Large Format Photography

First test shots with my old/new camera – Toyo 45.

It was a long journey till this moment. Since 2007.

I had an idea that one day I will switch from digital to analog and even to work with the big, old style, bellow kind, large format cameras. After slow progression towards the goal, I could say I have arrived to that desired point. I entered into the exiting new photographic field of LF cameras.

There is no point to explain what is so special to work with the old, mechanical cameras, so I won’t.

First test shots were made with Fomapan 200 film sheets, knowing that I will need a bit (haha) of practice until I can actually start doing something valuable.

Ireland is not for the faint hearted, that was my line following this (see below) picture on Facebook (for all of you who are following me on Face).

In Ireland there are no perfect days for getting out on the cliffs and shoot. Every day is as it is, and you need to do your best with it. That day the wind was strong, and the ground was covered with layers of spongy soft grass. There is no way to stick your tripod into something stable. But it was a dry, sunny day and that is almost perfect in Ireland.

I shot 4 sheets and all of them were actually successful. There was some things that was corrected in software after scanning, but all in all not bad. Composition is …well, just for the test. I used a CP filter and that’s it.

I used JOBO 2520 tank for sheet development and I did it by hand. I need to adjust few more things with that. Also, I recently bought MOD54 drying rack and it is OK, simple and functional.

My scanner is a bit of a problem. I have a flatbed scanner Canon 9000F and it doesn’t have a modus to scan a 4×5 sheet negative. Again with a little creativity I managed to do that, but I am losing a few millimetres from the sky and ground edges. And I have some problems with the SilverFast software. If I can bypass Canon and SilverFast it would be perfect.