Manarchy's 35 Foot Long Camera

January 18, 2012 4:51 PM

A one-of-a-kind, 35-foot-long camera that exposes 6-foot-tall negatives. The detail in a portrait subjects’ eyeball alone is a thousand times greater than what you get with the average negative. Resulting portraits will be featured on prints 2 stories tall. Photographer Dennis Manarchy is traveling around the country documenting various cultures.
posted by The Deej (16 comments total)

....and you thought 35mm film was expensive....
posted by schmod at 5:04 PM on January 18

really cool, but the narration is insufferable.
posted by leotrotsky at 5:05 PM on January 18 [2 favorites]

"Dennis Manarchy" sounds like the name of Bruce LaBruce's apprentice.
posted by griphus at 5:22 PM on January 18 [1 favorite]

Also.
posted by basicchannel at 5:22 PM on January 18

...and in that eyeball was the last thing he saw--the face of his killer.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:30 PM on January 18

enhance
posted by nathancaswell at 5:39 PM on January 18 [6 favorites]

So, they'll make prints in sections and join them up? Colour or black and white? What's the largest Ilfochrome print you can make? Largest sheet of bromide paper?
posted by unliteral at 5:52 PM on January 18

Joe McNally talked about shooting in the worlds largest polaroid, and it's not near as pretentious as that video was sounding.
posted by usagizero at 6:28 PM on January 18 [1 favorite]

"Manarchy" is what I would call my Roger Corman tribute b&w demake of Fincher's Fight Club. Someone with more time and talent should make one of those cut-up trailers.
posted by kandinski at 6:38 PM on January 18 [2 favorites]

Joe McNally talked about shooting in the worlds largest polaroid, and it's not near as pretentious as that video was sounding.

I've done some Polaroid transfer photography, and I still love that film. When I first heard of that big Polaroid camera I was enthralled and would love to get a chance to us it.

There is also a 20x24 inch Polaroid camera that William Wegman used extensively.
posted by The Deej at 7:19 PM on January 18

The timing is impeccable. Just as Kodak nears bankruptcy, along comes a project that must have film.
posted by exphysicist345 at 9:19 PM on January 18 [1 favorite]

I would be very happy to shoot 4x5 tungsten negative film if anybody made it. Grrrrr......
posted by mrhappy at 10:29 PM on January 18

Similar dimensions of the exposed picture, but without any negative and with a historical twist behind it: imago 1 : 1 in Berlin. "Measuring 7x4x3 metres the camera Imago 1:1 is the largest walk in camera in the world and has been so ever since its invention in the 1970’s by the physicist Werner Krause and the artist Erhard Hößle."
posted by megob at 2:38 AM on January 19

Does anyone else see this as a needless publicity stunt clothed in the robes of a humanitarian effort?

If you were concerned about these vanishing cultures, why aren't you going in there with video, audio, and laser equipment? I could put a decent SLR, video camera, audio recorder and a mobile LIDAR array into a backpack. Upon leaving, I'd have samples of the sounds of the environs, the peoples' language, and with the LIDAR, a 3D model of their village, homes, etc.

But nah, let's bring in the big fucking film-is-dead camera. Completely non-invasive.
posted by johnjreiser at 5:22 AM on January 19 [1 favorite]

"It could be a last look at our vanishing cultures."

GAAAAH!!!

At once so trite, overreaching, and meaningless... has a more useless phrase ever been written?
posted by IAmBroom at 2:03 PM on January 19 [1 favorite]

mrhappy, Sally Mann uses 8x10" glass plates, to create some of the most beautiful images humans have ever snapped.

You just have to want to do it badly enough.
posted by IAmBroom at 2:09 PM on January 19