Cameras Used by Irving Penn

In 1938, Irving Penn purchased his first camera: a Rolleiflex. A relatively simple camera, the Rolleiflex is a medium-format, twin-lens reflex camera with a rigid metal body that typically uses 120 roll film—film rolled on a spool that produces a six by six centimeter square image. Penn would have viewed the subject through the upper lens via the glass screen on top, while the lens on the bottom captures the image. 

Penn began using a Leica 35mm camera in 1950 while traveling for Vogue. (Penn later used the Nikon brand.) 35mm cameras—which refer to the size of the film—were portable and could be used with interchangeable lenses. Because of their small film size, 35mm cameras take incredibly sharp pictures and offer a higher level of control over depth of field compared to twin-lens reflex cameras like the Rolleiflex. During printing, they require a photographic enlarger, which allowed Penn a wealth of possibilities in the manipulation of images. 

Penn frequently used large-format Deardorff view cameras, including a 4" x 5" and an 8" x 10" format, during his early studio work at Vogue. View cameras, which usually sat on tripods, are composed of two planes—one for the lens and one for the film stage—connected by a flexible, accordion-like, light-tight bellows. Adjustments to the bellows allowed Penn to control the light and adjust image sharpness and depth of field. View cameras usually produced one image per negative.

In 1979, Penn began using the Folmer & Schwing banquet camera—a horizontally oriented view camera that produced 12" x 20" negatives. This significantly larger size of negative awarded Penn the ability to make finished prints by contact without the added process of enlarging them. Penn made special modifications to the camera to suit his purposes.

Gallery text from Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty as drawn from the Irving Penn Archive at the Art Institute of Chicago.

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