What do you do with a 4x5 Sinar-P?

Take a picture of it with your i-phone!

I was at a professional photography school the other day, watching
students (early 20’s) interact with a view camera. These students will
be doing virtually all of their work in digital, but the school still
insists on some fundamentals, including a course in view camera
proficiency. I watched a course where the students had their first
hands-on contact with the beast. They had a couple of 4x5 Sinar Pll’s
and a "to die for" cabinet full of lenses there! All of the students
were taking pictures of the view cameras with their i-phones, and of
each other behind it. They certainly felt it all looked very funny,
maybe even classy in a way. In using the camera they were intrigued by
the movements, and were experimenting trying to get the wildest
geometric distortions possible form extreme movements. They way they
handled the lenses showed they had none of the reverence those of us
here would have for all that beautiful glass. They didn’t have a lot of
lighting set up for the subjects they were shooting, and they were
dumbfounded when their instructor explained that, taking reciprocity
failure into account, they would need two minutes of exposure time. They
found that wildly funny!

There is a touch of sadness in all this, but then they are right not to
cling reverently to things of the past. And a few students in that
school actually do see the value in it, as witnessed by a few graduate
projects using large-format film.

"VOR-DME" wrote in message ...


Take a picture of it with your i-phone!

I was at a professional photography school the other day, watching
students (early 20’s) interact with a view camera. These students will
be doing virtually all of their work in digital, but the school still
insists on some fundamentals, including a course in view camera
proficiency. I watched a course where the students had their first
hands-on contact with the beast. They had a couple of 4x5 Sinar Pll’s
and a "to die for" cabinet full of lenses there! All of the students
were taking pictures of the view cameras with their i-phones, and of
each other behind it. They certainly felt it all looked very funny,
maybe even classy in a way. In using the camera they were intrigued by
the movements, and were experimenting trying to get the wildest
geometric distortions possible form extreme movements. They way they
handled the lenses showed they had none of the reverence those of us
here would have for all that beautiful glass. They didn’t have a lot of
lighting set up for the subjects they were shooting, and they were
dumbfounded when their instructor explained that, taking reciprocity
failure into account, they would need two minutes of exposure time. They
found that wildly funny!

There is a touch of sadness in all this, but then they are right not to
cling reverently to things of the past. And a few students in that
school actually do see the value in it, as witnessed by a few graduate
projects using large-format film.

*****
The simplest challenge to those students is with their phone cameras to take
an image of the top half a tall building, a tree, or even a pole at a
minimum distance - where the top of the image just includes the top of the
subject - without the subject "leaning" backward in the resultant picture.
A more difficult one is with the camera pointing vertically straight down to
take a picture of a baseball about a foot or so below the camera and six
inches or so from the vertical axis of the camera lens without making the
ball's image appear as an oval.

The one I like is to take an image of the receding line formed where the
vertical wall meets the carpet on the floor. The camera is placed close to
the floor horizontally several inches or so from the vertical wall, pointing
down that line. Everything along that receding line in the image front to
back is tack sharp. But everything a few inches above that line along the
vertical wall and a few inches to the side of that line along the floor is
increasingly blurred the further away from that line.

The issue is not one of clinging to "things of the past"; rather it is one
of today in the here and now being able to obtain desired results. Yes,
those phone cameras are adequate most of the time. But there are instances
where any - repeat, any - camera with fixed lens and imaging plane will fail
to yield the desired results.

In article ,
says...


*****
The simplest challenge to those students is with their phone cameras to take
an image of the top half a tall building, a tree, or even a pole at a
minimum distance - where the top of the image just includes the top of the
subject - without the subject "leaning" backward in the resultant picture.
A more difficult one is with the camera pointing vertically straight down to
take a picture of a baseball about a foot or so below the camera and six
inches or so from the vertical axis of the camera lens without making the
ball's image appear as an oval.

The one I like is to take an image of the receding line formed where the
vertical wall meets the carpet on the floor. The camera is placed close to
the floor horizontally several inches or so from the vertical wall, pointing
down that line. Everything along that receding line in the image front to
back is tack sharp. But everything a few inches above that line along the
vertical wall and a few inches to the side of that line along the floor is
increasingly blurred the further away from that line.

The issue is not one of clinging to "things of the past"; rather it is one
of today in the here and now being able to obtain desired results. Yes,
those phone cameras are adequate most of the time. But there are instances
where any - repeat, any - camera with fixed lens and imaging plane will fail
to yield the desired results.


Cameras with tiny sensors have essentially infinite depth of field, and
converging verticals are perfectly corrected in Photoshop CS4 and later. They
can do both much better than we can do with a view camera. They can't match
the quality, but that's not an issue in a world where 99.999% of all images
are viewed on internet or e-mail.

"VOR-DME" wrote in message ...

In article ,

says...


*****
The simplest challenge to those students is with their phone cameras to
take
an image of the top half a tall building, a tree, or even a pole at a
minimum distance - where the top of the image just includes the top of the
subject - without the subject "leaning" backward in the resultant picture.
A more difficult one is with the camera pointing vertically straight down
to
take a picture of a baseball about a foot or so below the camera and six
inches or so from the vertical axis of the camera lens without making the
ball's image appear as an oval.

The one I like is to take an image of the receding line formed where the
vertical wall meets the carpet on the floor. The camera is placed close
to
the floor horizontally several inches or so from the vertical wall,
pointing
down that line. Everything along that receding line in the image front to
back is tack sharp. But everything a few inches above that line along the
vertical wall and a few inches to the side of that line along the floor is
increasingly blurred the further away from that line.

The issue is not one of clinging to "things of the past"; rather it is one
of today in the here and now being able to obtain desired results. Yes,
those phone cameras are adequate most of the time. But there are instances
where any - repeat, any - camera with fixed lens and imaging plane will
fail
to yield the desired results.


Cameras with tiny sensors have essentially infinite depth of field, and
converging verticals are perfectly corrected in Photoshop CS4 and later.
They
can do both much better than we can do with a view camera. They can't match
the quality, but that's not an issue in a world where 99.999% of all images
are viewed on internet or e-mail.

***

[chuckle] The issue is that which one can do with the camera itself, not
what one can do with the image after it has been taken. Even in the silver
film world, post camera image manipulations were possible. See, for
example, the work of Jerry Uelsmann. So elucidate, please, how with the
phone camera one can create each of the three images discussed....not with
after image manipulation, but with in camera operation. I for one would be
particularly interested in how that third image - the one of a tack sharp
receding line with everything away from the line increasingly blurred the
further from that line - is created with a phone camera.

In article ,
says...


[chuckle] The issue is that which one can do with the camera itself, not
what one can do with the image after it has been taken. Even in the silver
film world, post camera image manipulations were possible. See, for
example, the work of Jerry Uelsmann. So elucidate, please, how with the
phone camera one can create each of the three images discussed....not with
after image manipulation, but with in camera operation. I for one would be
particularly interested in how that third image - the one of a tack sharp
receding line with everything away from the line increasingly blurred the
further from that line - is created with a phone camera.



The people with phone cameras don’t want or need to make that image. It would
not occur to them. They would find it ugly because "things are blurry". The
aesthetic considerations we apply often have their origin in the performance
possibilities and limitations of our equipment, as with all media. We learn
to compose with depth of field initially because early failures teach us it
is a performance limitation we have to overcome. Of course these photography
students will not be doing their main work with phone cameras, but mostly
with DSLR’s, and it is worth noting that after many years of digital cameras
with small image sensors and large depth of field, photographers began to
clamor for full 24x36mm chips so they could obtain some depth in their
compositions.

"VOR-DME" wrote in message ...

In article ,
says...


[chuckle] The issue is that which one can do with the camera itself, not
what one can do with the image after it has been taken. Even in the silver
film world, post camera image manipulations were possible. See, for
example, the work of Jerry Uelsmann. So elucidate, please, how with the
phone camera one can create each of the three images discussed....not with
after image manipulation, but with in camera operation. I for one would be
particularly interested in how that third image - the one of a tack sharp
receding line with everything away from the line increasingly blurred the
further from that line - is created with a phone camera.


The people with phone cameras don’t want or need to make that image. It
would
not occur to them. They would find it ugly because "things are blurry". The
aesthetic considerations we apply often have their origin in the performance
possibilities and limitations of our equipment, as with all media. We learn
to compose with depth of field initially because early failures teach us it
is a performance limitation we have to overcome. Of course these photography
students will not be doing their main work with phone cameras, but mostly
with DSLR’s, and it is worth noting that after many years of digital cameras
with small image sensors and large depth of field, photographers began to
clamor for full 24x36mm chips so they could obtain some depth in their
compositions.
******

tsk, tsk, tsk...quit, please, with the non sequiturs. The issue at hand is
the creation of said images with those camera phones. The issue is not the
want or the need by people to make such images. It is not whether those
images would occur to those owners of camera phones. It definitely is not
whether those people find them ugly. The issue - the creation of said
images - is in the nature of a rather standard assignment, I would think, as
per the "professional photography school" class referenced.

Now, once again....

"So elucidate, please, how with the phone camera one can create each of the
three images discussed....not with after image manipulation, but with in
camera operation. I for one would be particularly interested in how that
third image - the one of a tack sharp receding line with everything away
from the line increasingly blurred the further from that line - is created
with a phone camera."

On 1/17/2011 12:49 AM, Lawrence T. Akutagawa wrote:



"So elucidate, please, how with the phone camera one can create each of the three images
discussed....not with after image manipulation, but with in camera operation. I for one would be
particularly interested in how that third image - the one of a tack sharp receding line with
everything away from the line increasingly blurred the further from that line - is created with a
phone camera."





Easy!

1) Lots of light

2) A view camera with suitable lens

3) Adjust view camera per instructions above

4) Photograph ground glass screen of view camera with phone camera

Doug

In article ,
says...


tsk, tsk, tsk...quit, please, with the non sequiturs. The issue at hand is
the creation of said images with those camera phones. The issue is not the
want or the need by people to make such images. It is not whether those
images would occur to those owners of camera phones. It definitely is not
whether those people find them ugly. The issue - the creation of said
images - is in the nature of a rather standard assignment, I would think, as
per the "professional photography school" class referenced.

Now, once again....

"So elucidate, please, how with the phone camera one can create each of the
three images discussed....not with after image manipulation, but with in
camera operation. I for one would be particularly interested in how that
third image - the one of a tack sharp receding line with everything away
from the line increasingly blurred the further from that line - is created
with a phone camera."



Somehow we’re really not having the same conversation here. You say, "The
issue at hand is the creation of said images with those camera phones," but I
do not understand why you feel that is the issue at hand. I started the thread
with a humoristic account of students taking pictures of a view camera with
their i-phones, and went on to muse about their first impressions of what they
must consider to be a monstrous old beast. I would certainly not want to be
the one to try to explain to these students that the view camera does things
they cannot do with their digital cameras, because to me that premise is
clearly false. All of the exercises you mentioned are easily accomplished in
software today, and that is simply the way things are done. These students
will use a number of formats throughout their degree training, ranging from
cell-phone cameras to large-format film, but all of them will spend more time
behind a computer screen than they spend behind any type of camera or "capture
device". I am not going to go into a didactic on Photoshop technique (you ask
me to elucidate), but the depth of field exercise you describe is easily
accomplished, and with far greater control than we have doing it in the view
camera. I’m not going to say what their bokeh looks like, but I really do not
understand your insistence on the fact that the desired result must be created
in the camera, and not in post production. That’s just not the way it is any
more.

By the way, I am familiar with the work of Jerry N Uelsmann, and was really
quite taken with his technical wizardry back when those images were new. I
wonder what those students in the photo school today would think of that work.

In article ,

says...


tsk, tsk, tsk...quit, please, with the non sequiturs.



As an aside, it is interesting to note that, in art, depth of field of focus
really came into being with photography, and not as a creative opportunity,
but as a technical constraint. Of course the eye is a lens like that of a
camera, with a diaphragm as well, and as such obeys the same principles of
sharp focus as do camera lenses, but it has a very rapid autofocus feature.
Obviously if we look at something near, more distant objects fall
progressively out of focus, but we don’t really see them, because we are not
looking at them. As soon as we look at them, they snap into focus. If you look
at classical painting, pre-photography, you will find very limited and
infrequent use of out-of-focus depth clues. Depth was established through
geometry, perspective, lighting, color and contrast, and yes through a
lessening of detail, but not through a progressive degradation of sharp focus,
which painters did not seem to feel looked natural. In photography, we are
forced to compose with depth of field, because we cannot completely master it,
and the larger the magnification becomes, the worse it gets. With advanced
mechanical systems, using Scheimpflug we have some control over the placement
of the plane of sharp focus, but that is only a partial solution. Since we
have been unable to perfect photography, our perception has changed to
accommodate it, and everyone today has learned to "read" the depth clues in
the out-of-focus areas of a photograph. Since the advent of photography,
"depth of field" effects have found their way into modern painting, but their
use is anecdotal even today, limited to "photo-realistic" paintings, end even
these often use deep-focus far greater than what we would be able to achieve
in photography, as viewers feel this added sharpness adds realism.

What I am getting at is that there is no intrinsic reason why photo students
today should spend time learning your depth of field study, as this would
simply be studying a defect of a prior imaging system, and not an element of
intrinsic pictorial interest. They may as well do studies in reproducing
grain. If they have a capture system which allows them to record everything in
focus, they may as well use it and add depth of field effects, in addition to
other (better?) techniques, inherited from classical painting, within their
computer programs to establish depth cues.

"VOR-DME" wrote in message ...


In article ,

says...


tsk, tsk, tsk...quit, please, with the non sequiturs.

As an aside, it is interesting to note that, in art, depth of field of focus
really came into being with photography, and not as a creative opportunity,
but as a technical constraint. Of course the eye is a lens like that of a
camera, with a diaphragm as well, and as such obeys the same principles of
sharp focus as do camera lenses, but it has a very rapid autofocus feature.
Obviously if we look at something near, more distant objects fall
progressively out of focus, but we don’t really see them, because we are not
looking at them. As soon as we look at them, they snap into focus. If you
look
at classical painting, pre-photography, you will find very limited and
infrequent use of out-of-focus depth clues. Depth was established through
geometry, perspective, lighting, color and contrast, and yes through a
lessening of detail, but not through a progressive degradation of sharp
focus,
which painters did not seem to feel looked natural. In photography, we are
forced to compose with depth of field, because we cannot completely master
it,
and the larger the magnification becomes, the worse it gets. With advanced
mechanical systems, using Scheimpflug we have some control over the
placement
of the plane of sharp focus, but that is only a partial solution. Since we
have been unable to perfect photography, our perception has changed to
accommodate it, and everyone today has learned to "read" the depth clues in
the out-of-focus areas of a photograph. Since the advent of photography,
"depth of field" effects have found their way into modern painting, but
their
use is anecdotal even today, limited to "photo-realistic" paintings, end
even
these often use deep-focus far greater than what we would be able to achieve
in photography, as viewers feel this added sharpness adds realism.

What I am getting at is that there is no intrinsic reason why photo students
today should spend time learning your depth of field study, as this would
simply be studying a defect of a prior imaging system, and not an element of
intrinsic pictorial interest. They may as well do studies in reproducing
grain. If they have a capture system which allows them to record everything
in
focus, they may as well use it and add depth of field effects, in addition
to
other (better?) techniques, inherited from classical painting, within their
computer programs to establish depth cues.

****

You clearly have not fired at rifle on the kd range, have you?