Shen Hao TFC45-1

Recently bought the above camera used. I am totally new to LF, so bought a

couple of books, after receiving great advice here. On reading up on the

movements of LF cameras, it would appear i've made a bum purchase, as it seems

that 'back tilt' is by far the most commonly used movement. Yep you guessed

correctly...no back tilt on this model!

This is obviously one of the 1st Shen Hao models, albeit in 'as new' condition.

So...can anybody shed some light on this model, and confirm my worst fears,

that firstly there definitely is no back tilt on this one, and or, can it be

easily modified to incorporate this.

 

Also...the camera has all other movements, including front tilt/rise and

fall/swing, and back rise and fall and swing; so can I scrape by without back

tilt or not.

One of the main reasons for me moving to LF, was the whole front to back

sharpness issue, where MF sometimes falls short in the less conventional

situations.

Stu.

"as it seems that 'back tilt' is by far the most commonly used movement."

 

Not really. From my experience, lens tilt is the most commonly used method of altering the plane of focus. You can use back tilt, but doing so can overempasize the size of the foreground.

I've never heard of Shen Hao making a camera with back swing but without back tilt but then I don't really follow these cameras so I can't say for sure. Regardless of that though, I don't think back tilt is "by far the most commonly used movement" for many areas of photography. The only time I use it is for exterior architecture when I run out of front rise and need to aim the camera up to include the top of a building. Then you need back tilt to keep vertical lines parallel to each other. I don't do any commercial product photography but you'd probably sometimes need it there to maintain the correct shape of objects. Otherwise I think you can use front tilt (or, if you became really desperate and had a camera with back swing but no back tilt as you say your camera has, you might be able to turn the camera on its side and convert swing to tilt).

 

"The whole front to back sharpness issue" that you mention can be accomplished just as well with front tilt as with back. The main advantage of back tilt from that standpoint is that it doesn't use up image circle like front tilt does, which may or may not be important depending on the image circle of your lenses. It also distorts objects, primarily foreground objects, which can be good or bad depending on what you're trying to accomplish.

 

All in all I wouldn't knowingly buy a LF camera without back tilt but if in fact you now have such a camera you probably can get by with it as long as you don't do a lot of architecture or commercial product work.

Thank you both for your speedy replies. Brian... I think you've put my mind at rest somewhat, though I don't think I have a lot of room to spare with the image circle on the lens that I got with the camera (90mm Schneider Super Angulon) with a 216mm image circle).

It looks like this camera will ease me into LF, and an upgrade may be on the cards at a later stage. Stu.

You can get the equivalent of a back tilt by tilting the camera and then tilting the front to get it back to the vertical. You will probably also have to use a rise or fall to get the frame back where you want it. That should suffice the few times you would want to use back tilt to change the plane of focus. Of course, you can't simulate a rise as described by Brian without both front and back tilt.

I have back and front tilt on both my 4x5's and I almost always use front tilt only. For some reason, I just find it much easier and quicker to do. Lack of back tilt is far not a huge problem.

That model is a knock-off of an Ebony SW45 - a non-folder designed for shooting architecture. It has limited bellows (under 200mm). Unfortunately, the Shen Hao seriously compromises on the bellows material - the Ebony allows you to use from a 45 to a 180mm on flat lenboards which makes the camera very quick to set-up. The Shen Hao requires a bag bellows for short lenses, which sort of defeats the "quick set-up" fast shooting idea. It does have a lot of front rise specifically for architectural subjects (around 50mm I think). Unless you needed indirect front rise (and with a lot of direct front rise, you seldom would), rear tilt for architectural shooting is superfluous - you just wouldn't need it which is why the camera doesn't have it - rear tilt and swing cause geometric distortion which is not desirable when shooting architectural sujects. The restricted bellows is undoubtably the model's biggest limitation.

Here's a link to the Shen Hao web site; this page features that model of camera (you'll have to scroll down a little to find it):

 

http://www.shen-hao.com/E45.html

 

It rates the bellows compression-extension at 45-190mm.

 

The photos are fairly small, but it looks to me as though it simply has a limiting screw, or some other little gizmo, which keeps the back from tilting, a little way under where the tightening knob is on the rear standard. Perhaps this could be removed, if you decide you really need rear tilt.

 

But why bother? It looks like a plenty flexible wide-angle outfit. I agree with the posts above, that rear tilt is towards the bottom of a photographers "bag of tricks", thus almost never used if front movements will suffice.

 

Judging from the specs, it's not a bad camera at all, with front movements galore -- and rear rise -- to compensate for the lack of rear swing and tilt.

 

Send it along to me, and I'll be happy to run it through some tests for a couple of years for ya :)

I've actually messed around with one for a half hour and can confirm that with short lenses, no movements are available as a result of bellows compression - which is kind of miserable given the design parameters. Ebony gets around this by using their "universal bellows which has an unpleated soft front secton. You really need a bag bellows for this camera for wide angle use. Rear tilt is not an option - the rear standard has two guides to guide the rear standard up and down in the channel - you would need some machining to convert the rear standard to facilitate tilt. The camera is handy if you can make do with between a 90 and 180 with movements.

Sorry for the late reply, but I just saw this thread.

 

You have an excellent camera. I have a TFC45-IIA, which is the same camera with interchangable bellows. I find no limitation with the standard bellows. I have the bag bellows, which would work with any focal length, but I generally use the standard bellows.

 

Sorry Don Hutton, but I respectfully disagree that the standard bellows is a flaw (as he has stated in other discussions). If it was a flaw, than Linhof, Walker, Toyo, Philips, Lotus, Canham and some Ebony field cameras are also flawed. Every field camera made with the exception of some Ebony cameras use a standard bellows, with an option of using an accessory bag bellows or a recessed lens board to accomodate extra-wide lenses.

 

I have no trouble using a Nikkor 65mm lens with the standard bellows and having sufficient movements for the lens. At 65mm, the image circle doesn't allow for much movement, and the standard bellows is perfectly useable.

 

As for the movements, the lens tilt is much more important to me than rear tilt. As far as extra rise for architectural photos, the front rise is more than adequate. The non-tilting back makes the camera easy to level (one less axis to worry about).

 

You have a good camera. Go out and take some great photos.