Whithout going in depth in the history of photography, let's just take a look at how photographs were done in the 19th century, before the development of "modern" photographic techniques.

One of the main features of the photographic process in the early days of photography, is that the final print size was determined in camera. You want a small print ? use a small camera and a small metal or glass plate. You want a bigger print ? get a bigger camera, it's just that simple. This led to the construction of bigger and bigger cameras, and one popular size of those big cameras was the so-called "mammoth-plate". A 18x22 inch plate of glass was coated with sensitized gelatin and processed on the spot, yielding a glass negative that could be used to create stunning 18x22 contact prints.

The mammoth plate photographers were sometimes sedentary, producing exquisite portraits, but many were travelers. You have to imagine what commitment to the craft it took to have the courage to haul several hundred pounds of material around the world in the late 1800's. It's that commitment, symbolized by the sheer size of the mammoth plate cameras, that inspired us into creating MAMUT PHOTO.