is there any advantage to large format aside from resolution?

[unityofsaints]

I'm surprised no one mentioned contact printing yet

 

[David A. Goldfarb]

Certainly, contact printing and using handcoated processes with original camera negatives are attractions.

Also in can be interesting to use historic lenses--especially soft focus and portrait lenses--with formats they were designed for.

 

[TheFlyingCamera]

Large format images have a unique look all their own, and that is a major part of why people want to use it, in addition to all the previously mentioned reasons - nearly infinite variety of lenses that are all cross-platform compatible, ability to control perspective and depth-of-field (one of the things you can do through movements is to shift the plane of focus so you don't have to stop the lens down to f64 in order to get your entire subject in focus), ability to custom process each negative individually, contact printing rather than enlarging (contact prints will be sharper than any enlargement of the same negative because there is no lens getting in the way, so no optical distortions).

 

[Alan Gales]

There is nothing like composing your image on a huge 8x10 ground glass.

Of course the 11X14 and 16x20 people will disagree and wonder why I shoot such a small camera.

 

[John51]

I only did a couple of weddings, reluctantly under pressure from family members, the cheapskates.

If I had to do one again, I'd prefer a 6x6 to a 6x7. There's enough to worry about without fussing around with camera orientation.

One wedding photog I knew back then used to take the 'bride getting ready' shot a few days in advance using a 4x5. The actual wedding he shot with a Rolleiflex.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

I made several attends with LF by 4x5 cameras. Huge, slow and cheap. Press cameras and metal view Calumet. Huge enlarger, while paper I could afford is 8x10. Not worth of the effort after I printed from 4x5 at 8x10. Yes, some difference, but hustle is huge.

My next attend is going to be with 8x10, DiY and paper as negative or positive, if still available. Tripod only, no shutter but lens cap. As something completely different from 135 film rangefinders, which are my main and favorite.

 

[palewin]

Vaughn had the right answer a bunch of posts back: the camera is a tool, it all depends what you want to do with it. While I use 35mm, 120, and 4x5 cameras, my "true love" is my 4x5. But that is largely because I enjoy the process of working with it, and then the tactile enjoyment of working with the large negatives in the darkroom. While it is probably heresy to say it, in terms of print quality, my 120 negatives are pretty darn close to my 4x5s, at least up to the 11x14 size I print, and the Rollei 6006 (my 120 camera) is much easier to carry around and faster to use (hand held) than my 4x5. I used to shoot quite a few weddings and bar/bat mitzvahs with the Rollei, and couldn't imagine doing them with the 4x5. The view camera does give me perspective control, but if that was the only requirement, I could either use tilt lenses on a digital camera, or (yet more heresy) scan my negatives on my Epson 4990, and then do perspective corrections in Photoshop. All of this is a way of saying that while I enjoy working with LF more than my other formats, it is driven more by the way I enjoy working, and less by "unique qualities" attributable to LF versus other formats. (Last comment: if you look at the LargeFormatPhotographyForum where I am more active than here, many of us use hybrid workflows (starting by scanning negatives) and many who do alternate process printing still make their enlarged negatives digitally. Anything I am proud of I print the old-fashioned way in my darkroom, but the hybrid workflow approach really allows you alternative ways to do almost anything that used to be possible only with a view camera.)

 

[Black Dog]

Also there is nothing like looking at a 4 x5 or 8x10 negative on light box and being able to look at it real close.

I love 8 x10 for that tactile feel.

I second that-contact prints from large format just have that real wow factor. I remember seeing Edward Weston prints for the first time in 1989 and being just blown away by them.

 

[MattKing]

If you have a beard and grey hair, you need a large format camera to complete the ensemble.

You may find that working with large format appeals to you. If so, that is an inherent advantage that cannot be easily duplicated with other formats.

 

[cliveh]

Very little depth of field.

 

[Jim Jones]

Form follows function in little cameras. Wood and brass cameras can be beautiful. Beautiful tools are special to work with.

 

[Gerald C Koch]

If you have a beard and grey hair, you need a large format camera to complete the ensemble.

You may find that working with large format appeals to you. If so, that is an inherent advantage that cannot be easily duplicated with other formats.

... and often quote Zen koans.

For those that shoot 35mm it is de rigueur to wear shorts and loud Hawaiian print shirts with a small camera around the neck. The "flatland touristers" garb in the old Barney Google/Snuffy Smith cartoon strip.

 

[mshchem]

Very little depth of field.

YES! The bigger the "SENSOR" the longer the focal length of the lens which gives you an incredible tool , you decide what is in sharp focus and what should just be a blur. You can do this with a 35mm format but you need a 85mm f1.4 lens and really fast shutter speed. This can be hard to do with film.
These iPhone type photos are horrible you see garbage in te background totally inadequate.
Mike

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

YES! The bigger the "SENSOR" the longer the focal length of the lens which gives you an incredible tool , you decide what is in sharp focus and what should just be a blur. You can do this with a 35mm format but you need a 85mm f1.4 lens and really fast shutter speed. This can be hard to do with film.
These iPhone type photos are horrible you see garbage in te background totally inadequate.
Mike

Que?
From this comment it appears you have not heard of, nor observed the use of, perspective control lenses in 35mm. Examples are Canon's 24, 45 and 90mm TS-E lenses and latterly, Nikon's — among other third-party manufacturers. These lenses work excellently on film or digital and either means is not better than the other — just different. All of these specialist lenses provide rise, fall (alternatively, 'shift' up, down) and swing (or 'tilt') and rotational tilt, in movements in isolated or parallel application that have a greater effect in smaller increments than the equivalent bigger movements of large format. Note that PC lenses also provide for the adjustment of focus 'pegs' and the extension or limitation of depth of field at any aperture. Their use and application is limited only to the photographer's imagination really. They are an extremely useful introduction for photographers moving up to large format. That's all a bit more useful than a bog standard 85mm portrait lens...

 

[middleWave]

Yes, if a customer needs a large format color transparency, it is easier using a large format camera rather than a small or medium format camera.

yeah i got in over my head quickly there. made the silly mistake of thinking the mamiya 6 was large format. so the real question is actually whether it's worthy to go from 35mm to MF. i can tell from all these replies that LF is way beyond my interest at the moment, but thanks for all the info.

 

[Greg Heath]

You can probably get a decent monorail 4x5 with a normal lens and film holders for far less than the price of a single tilt-shift lens for any current DSLR system. I generally shoot 35mm now, but I had a Cambo SCX for a while and was only a few hundred in. Furthermore, when I sold it, I lost exactly one dollar.

The Cambo is Heavy as heck.

 

[Poisson Du Jour]

The Cambo is Heavy as heck.

And what LF does not have weight?? For example, supposin' you're high-falutin' and successful (read: cashed up!) and can make the equipment pay for itself in image sales ... a Linhof Master Technika Classic (a pearler for $10,000 odd...) and say 3 lenses to cover just about every landscape/scenic need will weigh you down a bit over 4+kg (this is what my mentor used in the 1980s-1990s!). Add 4-5 film holders and the weight goes up still more. Some of the Walker Camera LF jewels can cut down weight with polycarbonate and titanium, but for that you also pay a price premium, ditto the plush Ebony SV-series. Little by little, bit by bit, the weight of a LF system most definitely goes up proportionately to what you add to it. There was a member here a few years ago who joined my walking group with a truly ginormous Tachihara 8x10. Plonked incongruously stream-side in a dark and dank rainforest, it was so pretty (and big...) that the wind dropped and the rushing stream paused in silence for a quick gawk. Honourable mention to the 20kg studio tripod that also came along as a comfy perch for the beast.

"Heavy as heck"?? You were saying...?

Here's another pic of that Tachihara sticking its snout at an innocent little rainforest fungi...

 

[Greg Heath]

Ok point made. For me the Cambo SCX was too heavy and gangly to manage outside of a studio or unless I wanted to put it on a wheeled cart. There are lighter 4x5 cameras available. Carrying an 8x10 into the field might be worth it as the negatives are amazing. I'd still use a wheeled cart for that.

 

[David Brown]

Why large format?

Larger negative, more detail, wider tonal scale, contact printing; and judging from watching several friends, a certain amount of masochism.

 

[PeterB]

wider tonal scale,

Can somebody help me understand if the improvement in tonal scale means more exposure latitude, or instead smoother transitions between the grey scales with the same absolute tonal range.

 

[wiltw]

Can somebody help me understand if the improvement in tonal scale means more exposure latitude, or instead smoother transitions between the grey scales with the same absolute tonal range.

Smoother tonal gradations. Think of grain as a whole matrix of black dots of varying size...the more black dots, the more gradations of tone perceived.

Consider a given area of the subject filling 1 sqmm on 135 vs. 4 sqmm on 4x5. Using the same film in both, I have 16X as many film grains to portray the same subject area. So my tonal gradations changing across the subject area can be both 'more gradations' and also 'smoother' in transition between tones

 

[darkroommike]

Just for clarification when OP posts about large format he's really speaking about roll film medium format. For me (and a lot of others) large format is sheet film and a press, technical or view camera. Your wedding photographer, using his DSLR as a meter, sounds to me like he has just started dipping his toe into medium format or he'd be using a hand held meter, the Mamiya 6 (new, not the folder from the 1940's) has a pretty good meter so I'm not sure what his shtick was. It's a pretty slick camera and I wish Mamiya hadn't replaced it with the Mamiya 7 (OK, I just don't like 6x7).

 

[BMbikerider]

Then what seems to be the less than obvious reply and the one I would have posted first was almost completely invisible grain. Or completly invisable if you use something like PanF or TMax100. If it was for colour neg, then fabulous colour with terrific tones and saturation.

 

[wiltw]

Then what seems to be the less than obvious reply and the one I would have posted first was almost completely invisible grain. Or completly invisable if you use something like PanF or TMax100. If it was for colour neg, then fabulous colour with terrific tones and saturation.

Post 10, bullet 1

 

[Ai Print]

yeah i got in over my head quickly there. made the silly mistake of thinking the mamiya 6 was large format. so the real question is actually whether it's worthy to go from 35mm to MF. i can tell from all these replies that LF is way beyond my interest at the moment, but thanks for all the info.

I have big professional systems in 35mm, medium format and 4x5 including the ability to process and print them to high standards. Without question, my best imagery and most productive use of time and money is satisfied by medium format.

Large format is great but medium format is by far my favorite.