When I first got started in medium format film photography, I found it pretty confusing. But I, like many of you, was basing it off of the digital photography formats available. This can get even more confusing for digital photographers getting into film. So we’ve got a tutorial video that should sort it out.
And don’t worry, it’s actually all fairly simple.
Basically, consider the fact that in some ways, medium format is still sorting itself out and digital sensors are still sorting themselves out. The technology has come a far way but digital photography is also having its own evolution. With film photography, it started big and then got small. With digital photography, it started small format and is getting bigger. There are no commercially effective and fully working digital large format camera sensors for example; though they do exist.
So what you really should learn is that digital medium format and film medium format are two different animals. Digital medium format is quite good, but it’s possible to get significantly better photos from film medium format. Part of this has to do with something that everyone talks about: a bigger size. In the same way that so many people want to go full frame digital, lots of folks want to go full frame medium format. In digital, that’s 645. But in the film world, 645 is the smallest of the medium format standards. After 645, there is square format with 6×6, 6×7 and 6×9 formats. Sometimes you can even go bigger.
Our video goes over this, and a whole lot more. It can all get confusing and considering that medium format and film photography are undergoing a sort of renaissance it made sense for us to create this video tutorial. We hope you find it useful.
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