Camera
Deardorff
Deardorff 8×10 View Camera
Manufactured by L.F. Deardorff & Sons in Chicago from the 1920s through the 1980s, the 8×10 is a wooden field camera producing negatives 8 by 10 inches. Its bellows design allows for full front and rear movements including tilt, swing, and shift.
Artists who use this(9)
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Sternfeld shot "American Prospects" (1987) and his subsequent series on a large-format 8×10 view camera; the scale of the negative and the deliberation required by the camera's operation shaped his practice of spending extended time in a location before exposing a single sheet of film. His use of the 8×10 is documented in multiple interviews and in the afterword to the expanded edition of "American Prospects" (2003).
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Callahan worked with 8x10 view cameras for his landscape and close-up photography, particularly his weed and grass studies. Documented in accounts of his teaching at the Institute of Design and RISD.
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Used for studio portraits and still lifes at Vogue; flexible bellows allowed precise depth of field control
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Avedon used an 8×10 Deardorff view camera for "In the American West" (1985); documented extensively in the book's production notes.
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Adams used an 8×10 Deardorff as one of his primary large-format cameras; discussed in "The Camera" (1980) and his autobiography.
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Mann uses 8x10 view cameras for her landscape and portrait work, including the "Immediate Family" (1992) and "Deep South" series. Her large-format practice is discussed extensively in her memoir "Hold Still" (2015).
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Documented in the making of "Cape Light" (1978); Meyerowitz adopted the 8×10 view camera specifically for the Cape Cod series.
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Shore used an 8×10 view camera for "Uncommon Places" (1982); discussed in his book "The Nature of Photographs" and multiple interviews.
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Evans used an 8x10 Deardorff view camera for his FSA documentary work; the large negative produced the precise, frontal compositions for which "American Photographs" (1938) is known.
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