| After almost a year, my mammoth camera
was complete and ready for a field
test. I loaded the film holder - another article could be written about
that - and early on a Friday morning, drove to my favorite photo
shooting
site. The camera was bolted to the golf-bag cart, as was the tripod and
photo bag. Fortunately, I had the foresight to bring a towel, it was
extremely
hot and muggy that morning, and that towel came in handy. It took
twenty
minutes to set up the Mammoth to compose the first shot. I pulled the dark slide and squeezed the bulb slightly and maintained the pressure, exposing the negative for 8 seconds at f64. I used two filters, an orange and a graduated neutral density. I reinserted the dark slide, and pushed gently, it only went in about four inches and hung up on the film that had somehow buckled. |
|
| $8.20 gone in an instant.
Reversing the film
holder, I tried again. This time there were no problems, and I had
captured
my first 12 x 20 image on film. A week later, at the same location, I
experienced
a repeat of the previous week - one ruined negative, and one exposed.
At
this rate, it was costing me $16.40 for each negative! Inserting one of
the ruined negatives into the holder with the lights on revealed the
problem.
It seemed that the film was about 1/16 of an inch too wide for the
hundred
year old holder, and wanted to bow slightly when inserted. Another
project
ensued, and a few days later I had built a template to cut a thin strip
off of the length of the film in the dark. The trick was to design it
to
keep all of my fingers intact. This cured the problem, and allowed me
to
actually take two pictures per outing.
So there you have it. A twenty five pound camera that uses a two pound holder and a two pound lens, all resting on top of an eleven pound wooden tripod. Was it worth it? The best thing to come out of this project is that now my 8x10 seems small and very portable. So even if I never pack the 12x20 Mammoth out of the house again, I'm sure to toss that little 8x10 into the car for many weekends of photo fun. Now, check out a couple of Sample Images. |
| Update: July 23,
2007. After sitting for five years on its tripod in the living
room, I finally sold the camera on eBay. I have moved on to digital
printing (still shoot film) and selling my art at Art Festivals. I
wanted my Mammoth Camera to have a good home and to be used. |
©2002 by W. Underwood
