Page 1 of 2

National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 4:33 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Darwinean_John
I was skipping through the Gallery on friday afternoon and stopped dead in my tracks and gazed for ages at an photo image of a scientist who'd won nobel prize for describing the life-cycle of cells. The style of the image was consistent with that cellular theme. It was a very large image (circa 3mtrs top to bottom, 4 mtrs l to r).
I was mesmorised by the sharpness of the details in the plane of focus (essentially eyes and lips only) and the wafer-thin dof.
Whilst the sharpness is consistent with LF, the razor-thin dof is likely to be a problem for LF. At first I thought a moderate tele lens was used but I now suspect that only the Leica Noctilux 50mm f0.95 is probably capable of delivering this effect. But maybe I'm wrong. I'd like to do something similar without spending £8,500 on a Nocti. Any opinions / advices on a LF solution would be appreciated.

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 5:05 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Clive Gray
I can't say I've ever tried to do portraits but it's amazing how little depth of field you have with something like an 600mm F9 Apo Ronnar shot at near 1:1 I'm usually doing scarey things with tilt in the 20 to 30 degree range to get more in focus.

Process lenses like the 600mm Apo Ronars and Apo Nikkors seem to have declined in value quite sharply over the last few years I paid about 300 for a mint boxed one in 2008 and have seen examples go for less since then. They are very sharp and could possibly give the result you are looking for if you have a suitable camera to take them.

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 5:41 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by George Hart
I agree with Clive that long lenses may do the job for you. Without more info about this portrait it's difficult to say much more—was it a head and shoulders job, or did you see more of the subject? Was the name of the photographer available? Who was the scientist, and when was the photograph taken?

Should be straightforward, and even more so with a 10x8 or larger camera. A noctilux… here? Ha!

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 6:51 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by timparkin
Darwinean_John wrote:I was skipping through the Gallery on friday afternoon and stopped dead in my tracks and gazed for ages at an photo image of a scientist who'd won nobel prize for describing the life-cycle of cells. The style of the image was consistent with that cellular theme. It was a very large image (circa 3mtrs top to bottom, 4 mtrs l to r).
I was mesmorised by the sharpness of the details in the plane of focus (essentially eyes and lips only) and the wafer-thin dof.
Whilst the sharpness is consistent with LF, the razor-thin dof is likely to be a problem for LF. At first I thought a moderate tele lens was used but I now suspect that only the Leica Noctilux 50mm f0.95 is probably capable of delivering this effect. But maybe I'm wrong. I'd like to do something similar without spending £8,500 on a Nocti. Any opinions / advices on a LF solution would be appreciated.
You have to scale the aperture by four times to get the equivalent depth of field for 4x5. Hence a 150mm f/5.6 is equivalent to a 37.5mm f/1.4

10x8 is even better where you have to scale by 8 so a 300mm f/5.6 is equivalent to a 37.5mm f/0.7!!!

Scary eh! And that is before you end up looking at Petzvals with their possible f/3.5 which would give you a crazy f/0.44!!!

Tim

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 7:36 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Marizu
I'm going to stick my neck out here, but are you talking about the picture of Paul Nurse by Jason Brooks? He got a Nobel Prize for some kind of Cell Biology.
http://benchmarks.rockefeller.edu/viewA ... ssue_id=89

If so... then that's a painting!
No need for 8k on a Nocti. Just a few tubs of Dulux.
Brooks did work from Large Format photographs that he had taken of Nurse. So you will have no problem reproducing it :D

Regardless of what it is, it is one of the most wonderful portraits that I have ever seen. The sheer face slapping impact of that gaze is something else.

If I've messed up, then let me know which picture you mean. I was there a few weeks ago and I'm really interested.

If this is the one, then I have made similar types of portraits by using my 360mm Symmar on 5x4 (and about a metre of extension). You'd be amazed how the Dof drops away even when you're using f16 or f22, with that magnification.

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 8:27 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Rob Cole
Marizu wrote:I'm going to stick my neck out here, but are you talking about the picture of Paul Nurse by Jason Brooks? He got a Nobel Prize for some kind of Cell Biology.
http://benchmarks.rockefeller.edu/viewA ... ssue_id=89
The portrait (painting) of Paul Nurse referred to is only 1710 mm x 2710 mm in size, not 3m x 4m as described by John. There are 2 photographs of Paul Nurse in the NPG collection but indications are that these are not currently on display.

See - http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/searc ... =sit&rNo=0

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 8:55 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by dave_whatever
timparkin wrote:You have to scale the aperture by four times to get the equivalent depth of field for 4x5. Hence a 150mm f/5.6 is equivalent to a 37.5mm f/1.4
Offtopic: I make it more like a 3.5 factor between 4x5 and 35mm.

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 9:45 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Marizu
Rob Cole wrote: The portrait (painting) of Paul Nurse referred to is only 1710 mm x 2710 mm in size, not 3m x 4m as described by John.
Sure. I also think it unlikely that a photographer would mix up a painting with a photograph, although it is very 'photographic.'
It was the only large facial portrait that I remember seeing with a shallow dof when I was there a couple of week's back.
My mistake.
I wonder if it was something in the Taylor Wessing, although I don't remember anything that large.

Sounds great, whatever it is!

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 10:09 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Marizu
George Hart wrote:I agree with Clive that long lenses may do the job for you.
I'm not too sure about the long lens thing.

Although people usually say that wider lenses "have more depth of field," my understanding was that is only the case if you made a picture with a wider field of view. If you constrain the field of view to be the same, then the DoF is the same.

Practically speaking (assuming the same size film), if you make the head exactly the same size on the ground glass and focus on the eyes, then you will get the same DoF for a given f-stop regardless of the focal length used. For the different focal lengths, the camera will need to be placed in different proximity to the subject, with the widest ones closest. For wider lenses, you might be too close to see the ears and you will have round faces with bulbous looking noses.

For a forward facing head portrait, a general tip is to look for the ears and have the camera at least the same distance away as when you are comfortably talking to the person.

For 5x4, I find a 210mm lens to be very flexible from half body to close head and shoulders, but to get tighter headshots, I usually reach for my 360mm.

You might find that a 600mm on 5x4 will flatten the facial features too much and require excessive bellows extension.

I am happy to be corrected on this.

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 10:48 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Rob Cole
Marizu wrote: Sure. I also think it unlikely that a photographer would mix up a painting with a photograph, although it is very 'photographic.'
I've searched the NPG site and Paul Nurse seems the only likely candidate sitter for being a Nobel Prize recipient for work in the field of cell biology (perhaps John was mistaken regarding the dimensions of the portrait).

It would be interesting to learn exactly what John meant by "The style of the image was consistent with that cellular theme" (could this be a descrption of the 'painterly' feeling of the portrait ?)

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 10:54 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Marizu
That is why it came to my mind, Rob.
I have got to come clean and admit that I thought it was a photograph when I first saw it a few years back (for at least 10 minutes!) :lol:

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 2013 11:43 pm Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Darwinean_John
Thanks guys, all great input.
I am now questioning my sanity re whether it was a photo or not !!!
Now Rob has prompted, yes it was defo Paul Nurse. And I accept the dimensions suggested ie 1.7210mtrs x 2.7210mtrs - it seemed much larger but at least my estimated proportions were consistent-ish. The head & shoulders image is in the main gallery (modern portraits), not Taylor Wessing.
The style being consistent with the theme is a reference to the extreme sharpness of the in-focus areas - the skin rendition seemed to take one closer to the cellular level.
I hadn't realised the fstop relationship between different formats was similar to the focal length relationship (ie 10x8 1/8 of 35mm and 5x4 1/4 (or 1/3.5) of 35mm) - so LF does look feasible as a solution. I wonder whether my sf Cooke PS945 229mm f4.5 might get close??

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 12:37 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Marizu
Darwinean_John wrote: The style being consistent with the theme is a reference to the extreme sharpness of the in-focus areas - the skin rendition seemed to take one closer to the cellular level.
I hadn't realised the fstop relationship between different formats was similar to the focal length relationship (ie 10x8 1/8 of 35mm and 5x4 1/4 (or 1/3.5) of 35mm) - so LF does look feasible as a solution. I wonder whether my sf Cooke PS945 229mm f4.5 might get close??
I know what you mean about the skin it looks almost like he has 'corned beef skin'. Take a look at the brush strokes of the chin hairs. Some of them look to be pure black and some of them look to be pure white. This kind of interpretation contributes to the hyper sharpness of some parts of the image.
This truly is an amazing portrait. Over the years, I have literally spent hours looking at it.
You know that you are in the presence of a marvelous work of art.

I have never tried the Cooke so take my suggestions with a pinch of salt. It is a lens on my fantasy wish list. I really want to shoot with one.
You might need to stop it down to f/11 or f/16 to reduce the soft focus 'bloom' which would diminish that sharp 'pop' that you like in the Paul Nurse portrait but it depends upon how little dof you are wanting. Maybe you can control the bloom by reducing the contrast across the subject.
My gut feeling is that 229mm is probably going to be a little short to get a 'pleasing' perspective on the subject if you frame them like the Paul Nurse portrait.

I'd love to see what you come up with in your experiments. Just burn a few sheets of B&W film and remember to compensate for bellows factor (probably around 1.5 stops) :)

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 12:52 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by timparkin
dave_whatever wrote:
timparkin wrote:You have to scale the aperture by four times to get the equivalent depth of field for 4x5. Hence a 150mm f/5.6 is equivalent to a 37.5mm f/1.4
Offtopic: I make it more like a 3.5 factor between 4x5 and 35mm.
Well because the aspect ratios are different you need to think about how the images would be cropped for a direct comparison. I presumed portraits are typically 4x5 so if you crop you 35mm shots to 4x5 the ratio is 24mm to 96mm or 4:1

However if you were taking panoramas then you woukd be cropping your 4x5 and hence the ratio would be 36mm to 120mm or 1.333:1

I think 3.5 is the diagonal ratio but that doesn't really match either real world practise? Correct me if I'm wrong though!

I wrote a little about this a while ago..

http://www.timparkin.co.uk/2008/03/lens ... continues/

http://www.timparkin.co.uk/2008/03/lens ... lustrated/

Re: National Portrait Gallery

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 9:17 am Etc/GMT-1+01:00
by Charles Twist
Hello Tim,
There are several ways of calculating the ratios: comparing surface area, diagonal, longest axis etc. The value of 3.5 to 4 is pretty representative. I am however far less comfortable re your equivalent f stop ratios.

John:
I took this picture last summer:
Image
Is this the effect you're after? It was taken with a Busch aplanat about 270mm in length and aperture of f/8 - macro kills dof. Not sure what they go for these days, but definitely less than £8500!Sharpness & contrast is excellent on this lens. In fact I rather like lenses from 1890-1910 for their classic look, as popularised by Hollywood.
Good luck!
Charles