Just about any one with a small 35mm camera imagines himself or herself a photographer. Many who work in the profession haven’t the slightest idea what is really involved in professional photography, much less advertising photography. Photography is like any other creative profession in that it is impossible to realize what you do not know until after you have learned it. There are so many tricks and techniques.

 Three things govern the final quality of photographic images. Talent, equipment, and experience. All three are important elements that directly affect the final results. The most talented photographer with bad equipment will only be able to deliver mediocre images. Needless to say the best-equipped photographer without talent or experience will also be less than satisfactory.

 Ever wonder why some big poster images are clear and sharp while others are a bit “ soft”, almost as if they were slightly out of focus? When I first started my career in photography I didn’t have a clue. In fact my first paid photographs were made with a plastic “ instamatic” camera from KODAK, it had a fixed lens, and a film insert. The pictures from that camera were always a little blurred and try as I might I couldn’t get them really clear.

 Then I bought my first Nikon. It was a marvel of 35mm camera technology. I had three lenses that gave wondrous results, except that every time I tried to enlarge an image more than A5 it became slightly blurred. No matter how sharp the focus: in larger sizes the image would blur.

Then I bought a medium format Hasselblad, which used a film size that was about 4 times larger than the 35mm film. Suddenly my big enlargements were clear and sharp. Looking back I can see the answer was clearly there all along. Film is like a data disk each exposure has a fixed capacity to handle detail. The larger the film area, the more detail. It is really that simple. Now with the new high resolution digital camera backs for the medium format cameras the question of detail has moved even closer to perfection.

 There was more behind that little story than a technical explanation. The size of the camera does matter, the bigger the film area the more detail in the final results. That means a 35mm camera will always capture roughly 1/4 the detail of a 6 x 6 cm camera. The same holds true for digital.

 The second part of my little story was also important. I was being paid for my pictures, and tried hard to give of my best. But until I had the proper professional equipment I could not produce professional results. The sad part was that I didn’t know enough to know any better, so, I would chat up my clients in the best of faith to make posters from a film format that was simply too small to give the results they wanted.

 In developing countries you are going to constantly be faced with the problem of well meaning photographers who are under equipped. There are only three possible answers. Live with what you can get, always pushing for better quality and demand low ASA / DIN film. Bring in a well-equipped pro that has experience with your subject matter, or at least development communications. And finally the risky option of buying good equipment for your local photographer to use. Although I do not recommend the latter option it has occasionally led to good results.