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  #1  
Old 25th July 2014, 05:49 PM
gsingh gsingh is offline
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Default 35mm and photo size

I'm planning on taking a lot of portraight shots on 35mm film using a 50mm prime lens. Hopefully I can put these photos in an album. The only thing is I'm concerned about the photo sizes.

I have doing some reading but I can't really find the answers to what I am looking for. Basically I don't know yet exactly how big or small I want the photo's but I do know I want the photo's in a square shape. Standard size photos are either 6x4 or 7x5 which is ok in terms of size but the shape is rectangular.

The best example I can give is school photos. When a school photo of one person is taken the size can be very small or very large however the shape is always constant i.e. a square shape. This is the shape I am wanting to get because I prefer square shape photo's to make it look like studio shots.

Is this possible? If so would it be a problem shooting on 35mm? Would the image have to be chopped up or stretched?

Any replies would be much appreciated.
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Old 25th July 2014, 06:28 PM
JohnX JohnX is offline
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You'll just have to crop the 35mm oblong, to square.
You'll be cropping content from an already small format, 20% reduction and then you'll be enlarging whats left, doesn't sound ideal.
Take care to compose your shots for square.

I can't help thinking you'd be better off with 6x6 tbh
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Old 25th July 2014, 06:33 PM
Mike O'Pray Mike O'Pray is offline
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If you want 6x6 for instance then with a 35mm neg the total image size will have to be 6x9 and you then just crop the image to 6x6. Unless the portrait literally fills the 35mm neg completely then you should have enough space around it to crop without cutting out any of the person

You'll need 6x8 sheets of course or even bigger if you want a full 6x6 inch image and a border.

Play around with image projection and an easel with an inches scale until you like what you see.

These days square paper is nearly impossible to obtain so there will always be waste.

Mike
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Old 25th July 2014, 06:46 PM
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Argentum Argentum is offline
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35mm is fine for cropping to square IF you can hold the camera still enough to get very sharp images.

I mean even in landscape orientation you have 24mm of neg height. Thats an inch (near as damn it). So an 8 X manification will give you 8x8 inch print. AT 8 X magnification you should be able to get high quality if your technique, materials and processing are good. And most 5-7 element 35mm enlarger lenses are optimised for around that size magnification.
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Old 25th July 2014, 09:20 PM
gsingh gsingh is offline
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Oh dear. I didn't think it would be this difficult. I remember we had some family portraight shots done back in 2003 at a professional studio and they were using a digital camera. When the photo's came back my dad had all kinds of different sizes such as square size and even poster size. That was over 10 years ago so I thought the photo sizes would be flexible on 35mm as the sensor on the digital camera they would have used must have been a lot smaller.

My school photo's back in the early 90's must have been from film cameras so maybe they did use medium format cameras afterall. I honestly thought they would have just used 35mm.

It looks like I might have to go back to the drawing board on this one and see what photo size would be ideal without cropping.
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Old 25th July 2014, 09:50 PM
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Why? Cropping is done all the time by virtually everyone except a few nerds who try to insist the photo must be full frame without any cropping.

There are no rules and besides, rules are meant to be broken.

Suppose your portrait (note spelling) is of a family group sitting in chairs. Suddenly you want landscape format and not square. And then your next portrait is a full height of someone standing. Suddenly you want vertical orientation.

Trying to be fomulaic invariably causes you a headache. Just go with the flow, think about which format the subject best suits and crop in camera so that when you come to print you can crop neg to desired format. i.e. engage brain at the taking stage.
Nobody said that all you need to do is point and shoot and magic will happen, good photography requires a good deal of brain input before you trip the shutter.
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Old 25th July 2014, 10:05 PM
JohnX JohnX is offline
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I don't think I made myself entirely clear, by 6x6 I mean 120 film, not a final print size of 6x6.
The point I was trying to make is there is a lot more wiggle room enlarging and cropping a medium format frame than 35mm, and if you shoot the thing square in the first place (6x6), enlarging/cropping/grain are hardly an issue.

Even now after all these years of internets, I forget that lots of peeps do not shoot 120, I ought to keep my neb out of 35mm threads...lol

Anyway, I guess small enlargements may well be fine from a cropped 35mm, but as mentioned above there are things you need to consider to ensure you get a good print.
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Old 25th July 2014, 10:14 PM
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skellum skellum is offline
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Hey, gsingh-
are you shooting colour or black and white?
Are you printing yourself??
What are you aiming to end up with- big prints, little prints, some kind of web use???
Tell us more and we'll give you some choices.

For example, if your shooting colour and using a lab- use Ektar 100, get dev and scan. Crop the files yourself on your computer and then get prints.

OR- B&W, home processed. Shoot FP4, crop at the enlarger stage.

Tell us what you want to end up with and we'll try to get you there.
Cheers!

ps- I know you're new to film. If you want, PM me an address and I'll send you a couple prints made from 120 film, then you'll see what people are talking about.

Last edited by skellum; 25th July 2014 at 10:18 PM.
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Old 25th July 2014, 11:13 PM
alexmuir alexmuir is offline
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With 6x4 the biggest square is 4x4, and with 7x5 it is 5x5. Either size is fine for an album. Take your shots on 35mm, but plan to cut down the prints to a square shape. I'm thinking you want head and shoulders type images? That should be fine, but don't get too close with the 50mm. Take the shots with the camera in the vertical position ie with the long side of the frame vertical. Have the heads nearer the top of your frame. When you get your prints back, all you have to do is cut a section off the bottom part of the image to make a square. Some sort of paper cutter, rather than scissors, would be best, but scissors would work if that is what you have. Many people here develop and print their own pictures which allows far more control. If you are using commercial processing, there is nothing wrong with cutting the final print to suit your needs.
Alex.
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Old 26th July 2014, 08:23 AM
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If you shoot your portraits in the landscape orientation just fit the head and shoulders, as you require, within the height constraints of your viewfinder - whilst leaving a bit of wriggle room. You will of course include more to the left and right of the subject than required but that will be cropped away at the printing stage.

I would also suggest using a good quality 100 iso (approx) film / developer combo , a tripod and a hand held meter.

Neil.
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