Many years ago a
fellow that owed me some money decided to give me a 4X5 camera to pay his debt.
Reluctantly I took it because I knew I would never get the cash. He handed me a
big black box with a 4X5 Orbit camera, a Schneider 135mm Xenar lens and a
couple of worn out 4X5 film holders. I had no idea what to do with the camera.
I didn’t know how to use it, how make the lens work and… I had no concept of
what I needed to make a photograph with this funny looking contraption.
I was photographing
with a Pentax 35mm camera and I thought that someday I could make an image as
good as Adams or Weston with it. Little did I know! The 4X5 camera stayed in my
garage for a year or so. I began to understand that bigger might be better. I bought
a book or two concerning large format photography and threw them on the shelf
for reference. One day I was looking for something in my junk filled garage and
found the camera. I decided to find out how I might use it.
A trip to the photo
store was an enlightening experience. I found I needed a tripod to hold the
camera, 4X5 film, a cable release, dark cloth, light meter and all the rest of
the stuff. Someone told me I would have to develop my own black and white film
if I expected to get a negative to make a photo. Knowing that I would have to
make some kind of a darkroom I decided to put the camera and the new trinkets
that might make it work back into the garage until I could figure out what a
darkroom was. Some reading proved to me that I was in for a big challenge. As
the months passed I was able to acquire enough equipment to have a basic
darkroom. My garage became the “room of almost darkness” with the help of huge
sheets of heavy black plastic and duct tape.
I was ready now to
make the perfect image I thought. I still didn’t know how to use the camera but
I figured I could fake my way through it somehow. Then the storm arrived. I woke up one winter morning and a
gift from “the big guy in the sky” awaited me. The mountains and valleys east
of Santa Barbara were covered with a blanket of snow, beautiful clouds danced
above and I have never seen such magnificent light since then. Needless to say
the 4X5 camera came out and I went to work as best I could. I set the camera on
the tripod. I pointed it in the general direction of what I thought would make
a good photo. “God, this is hard work. No one told me that the image is
backwards and upside down and the ground glass keeps fogging up under this
stupid black cloth. What are all these knobs for on this damn thing”?
The darkroom was
intimidating. Never before having developed 4X5 film, I could only do the job
at hand from information I dragged out of a couple of large format
photographers I knew. Everything seemed to be a big secret in those days. I
developed the negatives in a tray using HC110, dilution B with +X-PAN film, a
stop bath with way too much acid in it and a hardening fix. Of course I diluted
all the mixtures with tap water. Santa Barbara water has among other things,
rocks in it.
I was very, very
lucky. My negatives looked pretty
darn good, or at least I thought they did. I believe that the developer I used
was correct for the occasion. Everything else I did was awful. The negatives
are filthy with spots and scratches…wonder why. Nothing can get rid of the
defects.
I was hooked. I
never went back to the small camera except for candid shooting. Large format
was the place for me and I had a lot to learn. I took up 5X7, 8X10 and even
14X17 formats. There simply is nothing like a large format contact print…
nothing.
With a lot of work
I can make a good silver image from the negative. I must admit that turning the
negative into a digital file and correcting the spots, scratches and pinholes
makes the job easier. It still isn’t a silver image however.
Beginners’ luck…
you bet and I’m still making images with film and the “big guns”. It’s the
process ya know.
by: Chuck Farmer
Larry wanted more photos from Point Lobos in honor of Weston. Heart Rock is from Point Lobos taken at the world famous Chuck Farmer workshop. The heart rock is no longer there--possibly returned to the ocean depths--probably snatched by some romantic for their garden. I did not bring heart rock to Lobos in my camera bag. It is too heavy and would have crushed my photo leaf bag.
Taos, New Mexico
Helen Levitt died on Sunday at 95. John Szarkowski once said, “At the peak of Helen’s form, there was no one better.” National Public Radio's Melissa Block interviewed Levitt in 2002. The New York Times has a lengthy obituary today.
"Trick-or-Treators" -- Helen Levitt
The New York Times will publish tomorrow (March 29, 2009) an article about Edward Weston titled Point Lobos, Where Edward Weston Saw the World Anew. On the web-site version, the Times has an audio slide show in which Kim Weston talks about his grandfather's work, and a slide show about Point Lobos and Weston's cabin on Wildcat Hill. This is definitely worth reading and watching. Thanks to Ben Hopson for pointing the article out to me.
Below: a few of my own versions of Point Lobos -- definitely not Weston's -- and (at the end of the post) the only other Point Lobos photographer who can compare with Weston.
Now here's a challenge: I know many of you who read this blog have your own Point Lobos images, so why not upload a few that you like?
Taken in the Alabama Hills during a Charles P. Farmer Photography Workshop.
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