When I first started out in Tampa in 1965, this was my portrait camera an 8x10 NEGATIVE size camera. It was modified so the largest film I used was five by seven inch negative or four by five film. I also could adapt the five by seven sheet so that you could take two exposures per sheet of film. We hand developed all the film, as I recall, we could develop sixteen sheets of film at a time and this had to be in TOTAL darkness. That made you really think about each step in the process, you did nothing without thinking about what you were doing. Then when you had the client make the selection, I made 5x7 “proofs” for them to see. On the brides, I would make 8x10 “proofs” and for awhile, I picked out the best pose and made a 16x20 inch proof. Man, I just don’t know where I had the time to do this. This just goes to prove the statement ”I ain’t as young as I used ta was”.
Using this camera was a real chore when it came to photographing children as they move so fast and the area of being in focus was so critical, that many times I would have to reset the camera several times before being able to take an exposure. This camera did not have a little thing to look thru like your little home camera now has, you looked thru the camera just like when Ansel Adams or Yousef Karsh looked thru their view camera. It was a royal pain you know where.
When the Hasselblad camera came into the scene, this camera gradually lost its usefullness but I thought you might like to see what studio photography was like when I first started out. I did not use this on candid weddings!
When I moved into the West Shore studio, I did not have a place to display this camera so a friend of mine wanted the camera and he refinished the whole camera and proudly has it in his home and has told many people about the history of the camera. Very nostalgic.
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