TtV Photography

[Doug T.]

Hi All!

While doing some research on an old camera I bought, I came across a site called TtV Photo, or Through the Viewfinder Photo.
What they do is take digital photos through the viewfinder of old twin lens cameras. My Argus super 75 for example.
The results are interesting, and it looks like a lot of fun.
Has anyone else heard of this, or maybe even experimented with it?


Doug

[daveh]

Doug,

I've taken some photos looking the wrong way down a telescope. Does that count?

Dave.

[Berndt]

It's actually a very common technique. So called 35 mm adapters for camcorders are working like that. The problem of digital photography is still, that there are no large sensors available. The idea has been, projecting the picture on a larger surface ( kind of "milky screens" as TLRs have them as viewfinder ) and capture it from there. The digital camera/camcorder ist just working as recording unit.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depth-of-field_adapter

35 mm adapters are slowly becoming outdated though, with the upcoming video capable full frame DSLRs.

However, it's still an interesting idea, but I couldn't manage to get good results yet. Trying to capture something from a viewfinder of a TLR for example, the exposure is not uniformly continiuos. The middle of the the screen appears just as a "big white dot" while the edges are dark. No idea, why this is so Inserted film will be exposed perfectly. I have no techiqual explanations for that

[daveh]

I would imagine that the reason why the results aren't too good is that the lens won't be anything like as well corrected as that used for the photo itself. The eye tends to filter out some of the deficiencies: the camera will record them. Of course the eye can see virtual images while the camera will need a real image to focus on. In all honesty I can't see the point of it, other than to show that it can be done. I can see more point in putting a screen in the film plane and taking the image from there.

Berndt, I presume you mean it is very common amongst a relatively small group of people. Of all the people I know who have a camcorder and a camera I only know one who has used it other than me. Both he and I have used it mainly to transfer from projection screen (usually 8mm cine) to camcorder rather than anything else. In English we have the term "not uncommon" to signify that something, while not being common is not rare either.

Sensors: Canon did develop a sensor measuring roughly 200x200mm a year or two ago. apparently it is capable of 60 frames a second and usable in light as low as 0.3 lux. Presumably, though, it was a bit too expensive. However, like all digital things, costs will drop with time.

[Berndt]

Dave, I should have been more precisely ... common among professionals. My altime favorite, shot with such an adapter is this one:

Technically a little bit outdated by Full Frame DSLRs meanwhile, but I can still see them frequently used by TV teams. They don't use DSLRs yet ( at least here in Japan ), because the editing system of the TV stations still requests tape for recording.

The main purpose is film ( in the meaning of "movies" ) though. In the field of photography, it doesn't make that much sense to me. If I want to take pictures with a medium- or large format camera, I would prefer real film instead of trying to capture something from a screen digitally.

BTW, this is probably the most famous ( and common among professionals ) maker of those adapters:
www.letusdirect.com/

[daveh]

Berndt,

I can understand why you want to use film to get the authentic look.

I don't know for sure exactly what equipment is used in Britain for all TV work, but the two people I know who have used "movie cameras" in their work have been using digital for some years - and straight digital too. One was a reporter for the BBC (he is now with RTE on Ireland). It ended up hi, being something of a one man band. He did the editing himself too. I don't know what editing system the BBC use now but at the time he was with them he was using Avid. Presumably he would send his report in as an avi file. The other was a freelance cameraman. He had a Sony professional camcorder a few years back, which he used for all his work (unless something else was provided.)

Both were recording digital to tape, presumably uncompressed .avi files. Of course most of their work is 'temporary' in that it is 'live' broadcasting where the 'getting the story out' was more important than the visual quality. One only has to look at reports from war zones to see the extreme of that method. Filming something 'cold' is another thing and I can see why other techniques would be used.

Dave.