© JOHN CHIARA
Chiara says he uses “precision barrel lenses,” but it took a long
time to find and modify them. “Usually lenses are symmetrical
with the aperture in the center. I have taken mine apart, putting
an element behind with the aperture in front, to create a tradi-
tional meniscus landscape lens.”
It isn’t Chiara’s first DIY camera. Fifteen years ago he started
experimenting with a Linhof 4 x 5, exposing chromogenic paper
directly. He liked the results so he constructed a 16 x 20 camera,
which he used to make large, macro images of objects in his stu-
dio. Eventually, he says, “I felt the work was getting too heavy on
precision, technique and effect.”
So he built a 40 x 50 camera “the size of a large armoire” that
San Francisco photographer
John Chiara tows his
50 x 80 camera on a trailer.
Right: He crawls inside it
to compose landscape
images that are part event,
part object.
was on wheels, and fit in the back of his truck. “The equipment
physically forced the process beyond my ability to control it com-
pletely,” Chiara says. “Like a psychological event, the outcome can
never be fully known for sure. I have to use a lot of intuition in
making the work.”
With the 40 x 50 camera, he was also adding elements—tape,
oil soap and spray paint—to the paper before making the expo-
sures. “I was looking to find a controlled chaos in the work,” he
says, but he was eventually able to pre-visualize the results too
well. He felt he had “too much technical control” and that the
work “started to develop a narrative I did not want.”
So he built the 50 x 80 camera that he uses currently, and explains,
“I have taken my hand out of it and am executing the work more in
the role of a traditional photographer.” When he makes an image, he
has an idea of what the result will be, but it isn’t entirely controlled
or predictable. “I let the process complete the work,” he says.
—David Walker
ADAM MAGYAR’S
SLIT-SCAN CAMERA
The black-and-white images in Adam Magyar’s “Urban Flow” series
stretch across time. Made using a slit-scan camera he built from
scanner parts and a medium-format lens, the images are unique
street scenes made in places like Tokyo, New York City and London
during intervals from less than one minute to several minutes long.
