Palm Desert, CA
I do feel we have lost a lot of the thought process in picture making since shooting large format film gave way to digital.
The issues of shooting with a 10/8” makes little sense in today’s digital world when a camera a fraction of the size and weight can shoot a 100MP file. But what we make up for in portability and ease of use, we loose in the thought process that came with a camera the size of a portable television. Film costs aside, a large format camera made you think about every step of composition, focus and exposure. Add to this shooting in low light and you had a photography session of considerable effort to get a well exposed sharp image. But it was because of the difficulties of large format that if you were in any doubt, you just wouldn’t shoot. This idea can be compared to an Uzi Machine Gun verses a match-point Target Rifle; The Uzi is like any digital camera set on automatic allowing for the Spray and Pray method of shooting. The Target Rifle, is like a view camera with one precise shot. Both will do the job, but one takes a lot more skill and thought than the other.
I think the mistake a lot of photographers make is that they think Large format photography will make them see things differently, or better, but this simply isn’t true. It will however make one think more about the end result and if the image is actually worth shooting in the first place. The biggest drawback with digital is that the image, or images, start off as being worthless and therefore totally disposable. On the other hand, a single exposed-film-frame has immediate value.
