Will Thompson
Well Known Member
"f8 and be there" What is the origin & meaning of this photo journalist statement?
-
Please use real names.
Greetings to all who have registered to OPF and those guests taking a look around. Please use real names. Registrations with fictitious names will not be processed. REAL NAMES ONLY will be processed
Firstname Lastname
Register
We are a courteous and supportive community. No need to hide behind an alia. If you have a genuine need for privacy/secrecy then let me know! -
Welcome to the new site. Here's a thread about the update where you can post your feedback, ask questions or spot those nasty bugs!
"f8 and be there" Origin & meaning?
- Thread starter Will Thompson
- Start date
Bart_van_der_Wolf
pro member
Hi Will,
No idea who came up with that, but it's not original.
There was a group of photographers known as Group f/64, and AKAIK that inspired a number of people to use the term "f/64 and be there", because f/64 on a large format camera will usually work fine for many subjects, and it strikes a good compromise between diffraction blur and lens aberrations, and produces a lot of DOF, on large format that is (for contact prints).
Of course f/64 will produce too much diffraction blur on smaller film or sensor sizes that need to be magnified for decent size output, so I assume some stole/borrowed the saying, and adopted it for something like 35mm photography where a lot of DOF is useful to get things in acceptable focus, with a wink to the old masters.
Cheers,
Bart
Cem_Usakligil
Well-known member
A brief search using google delivers many plausible answers, such as this one.
Michael Nagel
Well-known member
The original source is disputed.
There are sources that attribute these words to Arthur Fellig aka Weegee as Cem already suggested.
Other sources attribute it to Allen Hopkins.
f/64 has IMHO nothing to do with it. The name was derived from the f-stop yielding larger dof on LF, but this was AFAIK to counter the prevailing style of boudoir photography at the time the group was founded.
Best regards,
Michael
Asher Kelman
OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Today all one needs is "iPhone" and use it!"
Asher
Asher
Doug Kerr
Well-known member
Then there is "be there or be square" (used by DEA agents before a raid).
Best regards,
Doug
Best regards,
Doug
Bart_van_der_Wolf
pro member
Hi Michael,
I've been taught differently, f/64 was essential to achieve the largest possible DOF. In fact, f/64 limits luminance resolution to some 27 cycles/mm due to diffraction, or even a bit more for orthochromatic sensitized emulsions of those days. That's plenty for 'pure' contact prints.
"The group's effort to present the camera's "vision" as clearly as possible included advocating the use of aperture f/64 in order to provide the greatest depth of field, thus allowing for the largest percentage of the picture to be in sharp focus; contact printing, a method of making prints by placing photographic paper directly in contact with the negative, instead of using an enlarger to project the negative image onto paper; and glossy papers instead of matte or artist papers, the surfaces of which tended to disperse the contours of objects."
'Pure' photography was the goal of group f/64, IOW f/64 and be there.
Cheers,
Bart
Michael Nagel
Well-known member
Bart,
except for the 'be there' part I do not see a contradiction in what you responded to what I wrote.
You use the term 'pure photography' which is derived from their manifesto, I prefer the term 'straight photography' which encompasses the 'pure photography' as mentioned in the manifesto but is not limited to the group f/64.
I mentioned boudoir photography which is a prominent genre of pictorialist photography - the type of photography the group f/64 differentiated themself from in their manifesto.
I did not mention f/64 as diffraction limit - I do not think that they had this in mind when using the name and what large format? There are many negative sizes
The large DoF was important, but the technical term was not the focus.
Now 'be there' or 'f/8 and be there' - I think that it belongs to 'Weegee' Arthur Fellig though some might attribute it to Allen Hopkins.
'f/64 and be there' is in my eyes a retro-attribution. None of the permanent f/64 members had reportage as main focus to my knowledge.
Most sources cite Arthur Fellig as primary source.
As we cannot ask who was first, we can only look at the different sources and see what's most plausible to us and draw our conclusions which may differ...
Best regards,
Michael
except for the 'be there' part I do not see a contradiction in what you responded to what I wrote.
You use the term 'pure photography' which is derived from their manifesto, I prefer the term 'straight photography' which encompasses the 'pure photography' as mentioned in the manifesto but is not limited to the group f/64.
I mentioned boudoir photography which is a prominent genre of pictorialist photography - the type of photography the group f/64 differentiated themself from in their manifesto.
I did not mention f/64 as diffraction limit - I do not think that they had this in mind when using the name and what large format? There are many negative sizes
The large DoF was important, but the technical term was not the focus.
Now 'be there' or 'f/8 and be there' - I think that it belongs to 'Weegee' Arthur Fellig though some might attribute it to Allen Hopkins.
'f/64 and be there' is in my eyes a retro-attribution. None of the permanent f/64 members had reportage as main focus to my knowledge.
Most sources cite Arthur Fellig as primary source.
As we cannot ask who was first, we can only look at the different sources and see what's most plausible to us and draw our conclusions which may differ...
Best regards,
Michael