Do you go in for square comps?

[slackercrurster]

I did lots of squares decades ago. Then when I got out of 6 x 6 I didn't do much with squares. I'm enjoying getting back into them.

How bout you and squares?

 

[jtk]

I did lots of squares decades ago. Then when I got out of 6 x 6 I didn't do much with squares. I'm enjoying getting back into them.

How bout you and squares?

I usually frame 6X9, often vertical, often cropped per image.

 

[jvo]

the ONLY way to fly!!!!

 

[Pentode]

I usually shoot 35mm but whenever I take my 6x6 and 4x4 cameras out for exercise I’m reminded how much I like square format. I should use them more.

 

[ic-racer]

I shot exclusively 6x6cm for a almost ten years until in 1985 I got a 35mm Rolleiflex SL2000F to expand my horizon (bad pun). I remember printing the first roll from that how I felt the images were 'panoramic!'

 

[Sirius Glass]

For decades Hasselblad advertised that "Square is the prefect format." I firmly believe and practice that.

 

[Paul Ozzello]

LOVE the square

 

[Pieter12]

When I shoot with a square-format camera, I find the compositions are more interesting and more demanding. For me, horizontal format is more like we are used to seeing, our eyes usually scan side to side giving a more horizontal view. I am much more aware of the frame edges with the square, how everything sits inside this unusual space. Another thing I like about shooting square is in theory, depending if the image gets cropped as horizontal or vertical, I have the choice of two different equivalent angles of view as compared to shooting a horizontal-format camera (for example, an 80mm lens for 2-1/4 square is about the same angle of view as a 50mm horizontal or 35mm vertical on a 35mm camera). In reality, I usually won't crop a square shot to anything else than square.

 

[runswithsizzers]

For four decades I shot 135, and I rarely felt like any of my images needed a square crop. True, the majority of my 135 shots were transparencies, so cropping was not even an option until I started scanning the images, years later. After switching to digital, I do sometimes crop to 4x5, but almost never square. The 3:2 aspect ratio just seems natural to me, based on my experience. However, I do find myself cropping most of my portrait aspect images to 5x7 for some reason.

I am presently enrolled in a Medium Format Photography class, and I'm using a Mamiya C220 Twin Lens Reflex for class. It is quite an adjustment, but am learning to appreciate the square frame. I was talking to the class instructor about printing on 8"x10" paper, and I assumed the thing to do would be to fill up the paper, cropping a bit of blank sky from the top or grassy foreground as suited the image. No can do; she is insisting we print the whole image, square, as shot. So I might as well say I prefer square, at least until the end of the semester.

 

[jim10219]

I let the scene before me dictate the composition, not the gear. So while I often use square negative cameras, I don't often print square prints. Though sometimes a composition works best as a square, and if it does, that's how it gets printed regardless of the aspect ratio of the negative.

 

[Paul Ozzello]

Don't you dare crop a square negative!


But seriously. The most interesting aspect of a square camera is that you get a wider perspective vertically so often objects that would get cropped with a normal 35mm lens fit perfectly in a 6x6 normal lens.

For four decades I shot 135, and I rarely felt like any of my images needed a square crop. True, the majority of my 135 shots were transparencies, so cropping was not even an option until I started scanning the images, years later. After switching to digital, I do sometimes crop to 4x5, but almost never square. The 3:2 aspect ratio just seems natural to me, based on my experience. However, I do find myself cropping most of my portrait aspect images to 5x7 for some reason.

I am presentl6y enrolled in a Medium Format Photography class, and I'm using a Mamiya C220 Twin Lens Reflex for class. It is quite an adjustment, but am learning to appreciate the square frame. I was talking to the class instructor about printing on 8"x10" paper, and I assumed the thing to do would be to fill up the paper, cropping a bit of blank sky from the top or grassy foreground as suited the image. No can do; she is insisting we print the whole image, square, as shot. So I might as well say I prefer square, at least until the end of the semester.

 

[Vaughn]

I let the camera format be an important part of the composition. Never a shortage of images, and it helps make for a consistant portfolio.

My first camera was a Rolleiflex. For the first year or so I cropped to fill either 8x10 or 11x14 paper. Then I realized the beauty of the square, especially for more intimate landscapes, and printed up to 15"x15" (on 16x20 paper). After many years of 4x5 up to 11x14 view cameras, I have been making some 6x6 (Rolleiflex/cord) platinum prints...lots of fun, though I have some 6x10 negs (Brooks Veriwide) waiting to be printed! Working small is very different. I also have many 5x7 negatives to print...another pleasing format.

 

[Ian Grant]

These days I always shoot to the format, when I firts used Mamiya TLRs in the 70's and early 80's I didn't really like the square format. When I went back to TLRs in about 2006 I felt quite different and always use the whole frame.

Ian

 

[LimeyKeith]

I let the scene before me dictate the composition, not the gear. So while I often use square negative cameras, I don't often print square prints. Though sometimes a composition works best as a square, and if it does, that's how it gets printed regardless of the aspect ratio of the negative.

Me too.

 

[R.Gould]

I compose within he frame and all my MF is 66, folders and Tlr's, I like to print full frame, but even if I crop I still crop within the square format,

 

[Billy Axeman]

I already shoot 35mm for many years but literally everything is cropped to square. It is an excellent format for getting attractive compositions and it combines well with B/W. I have done some experiments with camera's that have a native square format (among them a Robot) but that didn't go well because with the 35mm format you have more leeway for shifting the crop around for a good composition (in post-processing).

One minor anomaly is that a square format slightly appears portrait, because humans have a field of view that is wider horizontally than vertically. So, I have toyed with the idea to invent a semi-square format that is slightly wider than high but when viewed it looks perfectly square.

 

[jtk]

For four decades I shot 135, and I rarely felt like any of my images needed a square crop. True, the majority of my 135 shots were transparencies, so cropping was not even an option until I started scanning the images, years later. After switching to digital, I do sometimes crop to 4x5, but almost never square. The 3:2 aspect ratio just seems natural to me, based on my experience. However, I do find myself cropping most of my portrait aspect images to 5x7 for some reason.

I am presently enrolled in a Medium Format Photography class, and I'm using a Mamiya C220 Twin Lens Reflex for class. It is quite an adjustment, but am learning to appreciate the square frame. I was talking to the class instructor about printing on 8"x10" paper, and I assumed the thing to do would be to fill up the paper, cropping a bit of blank sky from the top or grassy foreground as suited the image. No can do; she is insisting we print the whole image, square, as shot. So I might as well say I prefer square, at least until the end of the semester.

I suggest avoiding "fill up the paper" .... use a generous rebate to separate the image from the environment.

 

[runswithsizzers]

Don't you dare crop a square negative!


But seriously. The most interesting aspect of a square camera is that you get a wider perspective vertically so often objects that would get cropped with a normal 35mm lens fit perfectly in a 6x6 normal lens.

Where do these "rules" come from? Compared to the 3:2 aspect of a 35mm (landscape), 5x7 and 4x5 also provide more height, relative to the width. What if the best composition of my objects fits 'perfectly' into one of those rectangles? I think most of us try to find the best angle of view to rearrange the apparent space between objects for the best composition within what ever format we are using. But when the best angle we can get is still not quite right, why not crop, if the result is a better balanced composition?

I can understand why my photography instructor wants us to work within the square format long enough to learn the range of possibilities, to explore the potential of square. Outside of class, I retain my right to crop my images to whatever shape looks best to me, no matter what the hardware.

As a class "homage" assignment, I have been looking at images by Lee Friedlander who works in both square format (Hasselblad Superwide) and 3:2 rectangular (Leica 35mm). His square format book "Sticks & Stones" focuses on the infrastructure of the city as compositional elements, and for that, the square format works very well.

Friedlander's book, "Street, the Human Clay" is also urban, but people are more significant as subjects. For "Street" Friedlander chose the Leica. The 35mm frame works great for showing humans from mid-thigh or waist up, and is wide enough to include some big-city context without dwarfing the human subjects. Had he used the Hasselblad for Street, and kept the same waist-up captures of the humans - there would have been too much distracting city above his subjects' heads. Or he could have got in closer, in which case the humans would fill much more of the width, revealing much less of city to either side. I expect he chose the Leica for convenience more than for composition, but it would have been a very different balance between people and city had he used the Hasselblad.

 

[LeftCoastKid]

For decades Hasselblad advertised that "Square is the prefect format." I firmly believe and practice that.

+1. An obvious convenience for those who make their cropping decisions in the darkroom; for those of us full-frame shooters, an aesthetic challenge to "see square."

 

[runswithsizzers]

I suggest avoiding "fill up the paper" .... use a generous rebate to separate the image from the environment.

Good idea.

We have not got into much detail about printing yet, something I have not done since the early 1970s. When I said fill up the paper, I did not mean borderless, but rather enlargong the image enough to leave an equal size border on all 4 sides of the 8"x10" print vs. the unequal border on two sides that results when printing the square image on 8"x10" paper.

Here is a question for the square community: Where are the square photographic papers?

As a retiree-on-a-fixed-income, I was somewhat shocked by the price of paper. I would love to have the option to print bigger on 9"x9" paper, rather than paying for 8"x10" where my image size is limited to 7.5"x7.5"

A paper size of 9x9 has about the same square-inch size as 8x10. Leaving a 1/4" border on all four edges of 9x9 paper yields an image size of 8.5x8.5, or 72 sq.inches, compared to 56 sq.in. at 7.5x7.5 on 8x10 paper. When printing square on 8"x10" paper, I am paying for 20 square inches of paper more than I need.

 

[Pieter12]

And so it goes.

 

[slackercrurster]

Nothing wrong with full square prints with wide white borders. Common practice.

This lady got me re-interested in squares. While some of her stuff shows up as crops online, she seems to be all about 6 x 6.

http://www.gracielaiturbide.org/en/

 

[slackercrurster]

dupe deleted

 

[Paul Ozzello]

What I'm saying is that a 50mm lens in 35 format gives you far less coverage on the vertical as it does the horizontal. The equivalent 75mm medium format lens gives you the same horizontal angle of view as the 35format lens, but it is far wider vertically. Don't shoot the 6x6 format camera with the intent to crop, try using it to your advantage instead. If you can't see in squares then shoot with a more rectangular format. It all depends on subject matter. I mostly shoot square, but for my arctic landscapes I mostly use a rotating panorama camera as is better suits the subject.


I don't think they sell square paper - you're going to have to crop the paper...

Where do these "rules" come from? Compared to the 3:2 aspect of a 35mm (landscape), 5x7 and 4x5 also provide more height, relative to the width. What if the best composition of my objects fits 'perfectly' into one of those rectangles? I think most of us try to find the best angle of view to rearrange the apparent space between objects for the best composition within what ever format we are using. But when the best angle we can get is still not quite right, why not crop, if the result is a better balanced composition?

I can understand why my photography instructor wants us to work within the square format long enough to learn the range of possibilities, to explore the potential of square. Outside of class, I retain my right to crop my images to whatever shape looks best to me, no matter what the hardware.

As a class "homage" assignment, I have been looking at images by Lee Friedlander who works in both square format (Hasselblad Superwide) and 3:2 rectangular (Leica 35mm). His square format book "Sticks & Stones" focuses on the infrastructure of the city as compositional elements, and for that, the square format works very well.

Friedlander's book, "Street, the Human Clay" is also urban, but people are more significant as subjects. For "Street" Friedlander chose the Leica. The 35mm frame works great for showing humans from mid-thigh or waist up, and is wide enough to include some big-city context without dwarfing the human subjects. Had he used the Hasselblad for Street, and kept the same waist-up captures of the humans - there would have been too much distracting city above his subjects' heads. Or he could have got in closer, in which case the humans would fill much more of the width, revealing much less of city to either side. I expect he chose the Leica for convenience more than for composition, but it would have been a very different balance between people and city had he used the Hasselblad.

 

[FujiLove]

Here is a question for the square community: Where are the square photographic papers?

You can buy Ilford MGIV RC paper in 10 x 10” in the UK. Not sure if any of their other paper is sold in that size though. Even satin RC isn’t available in that size, only the gloss as far as I know.