Cameras and Formats

I have been in the business for nearly two decades now and have never regretted my original choice in cameras. I have from the beginning and still use the Mamiya 645 for literally everything that I do. Now my 645’s are not the newer ones but the old ones like the M645 and the 645–1000S. They of course have not been made in years but have modern counterparts like the one shown above. I have three bodies and two prism finders with an assortment of 120 and 220 film inserts.

Some people bash the 645 format which is 2 1/4” by 1 5/8”. They say it's a bad format. I totally disagree and have never understood why they feel this way. The format is rectangular like most of the prints we sell. To me the complaint about the 645 format not being proportional to print sizes just don’t hold up. While 4 X 5, 8 X10 and 16 X 20 are all the same proportions, the other common sizes are not the same. In addition, most images will be placed on cropping cards prior to being printed at a lab and if not, then all the better. The photographer who fails to leave a little extra space around his or her subject is not planning very far ahead. I always crop a little loose in the camera and have been very glad I did on many occasions.

My feelings on the larger format of 2 1/4” by 2 3/4” are fairly simple. It’s a bigger format. It gives you a larger area of negative to work with. If you sell mostly 50 by 90’s I might feel inclined to recommend it. For me, prints much smaller than that don’t justify the huge physical size of the camera to haul around. It is certainly a fine format to use but can you justify the doubling of your film and processing expenses? The 645 gives you 15 exposures per roll of 120 film. The 6 X 7 format gives you about 10. I really love the fifteen shot sitting on a single roll of film. I have less money invested in a sitting and I can show them up to fifteen images. I have made many 30 X 40’s over the years as well as 40 X 60’s. They all looked extremely good. I expose my film properly, focus the camera carefully as we should all do on every exposure and the results speak for themselves. Don’t even give a thought about grain concerns with the films we have today. It’s just not an issue anymore. We run our own lab and regularly have trouble using our grain focusing device. We just can’t find the grain. We have to go hunting for hairs or something bigger that we can use to focus on! Today's film is superb.

For those who voice a concern about sharpness differences between the two formats I say rubbish! You can enlarge even a tiny 35mm negative to some very large sizes provided you focused properly and your lenses are not bargain basement junkets. The 645 format has no issues in the area of focus that are not caused by the photographer. The larger format is not one bit better if you fail to focus well. Here is a classic case where the person rather than the hardware is again the most important contributing factor.

Next we have the old square format. This format is a favorite of wedding photographers because they don’t have to rotate the camera on a frame to switch from vertical to horizontal. This is certainly a benefit. You will use more film than with a 645 format camera. My thinking on why the square format is not a good choice relates to the making of images. Unless you plan to sell only square images to all of your portrait customers you will have to crop your images so that they will work as a rectangle. The problem with this is that you must always remember to compose with a rectangle in mind. If you don’t and you fill the viewfinder with the subject you will be forced to sell square prints or crop into something that may be very important such as a person!

The truth is that any format can be learned and used well. I know tons of fine photographers who use square format cameras with no apparent problems. It is just not a format that I could feel comfortable with.

What about 35mm cameras? Well that could be a long subject. The truth is that you can do great work with any format. The limitations with smaller film will drive most professionally oriented portrait photographers toward a larger negative eventually. You can indeed make large prints from well focused and exposed 35mm negatives with great success. When you use a small negative however certain things will from time to time crop up that you may find difficult to deal with. As you enlarge a small negative you will spread the focus out over a larger area. If you have not focused critically, it will be apparent in even small enlargements. There is no substitute for good focusing. Even on a large format camera, if you don’t focus properly you will have soft images. It will just be more apparent in smaller images with a smaller negative. Another problem with smaller negatives is that any dust that remains on the negative when enlarged will be enlarged more heavily. This will require far more dust spot removal after the print has been made. This alone is a major headache especially if you are the one doing the spotting! With the larger negatives the dust is not enlarged nearly as much and many spots are so small as to not require spotting at all.

I will not get into specific brands of cameras other than what I have already mentioned. To bash other brands is pointless because virtually all major camera makers produce equipment that works quite well. I do however caution against selecting a brand that generates huge expenditure on lenses and accessories. My Mamiya equipment could be purchased two or three times for the equivalent in another brand. Would my images be better if I used the more expensive brand? Certainly not. The equipment simply records the photographs that the photographer creates. The differences in lens quality is simply not significant. It is I who created the images and controlled the lighting, posing, color, composition and all of the other factors that make up the total look and impact of what the camera recorded. Today's cameras and lenses are very good and I see far too much time being spent arguing over lens sharpness from one brand to another. The differences are so minuscule that any serious discussion of the subject is to me almost laughable.

I am reminded of a situation a number of years ago when I submitted a commercial image of a clock into contest. It was judged by a panel of commercial photographers who were all masters of photography. The print was scored 100. It was the first time, that score had been given in the history of the southwest. Later that evening the judges got together and asked to have their photograph made with me and my print. During the following minutes of conversation there were a number of questions asked about the image. The one that sticks in my mind the most was the one where I was asked what format the image was made on. They wanted to know if it was shot on 4 X 5 film or 8 X 10 film. I felt sort of funny giving an answer because they were not expecting me to say medium format. They were very surprised when I revealed further that it was not even on 6 X 7 format but rather 645. They were very surprised to learn about the equipment used and resigned to the fact that it is again the photographer and not the hardware that creates the image. I explained that I am very mindful of having my image in proper focus and probably spend more time focusing than many people. Correct exposure is also a contributing factor as to the look and quality of an image. All things work in harmony to create an image of quality. Fail in any of these areas and you will have diminishment.

If you would like to visit the Mamiya web site, you may do so at:
www.Mamiya.com

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