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Post by moltogordo on Apr 4, 2015 3:14:10 GMT -5
I just don't have darkroom time right now, so I've spent what time I have free to learn about making digital negatives. After processing the film, I put my negatives in a negative carrier from my darkroom, and taped it against the frosted glass of a lightbox. Then I photograph them with my K10 and 35mm Pentax macro limited, which goes to life size. The resultant jpg or RAW files get processed, reversed and done up in GIMP. Voila. It's not quite as good as scanning a silver print, but I can do that later. Get to see and post my pics a lot quicker. I mostly work with medium format, but I also do subminiature and 4x5. Computer screens punish medium/large format photography quite a bit . . . the screen only resolves about 1.5 megapixels. So here you have a demonstration of what I'm talking about. The first shot is a 6x9 negative, the second shot is a 35mm half-frame. The advantages of large format are not really apparent here. Picture 1: Sinkut River, near Vanderhoof. Linhof Kardan 4x5, with a 6x9 Horsman rollfilm back. Fomapan 400 in Xtol, 90mm Schneider f5.6 Symmar. An 11x14 enlargement of this negative would knock your socks off. Picture 2 and 3: Telachick Creek, near Prince George, Olympus Pen FT, 38mm Zuiko lens, Kentmere 400 in Rodinal, 1/60th at f8. An 11x14 enlargement of these negatives would not impress you one little bit. They'd be good at 5x7. Thanks for looking in!!!
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Post by moltogordo on Mar 14, 2015 14:29:44 GMT -5
A bit off topic but Moltogordo asked in one of the previous post if there are any Miranda enthousiast on the forum well,i do have a few miranda's mainly because they fit in with my interchangable viewfinder theme. Miranda seems to be one of the (very) few lesser popular makes of wich prices on the market keep rising. They are nice cameras and whenever i find one at a reasenable price i will buy it. It must have been one of the cheapest well build interchangable viewfinder cameras. The Auto Sensorex EE however has a horrible shutter release. it has such a long travel, after a while pushing it just at the moment when you think nothing is going to happen "CLICK" not very helpfull in making snap shots, and camera shake. "shutter lag" wasn't invented back then, but the EE in some mechanical way has lots of it. These are lovely, and seem to be in terrific shape. I have only an Sensorex (original) and a Sensorex II which I take out for the occasional spin . . . . I have a really nice 100mm f2.8 Soligor Miranda I use with it for the occasional head shot. The SII I like a lot. Thanks for the pics!
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Post by moltogordo on Mar 12, 2015 13:00:24 GMT -5
" . . . . . .Maybe I should have only one system, get used to all it's peculiarities and think it's normal . . . but it didn't work out that way " I think we can all relate to this one! I still shoot a lot of film (ALL of my B&W is film, and B&W is 45% of my hobby), and still do some portraiture on the side. Seems I use a different camera every time I'm shooting! By the way, any other Miranda fans out there? Great cameras, beloved by the scientific set in their day . . . . .
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Post by moltogordo on Mar 12, 2015 12:48:36 GMT -5
Some personal notes . . .
I ditched my F2 and system for a Pentax MX and system after I began using medium format and 4x5 in my freelance business exclusively in the late 70s and early 80s (except for sports, which can be rough on equipment). Once I started giving customers 6x4.5 work my business solidified.
I found the handling qualities of the MX excellent, better than the F2. Ergonomics is often personal, not always an across the board thing. No complaints with their system, either. Optics were excellent.
I went back to Nikon after a while because the Pentax service wasn't there, and Nikon's was incredible. But I went back to an F3, which to my mind was a better camera in every respect than the much-worshipped F2. I hung on to the MX for personal use because it's size made sense when I was using a C330 or a 'blad for 90% of my work. I'm still surprised at the fact that you can get a mint F3 on Evilbay for chump change, and even a beater F2 will cost twice as much, easily. The F3 remains the only camera I've ever owned and used hard that I never had a repair job done on. I had 4 of them. Oddly enough, I don't have one now, but I only collect manual cameras. But the F3 remains my all-time favorite using camera of any format, especially with the MD12 drive on it.
I remember a friend of mine who owned a chain of camera stores in Vancouver, dropping the Contax "Real Turkey System" because of repair and reliability issues. But it was indeed pretty. The LX pretty much brought Pentax into the big leagues but they blew it with their incredibly inept autofocus cameras. I think it was the excellent Eos cameras that set the stage for Canon's future dominance . . . they had a big advantage in design with their early autofocus Eos stuff.
I'd also vote, as did the US Navy, for the Topcon. Incredible stuff. I still have a user, but lenses are scarce and I suppose that Exakta mount limited the design of ultra-wides, making budget lenses for the system problematic. I would also think the Olympus Pen FT should be more considered as a true classic - nothing like it ever made by anybody else, and it is extremely reliable to boot. In spite of the raves about the handling qualities of the OM1, I never liked it much - felt awkward. But it's reliability and optical excellence made up for it's (at least to me) quirkiness.
As a collector/user who still shoots 75 or so rolls of film a year through 35s, my most used and reliable cameras are my Pen FTs, Olympus OM-1, Pentax MX and Topcon RE Super. When I pick them up for a field session, I know they're going to work.
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 28, 2015 18:31:37 GMT -5
Now THAT'S retro! Nice addition! In reasonable shape for its age, too. (y) The y is supposed to be a thumbs up . . . guess this HTML doesn't use it.
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 28, 2015 13:34:00 GMT -5
XP2 is terrific for old cameras because it is forgiving, especially on the overexposure side. A lot of old cameras have shutter speeds that run very slow. It also enlarges beautifully. If you expose it at ASA200 or 160, a half-frame negative will compete with a full frame neg exposed on say, FP4 or TMAX 400, and a full frame neg enlarged to 8x10 will trick you into believing it's been taken with a Rolleicord!
I use it also in 120 in my Rollex back on my Linhof 4x5. It's easy to process in the kits too.
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 27, 2015 20:27:54 GMT -5
The Exa, little brother to the Exakta, is so simple with it's wooden box shutter and limited palette of features, that it adds reliability to it's quaintess. I like the original Exa, with the waist level finder. Taking my pair of users out is always fun. Here they are with two of my favorite Exakta mount lenses, the Schacht 35mm f3.5 Travegon, and the incredibly sharp 40mm f3.5 Kilfitt Macro: And here's a picture of one looking at the business end: Can these little gnomes really take pictures? You betcha!! These are all scanned 4x6 machine prints on XP2 film. Exa, 35mm f3.5 Schacht Travegon, 1/150th at f11, XP2 at 200 ASA. This is the machinery of a Beehive burner in Prince George, BC. This is a very good lens, as capable as any 35 I've used. A snowdrop, Exa, 40mm f3.5 Kilfitt Macro, 1/50th at f5.6. I usually expose XP2 film in these cameras because it has huge latitude, and the Exa shutter speeds all sound the same! They all look the same, too! And finally, for train fans. Prince George railyards. Exa, Schacht 35mm f3.5 Travegon, 1/150th at f11. I toned this scanned print with brown toner as an experiment. Think it worked. Thanks for looking in!
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 27, 2015 15:38:18 GMT -5
Remarkable picture - good story about the camera, too.
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 26, 2015 19:00:05 GMT -5
l had that Nikkor 20mm - forgotten what it can do. And those cheap little Canon RFs could really shoot!
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 26, 2015 4:16:37 GMT -5
l like your shot. Street photography is something I've not done much of. The camera is a classic for sure. What lens did you use? By the size of the woman's hand, I'm guessing 28?
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 23, 2015 17:52:54 GMT -5
The Konica Autoreflex has gone through many guises. This is the original. The claim to fame for this early SLR is the half-frame switch (second picture) which allows you to switch from full-frame to half-frame mid-roll or anywhere in between. Especially handy, claimed Konica, to stretch a roll at the end if you were running low on film. But Konica lenses were excellent, and when on half-frame, you are of course using the central area of the lens, so the Autoreflex produced some stunning half-frame images. The following shot was taken with the above camera, a Hexanon 50mm f3.5 Macro lens, and Tri-X film at 400, 1/125th at f5.6. Rodinal 1:50 for 12 minutes. These are the Prince George Lumber Kilns. l liked this shot, and a week later l decided to do it in 4x5, so l took my Linhof down River Road - and they were gone! Taken down! No longer in existence. Sad day to see these treasures removed. Full frame shot.
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 20, 2015 6:46:44 GMT -5
The Exakta RTL 1000 is a bit of an odd duck, but I have come to appreciate it - it has a metal shutter, and allows me to use my Exakta mount lenses as the "real" Exaktas often have pinholes in their shutters, for whatever reason. I've taken some nice shots with this bit of East German kitsch, and it has really grown on me - quite comfortable to hold, easy to hand hold steadily (notice the 1/20th second shutter speed on the 2nd picture) and the dual shutter release is a winner for the external diaphram auto-whatevers. Here's the Exakta RTL 1000 with an Auto-Aragon 100mm f2.8 lens mounted on it. I used this Japanese independent lens (don't know who made it, actually; maybe somebody here does) for both of the shots that follow. As you can see, the lens is a neat little package, not much bigger than a 50mm f1.4. It's a touch soft at f2.8 to 4, nice for portraits, but smartens up at f5.6. One of the better $25 lenses I've bought! The first shot is of one of my cello students, Megan. Auto Aragon 1/20th at f4.0, Ilford FP4 film, 1:25 in Rodinal, 10 minutes at 68 degrees, scanned 8x10 print on Ilford Galerie matte, grade 3. And a second shot with the same camera/lens combination, but this time on Ilford XP2 film. This is the Sinkut River near Vanderhoof BC, scanned 4x6 machine print, 1/250th at f5.6 Next up: the original Konica Autoreflex
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 16, 2015 17:48:20 GMT -5
Doing some 4x5 lately. I have a Linhof Kardan Color that has been my only large format for about 8 years now. Decided I needed a "new" one, so I went to EvilBay and got this vintage beauty, a Burke&James Orbit from about 1965, in mint condition, with a Rodenstock Sironar-N 210mm f5.6, and several other goodies including a pan head and Pentax Spotmeter, for about 450. I was actually looking for the lens, not the camera, but who could pass this up? The lens by itself goes for around $350-450 used. Needless to say, I'm quite happy about it!
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 12, 2015 17:52:21 GMT -5
Erratic weather has plagued us up north, and we've gone from heavy snowfall to rain and a case of the "brown uglies" like a teetertotter lately. Went to one of my regular haunts, Telechick Creek, after a thaw, rain and new snowfall last Tuesday, to see if the new snow could give me some new shots. A couple of Tuesday violin lesson cancellations gave me about three hours of playtime during daylight, so I packed up the Linhof 4x5 and went West to the Norman Lake area, where Telechick Road parallels the creek flowing out of Norman Lake. I got three keepers, which I also duplicated with the big Linhof 4x5. I'll be excited to see how those come out. In the meantime, the present snaps were taken with my Canon Rebel 2Ti, kit lens, all at 1/125th at f11. This is about a 2 stop overexposure, so I had to work at bringing out highlights in the snow with the RAW files, with only moderate success. However, the exposure is bang-on for the HP5+ I was running in the Linhof, which was the point of the whole exercise, anyway. Thanks for looking in!!
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Post by moltogordo on Feb 10, 2015 3:08:07 GMT -5
That's a very nice job, and as was said above, your snakeskin does suit the camera.
I also like the FX-3. I have two FX-7s, very similar but with a mount that's easier to get lenses for. One of mine is a bit ratty - maybe I'll start looking for an old handbag at Value Village and give it a whirl myself!
Those Pentax's are pretty awful, but I shouldn't say anything. I have a white Kx. Dandy little camera, but what I get when people see it is "it looks like an Imperial Star Trooper camera." Suppose it could be worse.
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