A rule exists that says doing head/shoulder portraits with a standard focal length (Diagonal of the used film format) should not be tried or done. Working with the AeroEktar/SG combo lately, I've come to learn this is just a rule to be ignored!

What really matters is your intention and motivation to capture the "soul" in a portrait. While doing a series on a model together with Leo, I decided to try it with my 8x10 on Polaroid. In the midst of the session, something inside me told me the time was now...! The model was ready and accustomed to the lights and... the photographers. I did setup the Wisner TF 810 and loaded the cassettes with Polaroid 809/804. You all might know, doing a portrait with a viewcamera is a tiny bit different, compared to shooting with an Eos 5D or even a Hasselblad V.

FYI: The lens used was a Doctar 300mm/f5.6 , Aperture halfway f5.6 and f8 (Bellows draw 1 stop), the distance well under 1 meter.
Actually technical details are not that important or relevant, the magic goes beyond! "When you use a camera, not as a machine but as an extension of your heart, you become one with your subject."
Moreover, I never make a photograph, I ask for a photograph!

Resume: "In his ordo est ordinem non servare"
 

Regards,

John D.

Driebergen-R, Netherlands 

    Yes, she's really asleep, and had fallen asleep while we were setting up to shoot, I had fumbled around too long w/my camera, and she dozed off, and so I started shooting. 

    I had Bill Orozco, the fine Tech at Steve's Camera in Culver City, overhaul a Pacemaker Speed Graphic, which I had him mate to a  178mm AeroEktar, and I wanted to first play around w/this combo using polaroid 690 film, at F2.5.   From the point of first having heard about it, I had always been amazed by the idea/selective focus possibilities of a LF lens like the AeroEktar with a max aperture of F2.5, and was now starting to explore just what kind of 'brushstrokes' this lens combined with Polaroid 690 would render.