First Trannies Are On the Lightbox

[scott_fleming1]

I was nearly shaking as I unwrapped the little packet and placed

them on the lab's lightbox. What a surprise ... all in focus and

within acceptable exposure. Blew me away. `The depth of field

seemed endless under the loupe even though I shot between f/11.6 and

f/16.4. If I had kicked it up to 22 it might have been even better.

 

I am soooo hooked! Those of you who may have read my previous

threads know I'm a former auto-everything-camera user (EOS A2E) who

had no idea which end of a lightmeter to look through untill two

days ago. Due to a tremendous desire to make large prints of the

wonderful scenes to be found along the wild rivers of Central Texas

where I live ... and a generous portion of hubris on my part, I went

out and bought a slightly used Toyo 45 AII and three new Schneider

lenses to go with it.

 

After my very first transparencies I have to say it was all worth it

and if I can do it anybody who loves photography can do it. The

incredible depth of color and detail is just unbelievable. I am so

pumped to get into the hard to reach places and get images rarely

seen let alone captured by LF.

 

I've never even used slide film before. Maybe it's the good lenses

and the easy to use Toyo or perhaps all this study I've done was

actually worth it. But my confidence level is that of a bass

fisherman who has just landed his first ten pounder where other

fisherman had said only small fish would be found. I know I can do

this. My wife may not see me much the next many months. Can't wait

for spring and the wildflowers.

 

I used both Fuji Velvia and Kodak Ektachrome 100vs for each shot.

Hard to see the difference although the greens are deeper with the

Fuji. The extra stop of the Kodak made for a better image however

given some little foam flecks on the water which looked like blurred

strips with the slower film. The muted browns of the tree bark

looks identical with the two films to me.

 

I did no bracketing but just this experience tells me that when I go

for a real keeper I will make identical exposures. One of the shots

was by far my fave but it was underexposed by maybe a third of a

stop. If it had been an image I wanted to frame the accompanying

identical exposure could have been adjusted whereas if I had

bracketed it would have been by a half stop and this would have not

been as good.

 

The darker image however had a perfect sky for what I wanted. Is

there any way to keep that sky and mate it with the better

foreground of a brighter exposre ... outside of PhotoShop?

[curtis_nelson]

So when are you gonna scan'em and post'em?

[scott_fleming1]

As soon as I start shooting something worth publishing AND I get a real scanner. Could be a while.

[dan_bramley]

I remember the feeling. Every time I get a box of film back I feel the same excitement. Every time I get film back I also learn something and through that you will get even better photo each time you are out.

Dan

[stephen hazelton]

I had a similar feeling pulling the film reel out of the tank the first time and seeing there were actually little pictures on it! Felt like Dr. Frankenstein, saying, "It's alive! It's alive!!!"

[harry_pluta3]

Congrats!

 

Wait till you get the hang of tilts and get that first in focus forground/background picture.

 

Best light,

[billkantor]

Scott,

 

Glad to see you are enjoying the world of LF photography. Your question seems to be about capturing the sky and the foreground. I have found the same problem. It is often difficult to get both and sometimes you just have to decide which is more important (a good spotmeter helps a lot to figure out where you will be keeping detail.) Here are some other things that help.

 

I use Fuji Provia--not as saturated as velvia but it has (by my tests) about full stop more dynamic range than Velvia. Sometimes an extra stop can do the trick. Although I have not done it yet (no scanner) I understand that you can kick up the saturation in Photoshop to get it to match Velvia if you want.

 

Use Fuji Astia. It has some additional range if you want to experiment. I seemed to get more--about a half to a full stop more than Provia as I recall in my test. But I have not shot it enough to give you personal results based on real world images. (I tested this a while ago on 4x5 but have not shot it since it is not available in 8x10--my format of choice.)

 

Make two exposures--one for the sky, one for the foreground--and merge them in Photoshop. I have not tried this but I have seen a writeup of the technique in Photoshop 6 Artistry. You can find the more recent edition on Amazon.com.

 

Use a graduated neutral density filter. I don't own one but have seen various discussions extolling their virtues. Personally, I think that this would be very hard to line up without seeing the line. But some have figured out the trick and have produced some astonishing images this way.

 

Good luck!

[billkantor]

BTW, another apporach is to use a very negative film which has plenty of lattitude/dynamic range. I have tried this but have never been impressed with the quality of the prints I can get. On the other hand, I have seem some astonishing images produced using negative film, scanned, and printed on a fine-art giclee printer.

[doug_dolde]

"The darker image however had a perfect sky for what I wanted. Is there any way to keep that sky and mate it with the better foreground of a brighter exposre ... outside of PhotoShop?"<p>

 

It will be quite hard to combine two different exposures in Photoshop. Tricky for several reasons. Your scanned files will be very large, you will have to have them sized identically, and they will have to be aligned identically. If you were using a digital camera then it would be easy but not with scanned film.<p>

 

I have success with ND grads. In fact I only bought two so far. A 3 stop hard edge for fairly flat horizons and a two stop soft edge for more varying horizons. I use Singh Rays 4x6 inch filters in a Lee holder. The edge and effect is easier to see on the hard edge filter of course.<p>

The trick here is that you must stop the lens down to the aperature you are going to shoot at to align the filter. With the lens wide open it won't be visible. The filters can be rotated as well as adjusted up and down in the holder.<p>

All of the images with the sun in them on my <a href="http://www.painted-with-light.com/html/seascapes.html">Seascapes</a> page were taken using the 3 stop hard ND grad. It brings the sky brightness down three stops.

[ken_schroeder]

Welcome to the real joy of 4x5, making images.

[paul_coppin]

I would second the opinion to give Provia a try - the reduced saturation from Velvia is a little easier to live with plus you get a bit more speed. You might also experiment with Portra VC in a neg film. Overall more latitude than Provia, and a bit more versatile in the darkroom if you wet print. Reduced saturation may help your sky issue some by making the sky a little less dramatic, although Graduated NDs are probably a better solution. Or, do like many of the colour "masters", take a book, CD player, comfortable chair, and wait until the light's just right:)

[philip_sweeney]

can't always get what you want! try to realize the scale of your film. I use E100S when I do color. for metering I use a Pentax V. you did not say whether you use a spotmeter, if you do I have found that E100S does well from zones IV to VII (brightest value placed VII), III will start to be dark and will no longer be "open." If your metered shot was V to VI, you could shoot for IV to V, darken a sky and hold detail (open and luminous) at IV.

 

When I want to use the entire scale of the film I place the highlight at VII, with some night shots one could place lamps, etc. at VIII.

 

I shot this with the lights placed at VII, and I personally can't achieve that kind of control with an averaging meter:

 

<html>

<body>

<ul>

<li><a href="pitts.html">a pittsburg panorama</a></li>

</body>

 

</html>

[philip_sweeney]

sorry about the dead link in the previous post

<html>

<ul>

<li><a href=http://home.att.net/~shipale/pitts.html <p>pitts_pan</p></a></li>

</ul>

<html>

[leonard_evens]

Glad to hear you finally have some pictures.

 

One suggestion if you are going to be viewing the results as transparencies on a light box. Don't look too closely with a high power loupe, particularly with respect to depth of field. Because of the way it works, the higher the magnification, the less depth of field. Also, if you apply enough magnification, you could begin to see the effects of diffraction, even at quite moderate f-stops like f/22. It is easy to become disappointed because of expectations that are not physically realizable.

 

I envy you being in Texas at this time of year. With the lousy weather we've been having in Chicago, I find it hard to find occasions to photograph anything.

[scott_fleming1]

Thanks to all who have responded to this thread. I've sort of lost my enthusiasm today however. Apart from the awful tragedy of this for the Astronauts and their families ... this is very bad for the space program. Mankind needs the space program. I pray that it can be salvaged.

[jonathan_bundick]

Scott,

 

Welcome to the LF club. Spread the word and help as many as you can find the joys of LF.

 

On the space program? We don't have to worry abuot it ending. It will continue.

[nicholas_f._jones]

Scott, I've recently had a comparable experience even though I've been in LF photography 2 1/2 years now. I do 8x10 black and white. Finally I got my enlarger, and we test-printed a mountain landscape at 20x24 and mounted it on foam board. It's the most god-awful beautiful thing *I* have ever created, for sure. It's on the dresser behind me now in our art/photography room as I write this. I return to it again and again for encouragement and inspiration to do more, to go farther. Bobby Fisher got it wrong; it's not chess that's life, it's ... well, you know what I'm thinking. As for Columbia, life (and I mean all that's so much more important than photography) goes on ... as all of us who've been around for a while eventually come to realize. Enjoy your images, and welcome to the community.

[dave_mueller]

Off Topic: To Philip Sweeney - you forgot the H at the end of Pittsburgh!

[nicholas_f._jones]

Dave, I tried to bring up Philip's landscape but no go on his url. Are you sure it's not a shot of Pittsburg, California?

 

Greeting from the Smoky City,

 

Nicholas

 

P.S. Actually, the heavy industry is long gone ...

[nicholas_f._jones]

Sorry, missed Philip's corrected link. Yes, definitely the city where the "three rivers" meet. Nice shot. Nicholas.

[michael_meacham]

Scott,

 

First, Provia 100F is your best bet for color transparencies. Second, get an 81EF filter. The orange in the filter blocks some of the blue light from the sky which makes it darker. It has little or no effect on the land portion of the picture. Expose for the land or set blue sky (no clouds) on zone V or expose for the clouds on zone VII. Meter through the filter, usually +2 stops. The beauty of Provia is you can push it to 400 with virtually no loss of resolution and this will make up for the filter. Note: 81 EF is same as a KR6.

 

Mike