blog. I am also catching up from the road trips taken in the first part of the year. While I play catch up let me start right in with the first post of the year. I get many questions about the camera I use. Most questions are related to the process used to get the shot. In this post I will detail as many of the intricacies of the large format view camera as possible. Along the way I'll also touch on what it takes to make a Platinum Palladium print. On this first post of the year I'll dive right into describing the camera.
Most of my work in the past 8 years has been done using the 8x20 inch panoramic view camera. The camera takes 8x20 inch sheet film. This is some seriously large film. Sheet film gets even larger. The sizes of sheet film go from 4x5 inches all the way to the mammoth 20x24. The 8x20 is the largest panoramic sheet film camera built. Back in the day the camera was used for taking group portraits in banquet halls. There were three major sizes in the banquet camera family. The 7”x17”, the 8”x20” and the 12”x20”. The 12”x20” is the only size in the banquet camera format that is not panoramic. In time the banquet halls events became nothing more than a memory. The banquet camera found new life as a landscape camera.
This year I decided to simplify a bit and add a smaller panoramic format. Not all shots are practical or even possible on the 8x20. I decided to start working with the 4x10 as well. The format is the same as the 8x20 and is much more practical to travel with. Not much has changed in design of the view camera. Very similar to what was used back in the late 19th Century. There have been some improvements here and there over the years yet the basic design and concept is the same. A light tight box surrounded by leather bellows. The image is projected onto a glass screen on the back of the camera for a view. Thus the reason for the name view camera. The image is viewed upside down and backwards as there are no mirrors to reverse the image. To better see the image a large black cloth is draped over the back of the camera.
Ebony SV810 View Camera
Here is my Ebony 8x10 view camera. Specifically a wooden field camera. The field camera was designed to fold up and travel. The 8x10 view camera is for the most part the standard size all view cameras are judged upon. I ordered a 4x10 reducing back for the Ebony. The 4x10 back lets me shoot panoramic images. When the view changes to a more traditional look I can switch out the back for a more traditional rectangular perspective. The Ebony view camera is arguably the finest in the world. The wood used is either quarter sawn Honduras Mahogany or Ebony wood aged for twenty years. All the metal parts are titanium. These cameras don't come cheap and take time to acquire. The wait can be as much as a year to get an Ebony.
The design of the field style view camera is pretty ingenious. The camera folds up into a box shape for travel. Once on the tripod, the camera opens up and takes on a whole different look. The basic components are fairly simple. The front section that holds the lens is called the front standard. The back standard holds the film and ground glass for viewing the image. Most 8x10 field cameras extend out to around 34 inches of bellows. To focus the camera, the bellows are moved back and forth. The longer the focal length of the lens (larger lens) the longer the bellows. A normal lens on 8x10 is 300mm or 12 inches. That means that the distance between the film and the center of the lens must be 12 inches to focus at infinity. Get the camera closer to the subject or use a longer lens and you need more bellows. I equate bellows to light. The more you have the better off you are. And light is another tricky factor. Double the bellows and you loose ¾ of the light in the distance it takes the light to travel through the lens, past the bellows and onto the film. Fortunately there is a formula for calculating the bellows factor. And all that loss of light means a longer exposure. Thus we hit another problem in what is called film reciprocity. Most films suffer the same fate when dealing with long exposures. The longer the exposure the more time must be added to compensate. Most times the best approach is to take a good old fashioned swag (Scientific Wild Ass Guess) and hope for the best.
The film for large format cameras come in sheets. The sheets are loaded into a wooden film holder. All wooden film holders are custom made to order for each camera. The film is loaded in complete darkness. The holder is double sided and will accommodate one sheet of film on each side. The larger the size of film the more problematic things get. Light leaks from the holders are the most common problem. Film can even be bad before it leaves the factory. Using large wooden view cameras is a huge gamble. The larger the camera, the larger the gamble. There's no way to know if what you see on the ground glass is what you will get on the film. There are simply too many factors. On most days luck is on my side and I get the shot with no problems. On rare occasions even my back up shot is ruined.
Ebony with a 4”x10” Panoramic Back
Sheet Film Holders
The film holders are all hand built custom and custom sized for each camera back. Below is one of the 4”x10” holders for the Ebony. The dozen holders I ordered took a craftsman six months to fabricate. These really are a work of art. Each film holder can take two sheets of film. One on each side. With a backup shot I use one holder per shot. Film is cheap. A reshoot is not.
Ebony 4”x10” Sheet Film Holder
View Camera Lens
The next component is the lens. The lens is really the most critical piece of the image creation process. A good lens will make or break the shot. This particular lens is a very specialized piece of glass. The design is for a wide angle view on an 8”x10” view camera. When used on the 4”x10” the view is very wide side to side and about normal from top to bottom. A modern lens like this is heavy, expensive and tricky to use. The angle of coverage is so extreme that light will often fall off on the edges producing a vignette type of effect. Fortunately when shooting 4”x10” I rarely see that effect.
Schneider Super Angulon 165mm Lens
These are the basic components of the camera. In part II I will show what it takes to get the shot. This is where the real fun begins. Personally I am not one the type to dwell on the merits of one particular camera over another. The view camera is a basic design that happens to have a handful of variations. The real deal breaker is always the lens. My first wooden view camera was a good 50 years old when I managed to snag it. The first few shots I was forced to use duct tape and toothpicks to make the thing work. Over the next few years I set out to restore the camera. When all the work was done the quality of the negative was the same. Any wooden view camera can take a good shot. A finely built wooden view camera can make getting the shot easier to get. I’ll get more into that on the next post.
No comments:
Post a Comment