20x24 polaroid pictures

[Will S]

Ran across this article on large polaroids:

http://www.making-ripples.com/2006/09/excuse_me_did_y.html

Has some interesting shots of the camera. Evidently the film is going to run out soon for these.

Best,

Will

 

[Roger Hicks]

Evidently the film is going to run out soon for these.

Dear Will,

Thanks for the link. Apart from the 'museum' quote I saw nothing to suggest that film was going to run out. Have you further information on this? I have an especially soft spot for these monsters as Polaroid kindly made a 20x24 portrait of my wife and me in 1995 with the Great Camera of Prague; it hangs on my séjour wall yet, a fascinating piece of technology.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[ann]

the article talks about that camera disappearing; however , there is more than 1 20x24 camera in use , so perhaps that is where the disconnect is happening.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

No indication of plans to discontinue on the Polaroid website--

http://www.polaroid.com/studio/20x24/rental/index.html

It sounded to me like the blog author just assumed that such things were dinosaurs, and the photographers probably said something like "who knows how long this stuff will be around?" and he may have taken that to mean that the camera was headed for a museum.

 

[Dave Wooten]

Tracy Storer a poster on APUG is director of the 20 x 24 camera in California...

 

[Alex Hawley]

The writer doesn't seem to know much about what he's writing about. He makes the usual unfounded journalist assumptions. Notice he keeps saying that the photographers "attempt" to "capture" the dancers.

Where's that thread about few women using Large Format? These girls look fairly young too.

 

[SusanV]

Linda Broadfoot, a friend of mine uses one of the 20 x 24 cameras for her work.
She does image transfers with those huge sheets... see some of them here at
the Weston gallery... Dead Link Removed

I haven't heard anything about the camera being retired.

Susan

 

[jimgalli]

From 11-21 2006. It was on the web so it must be true, right?

Tracy, help us out please.

 

[Robert Hall]

I believe we have one here in Salt Lake City at the Waterford School. I have seen some work done in Macro with it. Instant film feedback with that oh-so-true color.

 

[Dave Wooten]

Shh!

From 11-21 2006. It was on the web so it must be true, right?

Tracy, help us out please.

Tracy is busy designing and building some custom camera parts for my 14 x 17, I d rather he not be disturbed right now.

 

[Jim Chinn]

I can't speak to the future of the 20x24 Polaroid material, but several photographers working with the big cameras (Tracy among them) have been featured over the last several years in View Camera Magazine. It is always one of my favorite subjects that Steve Simmons covers.

 

[TracyStorer]

We've always known Polaroid would stop making the film someday. At present, when that "someday" will be remains uncertain.
I can't tell you how many times in the last 20 years I've heard others say how much they'd love to use the 20x24 someday. Perhaps if everyone interested follows up, we can postpone the inevitable even longer?

 

[Alex Hawley]

I can't tell you how many times in the last 20 years I've heard others say how much they'd love to use the 20x24 someday.

Count me in that crowd. Making it happen is the obstacle to overcome.

 

[mark]

It is the cost of using the 20x24 that is the big hurdle. At least it is for me. I have had a portrait project in mind for quite a while but it will never happen because of cost. I do like the look of those Polaroids though.

 

[Richard T Ritter]

There are quite a few Polaroid 20 x 24 cameras around its a question of who made the camera. Some cameras are better built then others same goes for the processors. I know of 4 cameras myself .

Richard T Ritter
www.lg4mat.net
www.finefocusworkshops.com

 

[Will S]

Dear Will,

Thanks for the link. Apart from the 'museum' quote I saw nothing to suggest that film was going to run out. Have you further information on this? I have an especially soft spot for these monsters as Polaroid kindly made a 20x24 portrait of my wife and me in 1995 with the Great Camera of Prague; it hangs on my séjour wall yet, a fascinating piece of technology.

Cheers,

Roger

Neil Gaimon reports it at http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2007/09/enormous-polaroid.html, but he is just an author, not a photographer I can only assume that either he is joking or that the photographer told him this. I just sent him a note to see if he would tell his where he heard the info.

Sorry to cause worry. Hopefully it will be good news.

Thanks,

Will

 

[Roger Hicks]

Neil Gaimon reports it at http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2007/09/enormous-polaroid.html, but he is just an author, not a photographer I can only assume that either he is joking or that the photographer told him this. I just sent him a note to see if he would tell his where he heard the info.

Sorry to cause worry. Hopefully it will be good news.

Thanks,

Will

Dear Will,

Thanks again. Certainly bears further investigation, even if we are all suspicious of the reliability of the reporters.

But the camera phone pic of his portrait suggests that he knows little about photography, and cares less -- though some of his written work is brilliant, especially 'Smoke and Mirrors' and, in collaboration with Terry Pratchett, 'Good Omens'.

Waiting 15 minutes for adjustments suggests a fairly incompetent portraitist, too: I don't recall even 5 minutes.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[wfe]

Joyce Tenneson did a wonderful portrait project with one of these. The name of the project escapes me at the moment.

Cheers,
Bill

 

[argus]

Linda Broadfoot, a friend of mine uses one of the 20 x 24 cameras for her work.
She does image transfers with those huge sheets... see some of them here at
the Weston gallery... Dead Link Removed

I haven't heard anything about the camera being retired.

Susan

Susan,

the link to the splendid pictures of Linda was something I immeddiately wanted to post also in this thread.

There's one thing I don't get about her work with the 20x24" Polaroids: her images are rather extreme macros requiering a good amount of bellows draw and exposure correction.
I have worked with type59 for some time now and I am not able to get acceptable color (read: no color shift) when doing exposures longer than 1/10th second.

What's Linda's secret on this? The lighting and which?
One thing I can come up with, is using a large aperture as this is possible when photographing rather flat subjects.

Greetings,
G

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Linda Broadfoot's images must be very impressive in person.

Her statement says she shoots in the New York studio, so she has ample strobe lighting available to avoid reciprocity issues. I suspect she's also filtering a bit since the transfer process causes some color shift, and her color looks very neutral.

I have some Type 809 on hand, and now I want to try some macros.

 

[argus]

Thank you David. I didn't think about strobes.

G

 

[doughowk]

I understand Linda Broadfoot & Anna Tomczak (both NE Florida area photographers) use the NY studio for their Polaroid 20X24 work. The Jax Main Library has featured their work (as well as other local photographers such as Jerry Uelsmann & Jay Shoots - Linda's husband). Anna frequently has her work displayed in galleries in the New Smyrna Beach area (just South of Daytona). If ever in NE Florida area, highly recommend finding their exhibits - it'll certainly make you want to join the list of Polaroid 20X24 users.

 

[SeamusARyan]

Polaroid 20x24

Hi Guys

I've used the camera several times, if you look on my home page www.seamusryan.com the image there is one I made on the 20x24 camera had copied onto to 5x4 trannie, scanned and printed out as a 30x20 digital print. That shell in particular was only 2 inches big. To photograph it we had the 20x24 camera at full bellows extension we then attached a standard 5x4 bellows to the front of the camera, giving us about another 2foot of bellows, and here my memory gets a little fuzzy, but I think it was a 90mm lens which we inverted on the front of the camera. That meant that the lens was so close to the shell and the strobes so close to the shell that the light meters were giving us error messages, we had to have the shutter open but covered because the workings were on the inside, so I can't praise John Reuter enough, he's the camera operator which title does him an injustice.

A little aside about the shell it self. I source my shells from an ethical shell trader here in the UK and when ever I get some new shells I bring them home and lay them out on a black velvet cloth likes jewel to show my partner. When she saw that particular shell and the price I paid for it she asked what I was going to do with it ( a little less politely than that) but when she came by the studio and saw it hanging to dry on the wall she apologized and promised never to question my purchases again (considering that she pays most of the bills around here, I've never held her to that promise).

I also shot some colour to do transfers, to save you trawling through my site I've linked them directly here, my site is currently under going a major overhaul so please forgive if some of the links go wonky.
http://www.seamusryan.com/pages/orchidcolour1_print.htm
http://www.seamusryan.com/pages/orchidcolour2_print.htm

if anyone has any specific questions please do not hesitate to contact me

enjoy and be well

Seamus
www.seamusryan.com

 

[Jim Chinn]

Half the fun of the 20x24 is reading about how the operators solve technical challenges in fullfilling the creative desires of the photographers. a truly collaborative effort.

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

So how do you do a 20x24" transfer? I guess this question is mainly for Seamus, but if others have done it, please chime in.

I've only done 4x5" and 6x6cm, where you partially develop the print, open the pack, and roll it onto a damp warm sheet of watercolor paper. Since part of the orange-yellow layer gets left on the original sheet, if one wants a neutral result, you can shoot with a warming filter to balance the loss of orange in the transfer.

I haven't tried an 8x10" transfer yet, but I know there's a method that involves transferring directly to the watercolor paper without partially developing on the Polaroid receiving sheet, which should prevent the color shift. Is this how you do a 20x24" transfer?