The title says it all; I have decided to commit to shooting large format for one full year. My decision was made for many reasons, not least of which is a desire to challenge my photography skills, and my philosophy on the medium.

How Did I Make This Decision?

In my Nikon F article, where I wrote about returning to basics, I left one ominous question at the very end that seemed to only serve a purpose as a joke/homage to tv shows from the 1950s that would end on a cliffhanger. “Will James let us exclusively review large format gear?” Tune in next… article.

That joke question began a train of thought. Shortly after that article was released, I descended upon Polacon 2022 in Denton, TX to meet with instant photography experts and try my hand at using the Lomo Graflok with Instax wide on my Toyo Super Graphic. The process, even though it was all instant film based, created a stirring within me; a feeling of excitement mingled with discomfort, a desire to see my photography skills advance beyond any previous expectations.

After the instant film festivities had settled, I decided to buy the first boxes of sheet film that I’d bought in over a year. The film in question – a box of Kodak Plus-X that expired in 1983. This box was purchased from a local seller who’d kept the long-beloved film in the freezer since purchase. The excitement continued to build.

Since black & white is my primary choice, I quickly loaded four sheets of Plus-X into two holders, one sheet for each side of each holder. I packed my Toyo Super Graphic and lenses for a morning hike at Fort Worth Nature Preserve with my colleague Jason King. While at the nature preserve, my excited discomfort returned. Only this time, it was more concentrated and purposeful. I still did not know how to interpret it, all I knew is that I only had four exposures and that I needed to use them carefully.

After hiking and driving around for about three hours, I exposed three of my four sheets; that’s one exposure every hour. I was completely satisfied with this outcome and was overall feeling pretty confident in my ability. However, those of us who shoot film are no stranger to being humbled, especially those of us who shoot large format. Only one of the exposures I made that day was decent ; the other two were cases of what I call, “it looked pretty good on the ground glass.” I soon realized that my groove was something that I desperately needed to get back. Sadly, I was not able to contact Stella for advice.

Reuniting With Gear

For the journey of 365 days of sheet film, I knew I needed a more flexible camera. While my Toyo Super Graphic is a finely made piece of equipment, it possesses more bulk and less movement than some 4×5 bodies, and I knew that I would want more of the latter trait and less of the former. That is why I chose to reunite with a Tachihara field camera.

My very first large format system was a Tachihara and I absolutely loved everything about its movements, build quality, and overall looks; it was a natural choice for me, lighter on the weight, and more abundant in movements. I also cannot overstate just how much I admire the craftsmanship of a Tachihara. For those unfamiliar, Tachihara made all of their field cameras by hand from 400 year old cherry which was aged for a minimum of four years. This is what Tachihara put in their manuals with new cameras; their pride in craftsmanship and quality is greatly appreciated to this very day.

Next, I sold my 300mm f/8 Fujinon lens that I briefly mentioned in my Toyo Super Graphic piece, and purchased a Schneider 120mm f/8, a lens that was originally made to cover 5×7. The major benefit of this wider angle lens on 4×5 is the allowance of certain movements without suffering from vignetting like some other wide angle lenses.

With my kit rounded out, I also purchased a new f.64 backpack made for the large format photographer in mind, complete with two separate pouches strapped to the side that are able to carry five holders each.

Large Format Cameras for sale | eBay

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The Philosophy of Large Photography

That was a lot of gear-talk. Why is the gear important? Different tools for different jobs.  For example, point-and-shoot users want to keep up with the moment and enjoy the convenience of photographing with a compact piece of equipment. SLR users prefer to see what the lens is truly seeing as well as real-time depth of field before the exposure is made. TLR/waist level users want to be discreet and immerse themselves in the three dimensional world of their smaller ground glass. Leica users want the best in build, the unobtrusiveness, and simplicity of a quality rangefinder; which is why they undoubtedly turn to the Lenny Kravitz edition. (Just kidding Leica owners, someone needs to make the friendly ribbing around here.)

With all of these options in gear. there has to be some sort of method to the madness. If you’re like me, and truly desire to explore and grow and change in your photography, then sometimes madness seems to be the only method that makes sense.

From a purely practical standpoint, large format photography is madness. Composing an image can be a minutes-long process, as well as focusing, and if you’re waiting for the light to reach a certain angle, color, or for a scene to be void of any people, then you could possibly be waiting for hours and run the risk of not even making an exposure at all. Why would I or anyone bother with a method this slow?

I like to compare photography with drawing; both require countless hours of practice, both require the decision of color or black and white, both can be done with many media, and both require skills of composition as well as execution of the final image. In short, I equate large format photography to a painter bringing a large canvas to life with oil paints.

First Exposures with the Tachihara

Reuniting with the Tachihara field camera was like reuniting with an old friend. Everything was where it should be; the locks were in the right place, I could adjust the front standard movements while concealed by the dark cloth with minimal fumbling (still getting my groove back). That’s why I decided the best place to test a field camera was where I was for the intro of this article – Dinosaur Valley State Park in Glen Rose, TX.

With Plus-X loaded into some holders and a vision somewhat planned in mind, I soon found myself in the Paluxy River bed composing my first sheet. The 90mm f/5.6 used to expose this sheet was on loan from a large-format colleague. This exposure, in hindsight, is mediocre at best. Although, it is a little more acceptable than the exposure of the tree, which I will include with this article, which features a sizable lens flare that I failed to notice while composing.

Finally, my favorite exposure of the day – the statue of Rex, one of the park’s signature dinosaur sculptures. Fifteen minutes would pass before I clicked the shutter on this exposure due to third and fourth guessing composition. I was quite satisfied with this shot, considering that I setup for compositions at least five to six times that day, but decided to break down the camera and move on when I couldn’t fully commit to exposing a sheet.

Finally, my desire to improve my composing eyes, patience and overall a deeper sense of purpose. Last year, I was in a cycle of making photographs for other people and not myself. I’m positive quite a few of us have experienced this not just in photography but any field where your input is needed in order to create a vision. The last six months have been liberating. Relearning large format has made me relearn why I was fascinated with photography almost a decade ago – tell a story, send an important message or document life all without saying anything.

Closing Thoughts

The biggest takeaway I have after six months seems to be kind of a rhetorical one; have patience and trust the process. This may confuse some and maybe even outright perplex others. However, what it really means is, trust your process. The only one who knows what they want from the exposure is the one operating the camera.

Ansel Adams referred to this as “the mind’s eye.” The key is to apply this Adams’ photographic philosophy to your own photography in order to create a process that only you understand and one that will ultimately help you create your vision and do so in a way where it eventually becomes second nature. I highly encourage everyone who has not exposed a sheet on large format yet to do so. Find a friend with a system that you can borrow, or rent one to test drive before buying.

How I Got Into Large Format Film Photography and How You Can Too

A friend of the site tells us how he got into large format film photography, and lays a path for you to take your first steps, too.

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The Cámara Galletita, or Cracker Cam, is a homemade pinhole camera where the image-forming element is a cracker – yes, the flat, dry baked food, also called ‘biscuit’ in many English-speaking countries. I made it as part of the #CamaraGalletitaChallenge on Instagram – a tribute to Italian artist Paolo Gioli, who made such a camera in the 1980s.

If you’re not familiar with pinhole cameras, here’s a very brief introduction. A pinhole camera forms images not with a lens, but with a tiny hole. It can be fashioned from pretty much any light-tight container. Rays of light enter through the pinhole and form an inverted image inside the camera. That image can then be recorded on light-sensitive film, paper or even a digital sensor.

Crackers have multiple holes, so the Cracker Cam is typically a multi-pinhole camera. Each hole projects a separate image. Depending on the spacing of the holes, the distance from the cracker to the film plane and various other factors, the images may or may not overlap.

Origin of the Cámara Galletita Challenge

I got into pinhole photography two years ago, and since then I’ve made a variety of pinhole cameras from household waste such as cardboard boxes, cake tins and plastic containers for 35mm film.

Most photographers use pinholes created specifically for cameras. For example, I usually cut a piece of aluminum from a soda-can and pierce it with a needle. ‘Good’ pinholes – small, round holes made on a thin substrate – make sharper pictures. Some people even buy precision pinholes drilled with lasers.

Paolo Gioli (1942–2022), an Italian artist and experimental filmmaker, was fascinated by ‘naturally occurring’ pinholes. Gioli made cameras from a variety of objects including buttons, needle-eyes, pepper-shakers and even ant-holes. In the early 1980s, he made the Camera Crackerstenopeica (‘stenopeica’ being the Italian word for pinhole).

[Image sources: Pinhole diagram from Wikimedia Commons, public domain. Still from Laboratorio Gioli (2013), short film by Bruno Di Marino. Pinhole Photography (2008), book by Eric Renner.]

I came to know of Gioli and his work only recently, via Instagram and the Cámara Galletita Challenge. The idea for this challenge originated in 2021, at photography workshops conducted by Sol Mendoza and Daniel Tubio in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

At one of their workshops, Sol and Daniel talked about Paolo Gioli’s experimental creations. In the following class, one of their students – Ana Lourdes Hernández Flores, a multi disciplinary artist from Mexico – presented her own cracker camera and photos inspired by Gioli’s work. Thus, as Sol recounted to me, ‘between experiments and jokes, the idea of the idea of the challenge took form.’

Ana posted her images with the #CamaraGalletitaChallenge hashtag last July. Sol and Daniel planned to publicize the challenge more widely this year, and encourage more people to join in. Unfortunately, Gioli passed away on January 28, so the challenge became a tribute in his memory.

Ana and Daniel’s images

Cámara Galletita is not an individual project but a community effort, so before talking about my own camera, I’d like to show Ana and Daniel’s images which came before (many thanks to them, for letting me share!).

Ana’s camera used Honey Graham crackers with 44 pinholes. The self-portraits were exposed for 45–60 secs (outdoors), and the doll for 93 secs (indoors). The third photo shows her camera made from a box, with a paper negative inside.

Paper negatives are popular with a lot of pinhole photographers, myself included. But a word of explanation may be useful for those who are not familiar with the idea. Enlarging paper, being light-sensitive, can be used like film. It is slow (typically around ISO 3–10), but if you’re using a pinhole camera, speed is probably not a priority anyway. The resulting image is a ‘paper negative’ – light areas appear dark, and vice versa. The paper negative can be contact-printed to get a positive print, or scanned and inverted with software.

Daniel’s image is titled ‘Mate con Bizcochito’ (mate is a tea-like beverage, very popular in Argentina; bizcochito is a salty cracker, frequently eaten with mate, which Daniel used for the pinholes). He made his camera from a cardboard box that came with a 100-feet bulk roll of Ilford HP5 film. The photo was a 15-second exposure in natural light from his studio window (the third photo shows the setup), also using a paper negative.

Making my Cracker Cam

My own Cracker Cam was made from a cardboard box that came in the post. The box is bigger than the 10×10cm paper I planned to use. I generally use smaller containers as they are easier to make lightproof and carry around, but in this case I just used the first box that I could find. In fact it’s a pretty slapdash build in general, because it’s not a camera that I plan to use regularly. I made it mainly for this challenge, and I will recycle it soon.

I painted the inside black with watercolor and a thick brush. On one side, I cut a rectangle for the pinhole. On the opposite side, I pasted a strip of paper as a guideline. When I ‘load’ paper in the darkroom, the strip acts as a reference, helping me align the paper so that it’s roughly centered. I’ve made other pinhole cameras with a paper holder, which is more convenient for repeated use. But with the Cracker Cam, I simply tape the paper to the inner wall.

The ‘focal length’ of my camera (distance from pinhole to paper) is about 8 cm. The box I used is a bit frayed and not very lightproof. So after loading, I wrap it in a red plastic bag, which seems to work well enough (photo paper can’t ‘see’ red light, so red is almost as good as black).

I generally make a proper cardboard shutter, but I didn’t make one for the Cracker Cam. Instead, I manually cover the pinholes with the Nikon lens cap shown in the photo. (Anything can serve as a shutter as long as it blocks light, but I thought it would be amusing to use an actual lens cap.) I remove the cap to make an exposure, and cover it again to end it.

Finally, I had to choose a cracker. We had three varieties at home. The small square cracker (McVitie’s 5-Grain) has rather large holes, which would make for blurry images. The large square one (Britannia NutriChoice) has weird elongated holes – it’s like cracker companies spare no thought at all for pinhole photographers. Anyhow, I went for the round cracker (Britannia Marie Gold) which has small, round holes.

Using my Cracker Cam

I built the camera in about one hour on a Saturday evening. I wanted to test it as soon as possible, so in the absence of daylight, I decided to use flash. Next question: how much exposure would I need? There are various ways to determine the effective aperture of a pinhole, which I’ve described in another article. But for the Cracker Cam, I just decided to use trial-and-error.

I set up the camera and my model, a Japanese doll, in a dimly-lit room (the behind-the-scenes photo was taken next morning, which is why it looks brighter). For illumination, I used a Rollei E15B flash, fired 8 times at close range.

I popped into my darkroom and developed the paper negative immediately (instant feedback, almost like using a digital camera!) The resulting image showed me that the camera was too high and too far, and also that I had underexposed. For my next attempt I repositioned the camera, and fired the flash 17 times. This produced an image I was satisfied with.

The photo of the Buddha figurine was taken the day after, in daylight. I used a 30-second exposure, with a dark cloth serving as a (partial) backdrop.

Final thoughts

If you are intrigued by the Cracker Cam, I would encourage you to try and make one (and to share your images with the #CamaraGalletitaChallenge hashtag). You can think of it as a community activity, a craft project or a science experiment, but it’s also artistically rewarding. Equally or perhaps more importantly, it’s a lot of fun.

The materials for a Cracker Cam can be found in almost any household (you can even bake the cracker yourself). For loading and developing, it’s probably easiest if you have access to a darkroom. But a very basic, makeshift darkroom will do – like a bathroom or closet. Nor do you need bulky, expensive equipment such as enlargers. You don’t even need trays; small paper negatives like mine can be developed in a jug.

Without a darkroom, a Cracker Cam might prove challenging, but you can still try other forms of pinhole photography, both film and digital. If you’re not sure where to start or have questions, just leave a comment and I’ll try my best to answer. Pinhole photography has given me endless enjoyment, so I love to see more people getting into it.

Evidently, pinhole cameras are not designed for sharp, technically perfect images; a Cracker Cam even less so. But as Henry Carroll says in one of his books, there are ‘human qualities that are hard to express through photography if everything is correct.’ The problem, he says, is that ‘cameras are perfectionists.’

For some photographers, such perfection is worth aspiring to. I myself have written reviews of superlative lenses and high-definition films. But not everything is about perfection. Sometimes, on an idle weekend, you want to sit down with some cardboard, scissors and tape. You want to make your own camera – imperfect, inconvenient, yet somehow still functional. At its heart, photography is simple; photography is fun. Sometimes, you want a Cracker Cam.

Want your own Cracker Camera? Go to the Grocery Store

Want a boring regular camera? Find one at F Stop Cameras

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Over the past year Sarah has been focusing on documenting the LGBTQIA+ community through the lens of her 4×5 camera, and I’m so grateful she was willing to take the time out of her day to tell us more about her photography and how her work has changed her life.

Thank you for taking the time to chat with me today! To start off, could you give us a brief introduction to yourself?

I’m Sarah Stellino, and I’m a large format film photographer! I’ve always been fascinated with people and their own personal history and motivations for the things that they want out of life. So, I primarily make portraits. I’m still pretty new to large format, just coming up on a year and a half since I bought my first 4×5 field camera. I primarily use black and white film, and really enjoy taking the process from start to finish by developing my own film and making prints in the darkroom too.

That leads perfectly into my next questions – What got you into film photography and what keeps you shooting it?

Originally, a friend of mine convinced me to take a film photography class in high school. I fell in love with the process, but I was still so young and had a lot of growing to do to find my voice and what interested me photographically (I still do!). I stopped taking photos for many years, but when I fell back into film photography, I felt like I found what had been missing for me in digital for a long time. Film, and large format in particular, forces me to slow down and really think about what I’m looking for in a photo. The workflow really fits my style too – I get exactly the look I want with minimal time spent editing on the computer.

What brought you back into it after so many years away?

I got interested in taking portraits on film again when my grandma gave me her dad’s 35mm camera. Then I went down the rabbit hole and wanted a medium format camera because I was hopelessly in love with my now wife! I bought a Pentax 6×7 and asked if I could take her portraits. [For more on the Pentax 67, see our review here.]

How fun! I love stories of family heirloom cameras. Which 35mm camera was it?

It was the classic Canon AE-1 Program! [For more on the Canon AE-1 Program, see our review here.]

Oh iconic! So you jumped into medium format with a Pentax 67, great choice. What was it that got you into large format?

I never totally fell in love with any camera (35mm or medium format), and I had fallen in love with shallow depth of field. I think I love shallow depth of field because it reminds me of a memory – my brain focuses intently on the main focus and everything else fades away. It was also the beginning of quarantine, and a new creative challenge was the perfect distraction from the state of the world.

I completely understand that. So as you mentioned you shoot a lot of portraiture which I absolutely love, especially your recent series focusing on members of the LGBTQIA+ community. Firstly, how did you get started in portraiture? And secondly how did this series come about?

I think my start in portraiture really just came from taking a lot of different photos and seeing what resonated with me. I think it also stems from my own sentimentality. I want to document the people around me while they are still here – and someday towards the end of my life, I will have the ability to relive all of the moments I’ve had with people who really matter to me. I started documenting the LGBTQIA+ community because I wanted to participate in the amazing work that other queer artists were doing in and around queer identity. I narrowed in even further for my series when I started to think about buying a home with my wife, and feeling a bit nostalgic about living on a farm again. When I lived on a farm previously, I wasn’t totally forward about my identity as a queer person, and I wasn’t sure if I would feel safe and welcome in a rural environment. So I’ve started to interview and make portraits to highlight LGBTQIA+ folks who live in and occupy rural spaces, not only for my own purposes, but also to challenge the assumption that queer people can only thrive in urban areas.

I think that’s very important work you’re doing. What has been the most rewarding experience so far with working on this project?

Without a doubt, the most rewarding experience so far has been meeting and spending time with the folks who have participated. It’s such an incredible thing, every time we go to meet someone. First, agreeing to share some really intimate parts of yourself with a stranger, and to the people who will view their portrait too. Second, every single person is so generous with their time, oftentimes opening their home to us, and sometimes cooking a meal for us too. The actual making of the portrait can feel secondary after the beautiful conversations and connections we make together.

That is absolutely beautiful. How has the LGBTQIA+ community impacted you as an artist or your artistic vision?

I think like a lot of people, I sometimes deal with impostor syndrome, so this project has given me a lot in terms of connecting with the community in my own way. I’ve grown as a photographer at the same time I’ve explored my own identity as a queer person.

As you’ve mentioned in your introduction many of your photos are shot on black and white film. What is your favorite black and white film to use and why do you prefer it over color? Is there something about black and white that speaks to your work more than color?

There is absolutely something that speaks to me with black and white film. I tend to like things that have a timeless feel to them, and to be honest I don’t know that I’ve ever taken a portrait in color that I have been wowed by. Maybe that means I see in black and white, or that I haven’t learned how to incorporate color in a way that speaks to me. I’m not sure I’m interested in learning that at this point! In large format, I almost always use Ilford Delta 100 and push it to 400 ISO. Sometimes I’ll use HP5 as well if I’m in a low light situation, but Delta 100 is my tried and true. I’ve tested a few cheaper Arista films too and have gotten good results! For an important project though, especially when there’s many hours of travel to get there, I want to make sure I’m using a high quality film!

I just shot my first roll of Delta 100 and can definitely understand why you like it so much! Do you also develop your own black and white?

It’s so nice! I do develop my own film. It started out of necessity, since developing and scanning black and white film at a lab costs so much more than color film. But I also like that I can develop and scan it that much faster myself!

It’s a dream isn’t it! So speaking of portraits, I also love the shots you’ve done of your family members. Can you tell us how that journey has been? Did it take them time to get comfortable in front of a camera or have they always been happy to pose for you?

Taking photos of my family members really just started because I needed to try out different cameras, or just to practice in the case of large format! Most often, I’ve taken portraits of my mom or my wife and they are always willing participants! I’m really lucky that way, since I know some people have family members who don’t want their picture taken at all. They really help me through my own process too, since there have been times when I’m just not happy at all with my work and get down on myself. I try to remember that I’m on this journey for the long haul, and it’s not realistic to expect to constantly raise the bar with each portrait I take.

Totally, no one progresses consistently. We all go through ups and downs. So of all the portraits you’ve taken, do you have a favorite and why?

Oof, asking the tough questions!! For personal work with my family, I would say either the portrait of my mom doing the annual maintenance on her plane, or my recent portrait of my wife on our bed in the late afternoon sunlight. I can feel their quiet strength in both of those photos. Beyond that, I couldn’t choose a favorite for my LGBTQIA+ rural portrait series. But I’m really excited about the direction I’m going for all of those!

How has photography changed your life?

I think photography has just encouraged me to explore more. It gives me the space to think more deeply about things I’m interested in, and what truly matters to me.

As we’re winding down here, what’s next on the horizon for you? Any big projects you have lined up?

I don’t have any big projects other than my LGBTQIA+ rural series, but I am working on getting at least a handful of portraits to show at an art festival/competition in September! I’m hoping to, at some point, have the opportunity to get some funding and continue to widen the circle of folks I can feasibly travel to!

So exciting! Can’t wait to hear how the festival goes and keeping fingers crossed on the funding. Before I let you go, is there anything else you’d like to share with us today?

I don’t think so! Thank you so much for asking me to be a part of this, I had a lot of fun chatting with you!

More from Sarah here – Website, Instagram

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[Some of the links in this article will direct users to our affiliates at B&H Photo, Amazon, and eBay. By purchasing anything using these links, Casual Photophile may receive a small commission at no additional charge to you. This helps Casual Photophile produce the content we produce. Many thanks for your support.]

The post The Large Format Film Portraiture of Sarah Stellino appeared first on Casual Photophile.

The level-up scheme exists in all hobby and professions. It says, “Now that you’ve done this, you’ve got to try this.” My first film camera was a Minolta X-700, an underdog darling of the analog community. Since then, I’ve owned approximately 30 35mm cameras. The level-up scheme tells you that while the Minolta X-700 was a great camera and experience, you’ve really got to try a serious camera like the Nikon F2 or a camera with next-level glass like a Contax. These are all things I’ve told myself. More and more, the most immediate next level is into another format. I got to a point where I felt like taking film photography seriously meant moving into large format (LF). 

Famed, fine-art photographers whose work I admire and own (in photobooks) like Richard Misrach and Joel Meyerowitz, in addition to professional landscape photographers I admire like Michael Strickland and Alex Burke, all shoot with large format cameras. The arguments for LF as a format are convincing but what ultimately pushed me was my identification of LF with professional work. It was also an unexplored frontier full of alien techniques. 

I set out to find a 4×5 camera with an affordable price tag — just to get my feet wet. With months of searching eBay and local ads, I found an auction for a Linhof Technika 4×5 camera that I ended up winning for a wicked good deal. Linhof is a high-quality camera manufacturer based in Munich and comparisons between Linhof and Leica are fair in regard to what each maker means for its format. Linhof began its life as a shutter design firm under the helm of Valentin Linhof, who produced the first in-lens shutter. The shutter endeavor ended early as Linhof sold that portion of the business to his partner, Fredrich Deckel, the man eventually responsible for Compur shutters. Linhof is now known for producing technical cameras, which are commonly considered to be cameras with a movable front or rear “standard” (as opposed to the vast majority of full frame and medium format cameras with fixed camera bodies). 

[Interested in getting started with large format photography? Check out our beginner’s guide here.]

A large format camera, at its most basic, is a rear standard to hold both your film and your ground glass for focusing, connected to bellows, connected to a front standard to hold your lens (which has an internal shutter). Focusing glass, bellows, taking glass. Technical cameras allow for movement of the standards for technical purposes, such as photographing architecture without distorting perspectives or altering depth of field for portraiture. Alex Bond has a helpful explanation of various types of movements and what results they produce. 

Linhof’s historical high point is in producing luxury field cameras. As opposed to monorail cameras, which are typically relegated to studio work, field cameras are meant for field photography. They fold up into neat packages for easy transport in, for instance, a backpack. With a monorail camera, the standards are placed together on a single rail, which facilitates extensive movements but also makes the camera unwieldy and heavy. A field camera is more portable at the cost of usually fewer movements, but typically still offers a fair degree of front-standard movements. 

The predominant Linhof line of field cameras are called Technikas — a portmanteau of the German technische kamera. They began with the Technika in 1936 and worked up to the Master Technika in 1972, with models II through V in between, and with some reissues afterward. Super Technika models (from the Technika III onward) incorporate a rangefinder. To make matters more confusing, the Technika III had five versions. In each case, Linhof emphasized their “Linhof Principle: Precision and Ruggedness.” Speaking of their commitment to the Principle, Linhof say in their 70^th anniversary catalog: “The factory’s own tools-design and tools-production department guarantees, through the high precision of their products, utmost exactness in camera production with tolerances of less than 1/100 mm. Many of the necessary gauges, jigs, tools and measuring instruments are made in the work’s own toolmaker shop. They are thoroughly tested before they are used. The temperatures in the workshops of the plant have to be kept on a steady level in order to keep the measuring instruments in proper gauge. The measuring instruments in use are constantly checked as to their exactness.“ 

Linhof’s commitment to their craft is both endearing and inspiring. Many Linhof workers lived in residential communities on the Linhof campus, apprentices trained for 3 1/2 years (though with twice-a-year camping trip allowances — I’m not joking), and employees were all served by a professional kitchen daily. One thing is certain: the Linhof of the mid-century West Germany was a lifestyle. 

Linhof campus.

However, this article is neither intended to be a reproduction of the Linhof annals, nor a replete digest of large format cameras. This article is about why I wanted one, what happened when I got one, and why I no longer have one. 

As I mentioned, to me large format photography represented a logical step forward. My resolution for Casual Photophile’s 2020 New Year’s Resolution piece was to “stop, think, plan.” I told myself (and you all) in that resolution that my 4×5 camera would make me think more seriously about the shots I take because of how contemplative the format was compared to 135 or 120. 

Now, seven months into 2020 (albeit a long seven months) the Linhof is out of my life and I’m not sure when, if ever, large format will return. 

After getting the Linhof, I still needed several more pieces of gear to get shooting. The outfit I bought included the camera, a Super Technika III v. 5, and a standard 150mm lens, the Schneider Kreuznach Xenar which offers a field of view around what a 45mm lens does on 35mm film. What I was missing was film, film holders, something to use as a dark cloth, a loupe for focusing precisely, a long shutter release cable, and a sturdy enough tripod for a heavy camera with slow speeds. Luckily I already owned a dark bag for changing film, so I had that going for me. 

It took me months to acquire the rest of what I felt I needed to comfortably use the camera. I ended up being gifted a beautiful dark cloth made by Wanderer Photo Gear. I found some light tight film holders made by Riteway. I purchased a Soligor spot meter to help ensure that my exposures were spot on. Since then, the meter’s helped me become more adept at guessing EVs correctly.

The camera itself was intoxicating. Not quite mint (or “minty,” as everyone seems to say now), but almost there. Clean black leatherette panels separated by sharp silver lines. The bellows and ground glass hood were impeccable, which is more of an exception than the rule with these old cameras. In looking at the camera, you can tell that Linhof had a sort of pride about the look of their cameras beyond just their function. This is most clear to me in the Art Deco lines that run down either pillar of the front standard. 

I would open the camera and play around with it countless times before I ever shot with it. The learning curve of LF is not remarkably steep, but you can feel it. On top of trying to figure out the exact combination of pushing this button in while holding this lever down to engage a particular movement, the camera mechanics are not as fluid as a new Toyo or Chamonix. The mechanics are willing but the lubrication is weak, or however that saying goes. 

Linhof uses a characteristic red paint to fill in any engravings like the name on the lens and the lightning-arrow on the back that indicates how the back is locked in or released. Then, of course, there’s the somehow over-the-top but also perfect Linhof crest affixed to the lens board. The crest is essentially a reworked version of Bavaria’s coat of arms with “Linhof” in script at the top. 

But beyond the camera’s aesthetic beauty, it also packs a functional punch. The front standard has a respectable host of movements including rise/fall, shift, swing, and back tilt (though no front tilt). Unlike other field cameras, the Super Technika III v. 5 also has the capacity for rear movements by using struts on the back to facilitate off-axis swing and tilt. The camera definitely possesses the traits that many would argue make large format unique and viable. 

The lens, a modest one in the Linhof 4×5 lineup, was immaculately clean with spot-on shutter times. Focus was buttery smooth. Altogether, the thing was perfect. 

So I would take it out, admire it, and then put it on the shelf. This went on for months while I gathered what else I needed and also dealt with the stress of jumping off the film-format deep end. I agonized over how to proceed. For one, I only lucked into the camera and hadn’t really anticipated getting one when I did. But for some reason, once I had it, it took me ages to even get film holders. I could chock this up to being busy finishing my master’s and then experiencing the changes brought on by the pandemic, but I think it was mostly due to my own trepidation. 

I wondered what I would shoot or what I should shoot. If I had my druthers, I would shoot landscapes, but that meant scouting a location and preparing for an outdoor shoot. This led to dismay at the fact that I felt wholly uninspired by the drab New England March, a time and place in which all is grey and brown. I questioned the sturdiness of the very flimsy tripod I used only on occasion with a mirrorless camera. And I stressed about how I would load and unload film without developing the film myself. 

The last point was the driving force behind my and LF’s breakup. I know how to develop my own film and have the equipment to do it, but I had moved on from it because my place was super small and my Epson flatbed produced truly awful scans. The lab I use in Maine is phenomenal and offers amazing scans, but each sheet of 4×5 film costs $10 to develop and scan. This is a more than fair price, but $10 for a single image hurts me more than $10 for 16 6×4.5 images or 36 35mm images. I toyed with the idea of just biting the bullet and going back to developing black and white myself, but the idea didn’t excite me. On top of this (and this is going to seem stupid) I didn’t have a good way to send out just a few sheets of film at a time. I had a single box full of film and no empty box to move exposed film to for mailing to the lab. I checked eBay for some empty boxes but that itself turned up empty. 

These may sound like excuses. People in my position manage to shoot LF. I accept that, but my difficulty overcoming these hurdles only speaks to my underlying lack of commitment. However, all was not lost as I began to explore alternative ways to use my camera. 

Come April, I had finally assembled a good gear lineup with an old Gitzo tripod being the final piece of the puzzle. Feeling buying boxes of 4×5 sheets would be a poor investment, I investigated what other options I had. I settled on two less than ideal setups but ones that might allow me to have my cake and eat it too (or at least some of it). 

The first compromise was shooting 120 film with the Linhof.  There were a handful of roll film backs made for 4×5 cameras. Some, like the Super Rollex made by Linhof, require the photographer to remove the normal back (with the ground glass) and install the roll film back entirely. This essentially forces the photographer to focus using the rangefinder, unless the photographer wants to install and uninstall the ground glass with each shot. Some other adapters, however, function as inserts, very similar to the way a 4×5 sheet film holder does. For these adapters, the photographer simply slides the adapter in between the glass and camera (as the film holder would), removes the dark slide, and shoots. This way the photographer can focus using the ground glass, quickly insert the adapter to capture a frame, and then get back to focusing and composing using the glass. 

The version I purchased was called the Calumet C2. The C2 was designed for 220 film, but functions just fine with 120 film and only requires the photographer to roll past the “frames” missing from a 120 film roll. The best part is that the C2 produces 6×7 (in cm) frames. Though still approximately 25% of the size of a 4×5 sheet, I had no other camera that could produce that size (though, obviously, 6×6 is almost the same). Moreover, the ratios of a 6×7 frame and a 4×5 frame are extremely similar given the actual dimensions. 

So this was my first solution: shoot 120 film with my large format camera. Clearly counterintuitive, but it jumped many of the hurdles. For one, it was much cheaper. I could produce ten 6×7 frames for roughly the cost of one 4×5 frame. Second, it also solved my storage issue by allowing me to shoot a whole roll and then mailing it out as I would any other roll of 120. But most importantly, it allowed me to shoot with slightly less anxiety over the cost of each photo I was taking. It overcame these hurdles while preserving many of the upsides associated with LF, such as slower photography and unique camera movements. 

The other compromise I discovered shouldn’t really be thought of as a compromise. To make shooting LF faster and allow photographers to carry more film with them, Fujifilm introduced a technology called QuickLoad. The system is ingenious, but has sadly been discontinued. Essentially, rather than 10 or 20 sheets of film being loaded together in a classic, three part, light tight box, QuickLoad sheets came each packaged in their own light tight envelope. When ready to shoot, the envelope gets inserted into a proprietary QuickLoad holder at which point the film sheet is left to be exposed while the envelope hangs out outside the holder. After shooting, the envelope gets put back into the holder and is resealed with a crimped metal clamp. The advantages are that loading can be done in daylight and that a photographer needs only to carry a single holder and as many envelopes as they like, rather than multiple 4×5 holders loaded with film. 

I thought that the QuickLoad system would be a fair compromise in allowing me to shoot 4×5 sheets but also ensure that I could mail out a sheet or two at a time for processing. It turned out exactly as I had hoped and I was only disappointed by the fact that Fuji discontinued QuickLoad back in 2009, and that the state of the aftermarket stock was dire. Moreover, as it turned out, the film I had was poorly stored and so the colors were all sorts of shifty. 

Even so, with the advent of these more financially and logistically accessible methods, I finally felt ready to take the camera out — six months after buying it.  

I’m torn here in thinking about how to describe my own experience shooting with the camera. One instinct is to describe the experience romantically. To explain how ushering yourself under the dark cloth is like an escape from your environs to see them from some critical, artistic distance. To tell you about the magic of composing an image upside-down and mirrored on your ground glass and how using the loupe to focus on a tiny zone of your image is somehow transporting. To say that the process of opening your lens, composing, focusing, closing your lens, setting your aperture, and finally tripping the shutter is meditative in the best ways. To verify that yes, front-standard rise helped reproduce the image I’d had in my mind’s eye, an image that I could never create without those movements. 

My other instinct is to embarrassingly say that I just felt frustrated by those very things that make up the routine of shooting a technical view camera. Rather than being tinged with pixie dust, as maybe I had hoped, the routine was nothing more than rigmarole that stood in the way between me and making a photograph. I know that some of these feelings arose from my newness to the format and my relative lack of inspiration. 

Maybe a few months from that point and several outings with the Linhof later, and maybe me standing on some inspiring precipice or vista overlooking the landscape I imagined capturing with this thing, I’d be happier. I can’t know for sure. But I can say that nothing felt magic for me like the other times I’ve stumbled my way onto a new outcrop, like the first time I ever shot with a film camera or my first time shooting with a TLR. 

I sold the Linhof to a young photographer who in a few weeks has already produced better images with it than I ever did during my six months with the Linhof. I used the money to purchase my first Hasselblad, a 501c. Since then, I’ve finished multiple rolls with the Hasselblad and turned out some of my favorite images, including portraits of my best friend on his wedding day. 

The truth is that while I felt that taking photography seriously meant shooting large format, it didn’t mean that. Taking photography seriously, for me, means producing photographs with a camera that gets out of the way. For me, these cameras are 35mm and modern 120 machines, often ones with an accurate internal light meter and AEL. 

Various writers have written a few articles on this site about the idea that not everyone needs a Leica, and that we don’t need a giant collection of gear to be happy, and generally about GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome), but my conflict with large format was not exactly a conflict of wanting new gear or feeling that a certain name-brand would validate me. It was, instead, the erroneous belief that the next step in my life as a photographer was a step into a new, more “professional” format. It’s almost a truism among photographers that the format or the gear doesn’t need to stand in the way of a great photograph. Richard Misrach shot the cover of the 18^th issue of Musée Magazine with an iPhone. And many of Joel Meyerowitz’s most celebrated photographs were shot with a 35mm camera on the streets of New York City. 

Even writing this, there’s a part of me that’s bracing for backlash. For the comments that will urge me to give LF another a try, or the ones that will claim my not being enamored of LF are due to some inevitable failure of my own. I know it’s not exactly commonplace to talk negatively about medium or large format and it’s potentially even more damning to reveal my disposition toward at-home developing. 

At the end of the day though, what I want to do is feel like the camera is an extension of my own eyes. When I’m shooting with my Konica Hexar RF or my Pentax 645N, I feel like I’m gliding over water. With the Hasselblad, I’m swimming. But the Linhof felt like treading water and getting tired real fast. That’s not the feeling I want when I’m photographing. 

Get your own Linhof Technika on eBay here

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[Some of the links in this article will direct users to our affiliates at B&H Photo, Amazon, and eBay. By purchasing anything using these links, Casual Photophile may receive a small commission at no additional charge to you. This helps Casual Photophile produce the content we produce. Many thanks for your support.]

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In a conversation last week amongst the crew, one of our lot posed the question: What are your favorite cameras made outside of Germany or Japan? It had us thinking. Is it an interesting question? Sure. Is it worthy of an entire article? Probably not, in normal times. But we’re doing our best to keep you stimulated. And maybe you’ve never thought about this? 

Take a poll among photographers and camera nerds asking them to list their top five cameras, and it’s likely that the lists would be completely dominated by cameras from Germany and Japan. All it takes is a quick mental accounting of camera manufacturers to underscore the outsized role these two nations have played in the industry. Minolta, Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Ricoh, Leica, Zeiss, Rollei – these are big names that prove the capitals of the photographic world have long resided in places like Wetzlar, Tokyo, Jena, Osaka, and Dresden.

But there have been camera producers elsewhere in the world, and many of them have been responsible for some truly excellent and interesting products. Today we take a look at five of our favorites.

Give it some thought and tell us yours in the comments.

Polaroid SX-70

The opening sequence of Wim Wenders’ Alice in the Cities, finds its protagonist traveling through America on assignment to write an article describing the country to Germans back home. Eventually he shows up at the magazine’s New York office with only a pile of Polaroids taken with his SX-70. The editor’s shocked that there aren’t any words accompanying the shoebox of instant images. 

Anyone who’s taken a Polaroid understands the writer’s dilemma: There’s something uniquely indescribable about an instant photograph, and within instant photography, no brand is more iconic than Polaroid. In fact, outside of Kodak, no other company came close to defining the American photography industry. 

No Polaroid camera is as iconic as the SX-70 folding SLR. Polaroid produced a nearly endless number of instant cameras, almost all completely plastic and automatic. The SX-70 is a different beast, at once more elegant and svelte than any of the company’s other cameras. James’ article on the SX-70 captures the romance and nostalgia the camera exudes.

There is nothing cheap feeling about this camera, made from metal, leather, and glass. The care and dedication that Edwin Land put into its creation shows in its design and functionality. It could take instant photos faster than anything else on the market, and once the photographer was finished, he or she could fold the camera and fit it into a jacket pocket. Unlike the plastic lenses typical to most Polaroid cameras, the SX-70’s four-element 116mm f/8 lens was all glass and engineered to be a big cut above every other instant camera lens. It was also an SLR camera, with a newly engineered mirror system, as well as a new auto-exposure system and creative flash control. 

That the engineers at Polaroid were able to fit all of this groundbreaking work into the SX-70 made the camera a revelation in its day. It really was a modern marvel. But in translating Land’s vision for the camera, they also succeeded in creating a masterpiece of unmatched industrial design and technical capability, all without losing the spontaneity and magic that makes the instant image such a magical experience.

Hasselblad 500cm

Swedish companies have proven a number of universal truths: that Volvos will run forever if allowed to; Ikea Kallax shelves are the best shelving for a record collection; Spotify has continued proving that customers will always sacrifice quality for convenience. While the jury is still out on the case of Italian vs. Swedish meatballs, there’s no question that Sweden has a deserved reputation for dependable and innovative product design. For a while, this extended into the camera industry.

Hasselblad’s reputation for quality is so widely accepted that it’s more of a maxim than it is a myth. The Hasselblad has been the epitome of high quality in medium format photography for more than seventy years. How many other cameras are of such a high calibre that they’ve snapped photos on celestial bodies other than Earth?

Born from one Swede’s desire to take better pictures of flowers, the Hasselblad V series is a modular camera system designed to take different lenses, film backs, and other accessories. Each component of the camera can be removed and swapped with something else, and this versatility made the series popular with pro photographers. Other manufacturers took note and the modular system became the gold standard for medium format professionals who enjoyed the ability to switch lenses and film stocks on a whim, both in the studio and on location, even if the location is on the surface of the moon. While other modular systems, like Mamiya’s RB67, caught on in popularity, none could match the prestige of Hasselblad’s system. 

Of all the variants in the series, the 500cm was most ubiquitous, being produced from 1970 to 1994. As Aaron explained in his article on the V series, the M in the name indicated the ability of the end user to modify the camera, instead of requiring a technician. With the 500cm, photographers could easily swap focusing screens based on need. The twenty-four-year production run is enough to speak to the camera’s quality, but it also means that the used market for the camera can be treacherous. Like that IKEA futon you had in college, these cameras were workhorses, and treated as such. 

Alpa 10D

Choosing a camera from Switzerland may seem like cheating, as it’s in the DACH countries (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) that make up the German-speaking world, but ask any German or Swiss and they will assure you that they are not the same people. To get a feel for the distinctive Swiss industries, just take a walk through Geneva, where nearly every business is either a bank, a watch retailer or a cheese and chocolate specialist. The Swiss concept linking all of those is a penchant for specialized, high-end products.

Specialized and high-end are perfect descriptors of Swiss camera manufacturer Alpa. It could be argued that Alpa makes cameras so niche that only a handful of camera nerds even know the brand exists. (We do and have written about them.) In a manner that would even make Leica fans blush, today’s Alpa describes its cameras as “precision tools, made with passion and skilled craftsmanship for a small group of connoisseurs.” The 10D was one of Alpa’s final cameras made in Switzerland before the company started outsourcing production to Chinon.

Alpa cameras are all mechanical, made with generous amounts of metal and accented dollops of brass, including a small rectangle where the owner could engrave their initials. In his review of the 10D, James highlighted some of the camera’s quirky design features, including a reversed film advance lever, three-cell metering system and unique rewind system. He likened it to a forty-year-old sports car, an apt analogy when you consider the bespoke lens mount that only allows for some of the world’s most incredible glass. In spite of its quirks, the 10D is a straightforward machine, a camera that emphasizes necessity over convenience. 

It’s a basic camera with a spec sheet not dissimilar to a Pentax K1000, but it’s made so brilliantly and with such care for detail that the two cameras seem to live in different universes. And in a sense, the Alpa does stand apart from everything else: it’s an expensive, deliberate machine, made to order by people with a love of proper industrial design and not bound by the demands of accountants or the market. In that sense, it’s a wonderful camera, and a wonderfully Swiss creation.

Kiev 60

Each of the previous cameras have shared the common thread of being uniquely well designed and constructed. The fourth camera on this list takes things in a different direction – a more eastern direction. It really would be irresponsible to not have Russian, or Soviet rather, representation on a list like this. Names like Zenit, Zorki, Kiev, and others released dozens of cameras that today are incredibly cheap and usable. While their quality control doesn’t quite match up with names like Hasselblad and Alpa, Soviet cameras are still relevant today, and even gave birth to modern brands like Lomography.

When the Kiev brand (it’s not really a company per se) moved into medium format cameras, its first entry, the Kiev 88, was a forgery clone of the Hasselblad 1600 F. The likeness was so identical that it was nicknamed the “Hasselbladski.” Even more unfortunate was the 88’s reputation for low quality and its unique lens mount that didn’t allow for using other lenses like the superb-by-comparison offerings from Carl Zeiss Jena. The next camera, the Kiev 60, was a completely different approach, an SLR instead of a modular system, modeled loosely off of the East German Pentacon Six and including that camera’s C-mount. The 60 also holds up much better today than the 88, especially as a budget-friendly entry point for medium format photography.

The Kiev shares many of the characteristics typical to cameras made in the U.S.S.R. It’s a massive rectangle, weighs heavy on the scales thanks to its metal construction, is basically designed to be cheaply repaired, and looked twenty years old on the day it was released in 1984. These aren’t necessarily bad traits. The camera’s simplicity of design and abundance make it extremely affordable and easy to replace. It looked dated when it was released, but it doesn’t really look any older thirty-six years later. It came with an 80mm f/2.8 Arsenal Volna-3 lens, prone to flaring but completely without distortion, and also allowed for shooting the entire gamut of lenses made for the Type-C mount.

Medium format cameras rarely come covered with bells and whistles like a 19th century field marshal. They’re often just light-tight boxes that only allow for the changing of shutter speeds and maybe the setting of a timer. They are typically geared toward professionals, or at least those capable of doing in their mind what other cameras do with circuitry. In the end, it’s all about that fat and juicy 120 negative in the back of the camera and the epic glass that sits on the front. And in that sense, the Kiev 60 fits the bill. You can create stunning images with this camera. What’s even better is that it can be bought for pennies on the dollar compared with its contemporaries made in Germany and Japan.  

Intrepid 4×5 Mark 4

Now for another left turn. The final entry on the list is both the newest camera, and the one using the biggest, most expensive film of the five. No one has yet created a digital sensor that matches the resolution and quality of a large format negative. But with great format size comes a greater price tag, and the cost per frame of 4×5 and 8×10 film is exponentially higher than smaller formats. Then add the expense of the camera and the lenses with all the accoutrements and the price gets even steeper. So for many of us, myself included, large format photography remains our version of the mashed potato mountain from Close Encounters. Something we can’t get out of our head, but can’t seem to fully realize. 

But the Intrepid company has achieved something of a modern miracle by creating a series of cameras that are relatively cheap and portable, two words seldom associated with large format photography. Based in England, Intrepid is currently on the fourth version of their 4×5 and second version of their 8×10 field cameras. The cameras are made from birch plywood, rust- and oxidation-proof aluminum, 3D-printed plastic derived from plant starch, with bellows made from nylon with a special lightproof interior casing. The choice of materials makes the cameras extremely light compared to other field cameras (the 4×5 weighs 2.6 pounds, the 8×10 5.5 pounds) and the design puts a priority on portability. The price is also refreshingly low for a newly made field camera. The 4×5 Mark 4 costs 280 pounds, or $350 and the 8×10 Mark 2 costs 480 pounds, or $598. The comparatively low cost also comes with the knowledge that a real, existing company is available for support. 

Getting into large format photography can be an overwhelming idea. It’s not just the negative that’s bigger, it’s the potential, the demand for precision and the fact that each shot costs bills and not coins. Everything is slightly different and the process is much slower. By offering an affordable and portable camera, Intrepid gives photographers an easier entry point into what can be an incredibly rewarding photographic experience.

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His most recent work, entitled “An Empty Valley” explores the people and history of the region near the city of Carrara in the Apuan Alps famous for its rock quarries. The project explores these quarries and the people that use them to make a living. “On one side this tough nature hardly allows space for man-made constructions,” he says about the region. “Yet on the other side it lets quarriers reach its very heart with their apparently unnatural lengthwise cuts.”

Even though the region is heavily impacted by the quarries, it remains a diverse place. “One may also find a shepherd writing poetry, or a quarrier with a university degree; and even meet a hunter who prefers using his legs for trekking to using his rifle for killing, or a sculptor considering his solitude an opportunity,” Moni says.

We wanted to bring you Ettore’s work, and share some of his thoughts with you. He was gracious enough to give us some time. Here’s that conversation.

Who are you, where do you come from and where are you now?

Hi, my name is Ettore Moni. I am Italian and I live in Parma, Emilia-Romagna, located in the northern part of the country.

How and when did you first become interested in photography?

Photography started to enter my life following the death of my father when I was twelve years old. I came into possession of a Pentax and everything started from that point on.

What were the biggest challenges you faced when starting as a photographer?

I think the biggest challenge when you start is to understand your way, and this only happens with living life and being interested in everything.

What about photography do you find most interesting or meaningful?

There are photographs that are interesting but they don’t strike you, they don’t show you anything new, they don’t open up new visions or ideas. There are others that instead strike you, and from there you see things in other ways. Photography can change you.

How did you get yourself through that phase?

I went through the period shooting everything and everyone with a 35mm camera. I had no idea what I was doing, I was just shooting. I was not interested in anything specific, I was shooting just to remember what I saw.

What are some of your current projects?

My latest project has been a research on contemporary churches in northern Italy.  It was due to come out this April but has been postponed until September because of the Covid-19 crisis. It will be released in September along with a book featuring seventy images. I have other projects in mind and that I wanted to start this summer but unfortunately everything is at a standstill at the moment. I prefer not to talk about it in detail, but they will always be projects on the territory and Italy.

What are some of the biggest challenges you face with your work?

Sometimes, especially here in Italy, there can be difficulty having authorization to photograph and letting people understand what you are doing. In some locations there is very little photographic culture and many times people are afraid that your photographs will be used for purposes that are not purely artistic.

What photo are you most proud of and what was the process in creating it?

The photos all have their own story and I am fond of them all. Perhaps the one I like most is the photo of the interior of a quarry in my project “An Empty Valley.”  Shooting it was a unique experience that changed my perception of quarryman and the work that they do. I came away from the experience with friendships. In order to do it, however, it was necessary to spend months in the quarries and become friends with everyone. This was a great life experience and the photo itself was only a moment of a long period lived on the site.

If you had to introduce someone to photography using one photographer as an example, who would you choose?

I would use more than one, I don’t think there is a single photographer capable of having all the right keys, but surely I would start with the well-known names of American photography without forgetting Germany, etc.

What photographers are you currently following?

Years ago I would have said Alec Soth and Joel Sternfield. But now it’s more difficult. I collect photo books and follow everything that inspires me and somehow opens up new visions for me, including the work of Geert Goiris, Yann Gross, Pablo Cabado and Felipe Russo.

What equipment do you most enjoy using? Does your choice of camera impact the way in which you work? (Camera, film, lenses, etc.)

I only work in the 4×5 and 8×10 formats, and of course on tripods. I use an Italian 4×5 camera that was handbuilt in Tuscany and an 8×10 Chamonix, and I also own a Toyo.

What are the biggest challenges photographers face in 2020?

For analog photography, speed is always a huge challenge, especially with large format photography. But I think this type of photography makes up for the lack of speed with quality and the study of the subject. 

See more of Ettore’s work on his website and Instagram.

If you are or know of a photographer you’d like us to interview, please reach out via email to contact@fstopcameras.com. 

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