Quote:
Originally Posted by benb
I actually think what he is doing is one of the cases where it actually does still make sense. That is still a unique area of film, and digital either costs as much as a nice pickup truck or a starter house in that arena or still has major issues, and the view camera itself is still something most digital systems are not doing well.
But what I can't understand is why he is going to all that huge effort and then not developing the large format film himself like Ansel Adams, etc.. actually did back in the day. Sending it out for processing seems to defeat much of the point if you're going to such a huge effort and cost and then be dependent on someone else to do a critical step correctly.
The way those old masters fiddled with their development outside the manufacturer parameters and then did selective burning/dodging on individual prints completely in the analog realm was a large part of the magic. (Also the low magnification aspect). He is also just selling them all as inkjet prints also making his final work a lot less unique. I love the fine art way of calling fancier inkjets Giclee.. there have been some funny rants about that.
More power to him if he can make a living doing this. The whole thing is weird though, and more about personality and sales than anything. To me at least it feels like almost everything about landscape photography has become trite, we've seen it all a million times and tons of photographers have taken the same images to the point they become meaningless, and so few of them have conservation messages or a point to their photography like they did in the past.
This whole thread is just total Deja Vu of 20 years ago. It's amazing it plays out like this here in 2024.
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"digital either costs as much as a nice pickup truck or a starter house"
Not really.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produ...um_format.html Of course, you'll need a few lenses which will get you close or over 10,000, but, still, just in film and processing savings alone.
"But what I can't understand is why he is going to all that huge effort and then not developing the large format film himself like Ansel Adams, etc.. actually did back in the day."
He's shooting color. Ansel only processed BxW in his darkroom. Color transparency processing is a whole different beast, and, I'm guessing, the most cost efficient way to do it on your own is to, basically, open your own lab as a side gig to both pay for it and keep the machine running smoothly, because, the more film running through it, the more stable it becomes.
It's also quite dangerous. I hand processed E3 in the 70s, not for long, fortunately. There's a stage at the end that uses formaldehyde. And you breath it. Yup, funeral parlor stuff.