RE: Rollei 6008 & Polaroid Back

I attended a demo by the local agent of the 6008i recently.

 

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During the demonstration, the Gentlement from Germany was trying to illustrate the SCA 300 system, by using a mock up studio set up, Metze flash, monolight, polaroid back and the master control. To his embarrassment, all the shoots were improperly exposed and erratic. He couldn't figure out the problem and had to apologized for the hick up and promised to revert back to the participants on the next day.

 

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The explanation he gave the next day is simply that OTF TTL flash just DOES NOT work with the polaroid back!!!

 

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He asserted that OFT TTL, as the name implies, rely on the reflected light from the film for the computation of the amount of flash power required, and that reflected light is calibrated according to the reflectance of standard film, be it a positive or a negative. Since poloroid film has different colour and reflectance compared with conventional film, the computation by the microchip is inaccurate.

 

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The rational sound pretty convincing, but would render the polaroid back useless, as I would imagine that one would buy the back mainly for proofing purposes. And now, you can't use it in the studio for flash photography. What an irony!!!

 

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I wonder if this problem also applies to other MF camera with OTF TTL on poloroid backs? Any idea?

 

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Thanks & regards

 

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MC Lau

Kuala Lumpur

Malaysia

Actually, this doesn't render the polaroid back "useless in the studio"; you just can't use it with the TTL-OTF activated. I use a polaroid back with my Rollei 6003 SRC in the studio (it's actually a back for the SLX) and it's fine. When using studio flash or my Metz (set MANUAL) I can determine exposures fine! I just have to remember to put the flash to TTL when I'm done testing and start to shoot. The camera is a complete dream! Only problem I had was shooting Konica film once! (see thread)

The explanation offered by the Rollei rep does not make sense. Whatever the reflectance of the Polaroid film, and no matter how much it differs from standard film, it must deviate by a standard amount- whether 1 stop, 2 stops, 1-1/3 stops, whatever. This can be compensated for by adjusting the ASA setting or exposure compensation setting (same thing anyway).

 

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In short, if this were the problem, the exposures would not be erratic, but uniformly either consistently underexposed or overexposed. I cannot believe that the reflectance of Polaroid film differs from that of standard film by an erratic amount.