Playing around again with aspect ratio. While I love the square (1:1) it's always fun and informing to experiment.

Many of us grew up in photography wedded to the 24x36mm frame. The "3:2" aspect ratio. The "standard" of the industry... But there are more formats out in the wild than most people are comfortable using. I've written here many times about the square (1:1) and I'm sure a more able and verbose writer than me could engage you for hours and hours with a discussion about how each format came into being, its historic ramifications, and even its religious symbology, but I am not here to deconstruct alternate aspect ratios, I am here to praise them. 

The 3:2 ratio is chummy and comfortable for most photographers. Some, like me, have a preference for stockier, more square forms while others appreciate the wider feel of the 16:9 format. I find portraits easier to compose in the square. Others find scene are better presented in the wider and more cinematic settings. To each their own.

After decades and decades of making images with square and 3:2 format cameras I've gotten stuck in my ways. Or at least I was until my friend and peer, James Webb decided to pursue a project in a format that was entirely alien to me. He was working, I think, in the 21:9 aspect ratio which, I believe, is similar to CinemaScope or a standard, wide format used for movies. It's what I've used here for all the included samples except for one. I stuck in a 3:2 image just to work as a contrast to the much wider bounds of the other frames. 

James worked for over a year in the way I expect a real artist to work. He went out every day, after work, before work (he's been working on the staff of a high tech company for the past few years years as a video producer. A good day job!) and at lunch time. He never varied from his chosen, wide, horizontal frame configuration and instead looked for images that worked for his formalist structure. At first I was a bit dismissive of the idea. But thankfully James ignored my input entirely and we didn't speak of the project for over a year. This Winter we worked together on a project. He was the videographer and I was the still photographer on a daylong project. At the end of the day he handed me his printed book of wide images and... to be frank...I was blown away with not only how much I loved the way he handled the capture of the various scenes but also the dynamism of the format. It just worked. And the book amazingly fun to look through. It's also impressive. 

I was playing around with cameras today, procrastinating finishing my tax preparation, and I started to look through the menu in my five year old Sigma fp camera. It's the original 24 megapixel one and not the fpL. When I went into the aspect ratio settings I noticed that there was one I had never tried; never even noticed before. In fact, that camera has the 21:9 format available. You can set that ratio and shoot in DNG but when you open the files up in Lightroom Classic they open up to show the full 3:2 frame. You'll need to re-crop them to get back to your original, wide shooting intention. Or... you can be brave and shoot all the wide frames as Jpegs. That's what I did. 

The one camera/one lens kit I worked with this afternoon included the fp and the Sigma 45mm f2.8 lens. That one is a favorite because it's small and light and when used correctly (not at the close focus limits while at a wide open aperture!!!) it's sharp and contrasty. It's actually just right. A Goldilocks of a lens.

I found working with the tighter frame (especially from top to bottom...) was much more difficult than I expected. I needed to move back nearly every time I started photographing something. The next time I go out to shoot in a super wide, cinematic aspect ratio I'll follow James's lead and use a medium zoom instead. Something like a 24-70mm. That way I can more easily get things to fit into the frame. 

I've never been a big fan of composing on the rear screen of the camera but I'm not particularly excited about using the enormous Sigma Loupe that's made for the camera ---even though I've had one for years. And I'm even less excited about buying the EVF that was introduced with the fpL because it makes the camera bigger, less svelte, more kludgy. So, I bit the bullet and went for the naked screen shooting process. 

To really make that work I have to turn up the screen brightness to maximum and make sure to wear my latest eyeglasses prescription to see detail on the 3 inch screen. On a cloudy day like today it works pretty well, and I do find that I compose better on the rear screen than I do in a more immersive optical finder or EVF. Something about the way the images are rendered flat across the glass is more or less like looking into the waist level finder of a Hasselblad 500 C/M or the ground class of my old view camera. You look more. You pay more attention to the edges. Whatever. I did find myself making more compositional adjustments than I usually do and I was happier with some of the frames as a result. 

When I got home and played with the images I remembered why I keep the Sigma fp around even though I have more "complete" cameras I can use. It's the way that camera makes images. The color science Sigma put into the same. But it's also the fact that it's a far less serious camera. I use it in a more cavalier way than I do one of the big Leicas. 

I went out with three batteries this afternoon. I guess it's from some experience I had several years ago when it was my (impatient) perception that the camera "ate" batteries. But I needn't have been so over-prepared. The camera and I walked for two hours, shot a couple hundred frames and we still have almost half of a battery charge left. I think the camera was just showing off for me today. But I have to say that I find it adorable and fun. A nice combination for an inanimate object. It's small and sweet. Go buy one. You'll see what I mean...

Images below.

a "3:2" sample to show the differences. Also one just below.

SXSW is back. This week is the set-up week for the main show.

By Friday downtown will be packed with attendees. 

Right now it's the education component that was added

a while back. We'll have fun shooting the big show!!!

This enormous pile of dirt will be transformed into an obstacle course.

Rivian (the electric car maker without the insane CEO) will use it to demo the 

off road capabilities of their trucks. The trucks that don't rush after a brief rain shower....

If you own a CyberTruck you are probably not reading this... But if you are, you got screwed. Bad. By a psychopath. But hey, everyone makes mistakes. Don't bother leaving a comment; it will be excised. 

I guess everyone has a friend or a family member who has decided to institute an endless and ever changing list of diet restrictions which they think will make them immortal and immune to the ravages of aging. Mostly, in the long run, that just makes them more miserable than people who can actually enjoy food. Just sayin' 

opinionated artist/photographer/gadfly testing out his fp in a wider aspect ratio.