Landscape composition with Mamiya 6.

[bengt_rehn]

I am thinking about to buy a complete set of Mamiya 6 MF (multi

format) and use it for some handheld travel, wedding and for serious

landscape photography. The set consist of 2 bodies and one of each

50,75,150mm lenses and a closeup extention tube for the 75mm lens. I

want a 6 X 6 system and I think I can do a fair amount of good

photography with these three focal length. Money and weight are

factors and I would like to carry a stereocamera and a small 35mm

system as well on hikings. The alternative would be to get a used

Hassy or Bronica system, I think. I would pay about 2000 USD for the

Mamiya set in very good condition. For the landscape part, I will use

color correction filters, graduated grayfilters, polar filter as well

as good lens shades ( bigger than the Mamiya orginal) and of course a

tripod and a handheld meter. I know all of these use will be a lot

more difficult with a rangefinder system than with a SLR. My biggest

worries are about how this system will affect my compositional

ability and my ability to improve my skills in that field. Is it

possible with dedication and practice to develop the visualisation of

the final image in the way it would be, using a waist level finder

with a matte screen? Of course it will be harder and take a longer

time, but will a likely to get there or will I walk on an end road

with the rangfinder system? Comments on my questions and thoughts

will be appreciated, and I prefer to feel stupid now, rather than

after the purchaise.

[john_hicks___]

I think Bill Pierce put it best; with a viewfinder camera you put a frame around the subject, while with a groundglass-viewing camera you arrange the subject(s) in the picture. Or iow, it's just a different way of composing and may or may not suit your taste.

 

You can't really know how using such a camera, if you're used to groundglass viewing, will affect your work until you try it.

 

The everything-sharp viewing can help in spotting potential tonal/detail mergers, that piece of trash in the mid-distance, that one intruding weed three feet away etc. Otoh it can make DOF judgments difficult.

 

Tidbits....

 

The Mamiya shades are sloped and have cutouts so they don't block the viewfinder very much; longer or bigger shades may block too much of the viewfinder.

 

A bubble level, one of those shoe-mount types, can be _very_ useful in getting horizons level especially with the 50mm lens.

 

Mamiya has a new swing-out polarizer, which should make usage very easy; otoh effective use of a grad filter will be rather difficult.

[adrian_tyler]

I've been using 35mm rangefinders for years, and when hiking sometimes I don't feel like lugging around my Hasselblads so I have experience with landscapes and rangefinders. To me it's like a different way of composing, more intuitive (more guesswork), the Leica M3 and M6 shoot about 10% more than the framelines suggest, so you have to take this into account and really sometimes if you want a tight frame just have to hope for the best. You can check the results of the rangefinder (I have a large 35mm framed print in the house and line up the rangefinder on it and cna see the "overs" on the photo of the photo) or just lineing it up as you please and this will help you get the feel.

 

I don't think I would worry too much about never getting the hang of it I think that depends on your capacity to handle change, but maybe a bit of experience with a 35 mm rangefinder may give you an idea, take one out for the weekend.

 

Sure my Hasselblad landscapes are more easy to compose but I got to work harder no to make them less rigid, the rangefinder seems to me somehow more spontanious, but lets not get into all that mirror vs. rangefinder stuff, Eliot Erwitt says it all pretty well in the intro to his "Personal Exposures".

 

good luck

[david_henderson]

I use a Bronica 6 x 6 and also the Mamiya 7II. Composition-wise the rangefinder has certain advantages and clear disadvantages. You can't see depth of field which isn't exactly a plus, and neither can you frame exactly since not only does the brightline frame not coincide with the edge of the image but the degree to which it fails to do so is variable with focus distance. A big shade is likely to interfere with the viewfinder image. Equally the viewfinder (though not the auxillary viewfinders) for the M7 looks sort of polarised so in some cases the colours are a little misleading. On the plus side the rangefinder allows you to see outside the picture area too, though personally I find this a mixed blessing. I also find the interchangeable screen useful on the Bronica - I find that a 1cm grid helps me compose better and keeep the camera visually level. I'm not sure you can change the screen on a Mamiya rangefinder.

 

So on balance I'm saying that I do find the M7 somewhat more difficult to compose with than a MF SLR; though the lenses are truly excellent.

 

You mention that you want to use ND grads. This is difficult and many would say impossible because you just can't see to align the grad with the area you're trying to underexpose. It's probably the biggest single reason why I reach for the Bronica and not the M7 for most of my landscapes. I have a screw -in ND grad on order, more in hope than expectation, and all my attempts to use my Hi-Tech filters with the rangefinder have failed.

 

There are some circumstances where rangefinders are more flexible than SLR's for landscape - for example when you can't use a tripod; when you need the lighter weight. On balance though I still find the SLR the more flexible tool because there are few types of photograph I can't make with it whereas the rangefinder has clear limitations. I regard the M7 as my excellent second camera - I 'm delighted with the images but I could see me going on a trip without it. There's no way I'd leave the Bronica behind.

[john_hicks___]

I don't know how relevant this may be to your intentions....

 

I use the M6 gear and a Hassie SWC for lightweight travel/landscape/etc, and rather than lugging around the 6x6 SLR equipment for the times the light outfit isn't sufficient I find that it's no more difficult, heavier or time-consuming to just use 4x5.

[paul_wilson2]

John Hicks advice about a bubble level is very good. I used to have a 6MF and found it harder to get even horizons than with an SLR. I bought a shoe-mount bubble level and this helped a lot. I traded the 6 for a 7II and still use the bubble level. However, since I usually have the finder for the 43 mounted, I just hold the level on the top plate of the camera and then put it in my pocket when I'm done.

 

Before the 6MF, I owned a Pentax 67. For some reason I just never got along with the thing. It's a great camera but I never got great compositions with it for some reason. I found I compose better with the Mamiya rangefinders. In other words, you may get used to and even like composing in the viewfinder or you might hate it.

[bengt_rehn]

Thank you very much for your responses! My main interest is to project slides. Some of you were mention the d.o.f issue. Is it not sufficient to use the d.o.f scale on the lens? For the use of bigger shades, my idea is to compose from a tripod without it and then carefully attach it to the lens. For the use of grad.filters, my idea is to take a series of test shots and then make a scale on both the filters and the filter holder, one scale for each lens. I will then make a judgement in the finder that, as example, I need the edge 30% down from the topp. Assuming the judgement is right, I would know exactly were to put the filter. In difficult situations, I could make two or three bracketings with slightly different positions. I dont know, maybe I underestimate the difficulties.

[david_henderson]

I can only speak for the M7 but I doubt the M6 is much different. The DOF scales on the lenses are not adequate because like most others they are very optimistic for critical use. At least you'll have to use the values for f11 when shooting at f16 and so on. But I wasn't implying that these cameras have a particular DOF problem - just that you can't see it. For example with an SLR stopped down, you can see how much out of focus a particular part of your scene is, and you will find this difficult using DOF scales alone. It's relatively easy, given the right film speed and aperture, to set the camera up for when

you want everything to be in acceptable focus. But what happens when this just isn't possible because the wind's blowing and you can't buy the shutter speed implications? Or if you want part of your photograph to be somewhat out of focus, and you need to see how much? Or if the front to back distance you want to incorporate in the image is just too great for even minimum aperture? It's these difficult shots where a rangefinder struggles which is why I say that SLR's are actually more flexible.

 

Your idea for grads is interesting, but if you're bracketing exposures as well as grad position then you could be needing an awful lot of shots, and nature won't always give you that opportunity. Also (and I might have this wrong so others feel free to correct me) is it the case that at different apertures then different portions of the lens are in use, and therefore unless you're setting the grad exactly in the middle, the optimum position of the grad will vary with aperture? If so, it could be quite a complicated scale you need to develop.

 

Equally consider a polariser. We've all worked out that using a polariser with a rangefinder isn't so hard and you just have to twiddle the thing before putting it on the lens not afterwards; but with an SLR you can make tiny adjustments in degree of polarisation for example to trade off degree of saturation against excessive darkening of the sky. With a rangefinder this degree of accuracy is much more difficult.

[john_hicks___]

> Is it not sufficient to use the d.o.f scale on the lens?

 

That works fine for me; I use a stop smaller than the scale I'm using since the scale is intended for about 4X. For example, if I want the DOF indicated for f8 I'll actually shoot at f11.

 

I just had a thought....you might consider the Horseman VH-R or its earlier incarnation, the 985. This is a 2x3 technical camera similar to the Linhof Technika in that it has RF/VF focusing and viewing for freehand shooting and groundglass focusing/viewing plus some movements for more contemplative or precise work. You could probably find a clean 985 w/three lenses and rollback for around the price of the Mamiya outfit. It'd be heavier, but might give you everything you want.

[bengt_rehn]

Thank you David and John for the information! I didn´t thought about d.o.f in that way, as I rarely fine tuning the amount of unsharpness in 35mm format. Most often I want everything sharp or a lot of background blurring, but I realize this will be much more of an issue, working with a bigger format. One way of solving the problem could be to bring my 35mm SLR along with a 50, 85 and 2X converter, and view a part of the MF frame at a time, not convenient but maybe it will work. When you are using ND-grads with a mirror camera, do you have to adjust the filter with the lens stopped down in order to get the edge precisely where you want it to be? John! You are complicating my life. Camera movments is something I want to do sooner or later, and that is one factor who prevent me to forget about the Hasselblad system ( Bronicas and Rolleis dont have a device for tilting, as I know of). I am a bit obsessed about lens quality, and this is one factor which attract me to the Mamiya 6. Would the lenses for Horseman VH-R be close in performance compared to Mamiyas when used in 6x6 format? Is it possible to use the 6x6 format without wasting film by cropping the 2 x 3 frames? Another complicating factor would be to get my hands on that kind of gear, I guess. I am living in a little country with only nine million people, it´s where Hasselblads and Volvos are made, and the people here are using this products in a proportion, not found anywhere else.

[george_nedleman]

I've got a 980 Horseman and you can get a large variety of lenses for it. I have a 105 and 180 Topcon and a 65 Schneider. All are sharp but it is the flexibility of the camera I love. "Movements rule" . cost thus far +/- 2K. Light it ain't. 3backs/camera/lenses/meter/tripod/filters/etc in a back pack =#25-ugh.

George Nedleman

[john_hicks___]

> Would the lenses for Horseman VH-R be close in performance compared to Mamiyas when used in 6x6 format?

 

The Horseman/Topcor lenses have very good repuations, plus you could use lenses from Schneider, Rodenstock, Nikon etc.

 

> Is it possible to use the 6x6 format without wasting film by cropping the 2 x 3 frames?

 

Well, you could; the Horseman camera uses interchangeable rollfilm backs, the most common being 6x7, which is proportional to 8x10 and 16x20 paper. 6x9 is also available. I don't think there are any current 6x6 backs; Graflex made them and they're rather inexpensive but those old Graflex backs can have serious film-flatness problems.

 

Another alternative, which would give you a little front tilt but no rise, fall or shift, is the Rollei SL-66. The newest models are very expensive but older ones which don't have TTL metering etc aren't any more expensive than the common Hasselblads.

 

Otoh, with Horseman, Rollei and Hasselblad you're getting into a lot more bulk and weight than the Mamiya.

[kappel]

I am using a complete Mamiya 6 outfit (yes, the close-up attachment and the panoramic kit too). My main subject is landscapes, and I that this camera is a very good light-weight equpiment for this purpose. I am sure that you will get accustomed to visualizing your images. It is different from using a SLR, but once to get the hang of it, it may actually be a faster way of working. I don't think that it is very difficult to use ND grads on the M6. I just look in the viewfinder and estimate how the filter should be positioned. So far, I have never taken a photo, where the use of the filter can be clearly seen. Your idea of test-shooting and marking the filter holder seems like an overkill to me.

 

BTW, the close up attachment is not an extension tube, it is a dedicated close-up lens that is attached in front of the lens. It yields very sharp images, but it doesn't allow exact compositions to be made. Rangefinders are just not meant for close-up photography. In spite of this fact, I have shot a few very nice full face portraits with the close-up attachment.

 

You can find my user comments on the Mamiya 6, in your mothertoungue (not english), on my website.

[richard jepsen]

Bengt, part of your question deals with landscape compositions in the big square. Fay Godwin (1931), a British landscape photographer published a book called "Land" Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 85-50112 (1985). Many of her pictures are done square. She uses diagonals and strong foregrounds while contrasting the wild and primal to the orderly and cultivated. All of these elements are set against wonderful moody skies.