Rolleiflex wide or Hasselblad swc/m ???

Yes she also shot with a 60 mm and an old 500 C. She prefers the 60 mm compared with

the 80 mm, you're absolutely right...!

Aha! I see - that explans why the photo of the men underwater in the pool shows distortion

at the edges. This would not be the case with the biogon.

<p>

I see she also likes to burn in the top of skies a lot to add drama. And she loves the golden

section, so many of her images are with a square and a triangle.

I shoot with a 80mm Rollei TLR professionally for years. I've had the SWC and used it as well, but finally traded it for a 40mm CFT. I would definately go for the Rolleiwide. It would be a great camera for the way I work. Until then, I'll use the 60 distagon on the H'blad.

After 14 days of using the SWCM/CF I sent it back and got my money.

 

Reason: Awkward finder that did not show the field of view in its entirety; being obstructed by the lens mount. I exposed a picture on my porch using a tripod and a cable release. I missed a round vase on the bottom right corner of the composition...the round vase became oval. Yes, even the famous Biogon shows distortion.

 

I'll bet, the Fiorio's picture of the running Asian people, was cropped, and the swimming pool done with a Rolleiwide was not.

"Yes, even the famous Biogon shows distortion."

 

If you stand in the middle of the road and aim your Biogon down that road, the image will show terrible distortion with the parallel sides of the road appearing to converge in the distance. But this is a matter of perspective and has nothing to do with the Biogon and its lack of distortion. So is the distortion you art talking about. The Biogon has very little distortion, but it cannot perform miracles. When you look at the top of a drinking glass sideways, it looks oval. No lens can make that oval into a circle, only moving the camera position can do that.

Ilkka,<br><br>That is perspective, not distortion.<br><br>To put the non-perspective distortion of the Biogon in perspective:<br>- the 38 mm shows 0.3% max.<br>- the 40 mm FLE (not the IF) Distagon 1.5% max.<br>- the 80 mm Planar shows slightly over 1% max.<br>- the 100 mm Planar 0.1% max.<br><br>So the 38 mm Biogon is quite good, much better than the Distagon. Better even than the 80 mm Planar, but not so good compared to the 100 mm Planar.<br><br>There is one lens that beats the pants off all of them, and that is the 60 mm Biogon that was used on the cameras NASA took to the Moon, and later featured on the Hasselblad MK-series photogrametric cameras:<br>maximum distortion approx. 0.0018%.<br>That's some 160x less/better than the 38 mm Biogon.

Uhm...<br><br>Ilkka, you of course said that it was perspective, not distortion, and i only wanted to my add 'vote' to that. It should have read "Tito, That's [etc.]".

<i>"After 14 days of using the SWCM/CF I sent it back and got my money."</i>

<p>

14 days it not long enough to get to know any camera, let alone one as different as the

SWC/M!

<p>

Had you kept it longer you would have discovered that by keeping the camera level the

perspective distortion you speak of disappears. By the way Fiorio did not use a Rolleiwide

- I cam across an interview with her and she says she only uses an SWC/M and a 600mm

Distagon on a 500 series body. There is nothing to suggest that the picture of the Asian

people is cropped - it looks like a normal unmanipulated SWC/M image to me - but of

course, had you not sold yours so quickly you may have discovered that for yourself.

Tito,

<p>

On reflection I dont think you have any experience at all in using wide angled lenses -

perhaps you should have checked them out more fully before purchasing.

<p>

The Voigtlander finder for SWC is a great improvement over the original, but I would

make the following point: as a photographer you would be well advised to visualise in

your minds eye what it is you are trying to create when you click the shutter. No camera

no matter how good can show you exactly what an image will look like on film or in the

final print, only the photographer can attempt to do that in hi/her mind's eye.

<p>

If you look at the SWC/Ms viewfinder again with that idea in mind then perhaps you may

appreciate that it may actually aid your visualisation process by not attempting to do it

all.

Antonio, I'm very familiar with an extreme wide-angle and its usage, of handling a tripod and a spirit level, as for years I follow the LF discipline with a 4x5 and a 8x10.

 

The gripe concerning the finder, (obstructed by the lens mount) is that, I did not see the vase on the lower right thus, from round, it became oval. If I had a 40 Distagon, this would not happen as I had excluded the vase changing the camera position.

 

I do think that 4 rolls of TRI-X 320 exposed during the 14 days trial period with the SWC would have given me a pretty good knowledge about the camera.

Tito,

 

4 Rolls of film? Is that all you put through your SWC/M? That is a joke surely. The manual

for the SWC/M clearly illustrates viewfinder coverage, sounds like you didnt read it. All wide

angle lenses show the perspective distortion you speak of, but not all are rectilinear like the

SWC.

Antonio:

 

Yes I read the manual, however, it does not teach you how to overcome the 1/3 lower obstruction imposed by the lens barrel when looking through that sorry finder. Perhaps, I missed something like: going to the nearest Home Depot and cutting the upper part of the lens barrel:~)

 

Yes Antonio, I work everyday from 9 to 8, and I think I did well for just exposing 4 rolls in 14 days. Pardon me, but my real work is not a joke.

Tito, clearly you did miss something as the lower 1/3 is not obstructed, and nowhere in

manual does it say it is! I tested using a ground glass finder and compared it to both a

Hasselblad and Voigtlander finder. Had you spent a bit more than 4 rolls using the

camera you would have discovered that actually the finder covers the entire scene and

that if you look at the bottom corners they are accurate too - all you then need to do is

scan the scene with your other eye to see what is in the scene between the bottom two

corners and you are set - how hard is that? My criticism of you is that you purport to have

definitive information about the camera when in reality seem to know very little about it,

cerainly you have hardly used one. 4 rolls of film is nothing.

<p>I just purchased an SWC/M and for the fine focusing, I'm planning on using my Leica in order to get the distance and then just set the SWC/M to match. have you thought about that? Then you won't need a tripod and ground glass focusing tool. What do you think?</p>

<p>To: <a href="http://www.photo.net/photodb/user?user_id=1060100">gary gumanow</a><br>

That is an interesting idea, however, you will probably need to get another wide angle lens to get the 50cm close range.</p>