brian_c._ellis

You mention that you develop no more than four sheets at a time in a

Jobo drum. I don't use Jobo equipment but when I attended a John

Sexton workshop at Anderson Ranch I remember being told something to

the effect that Jobo drums (at least the models we were using) should

always be filled to capacity with film and that one unexposed sheet of

film was equal to two exposed sheets. So, for example, if the capacity

of the drum was ten sheets, and we had six negatives to develop, we

would add two unexposed sheets to the drum. My memory is a little

vague since it's been several years since I attended the workshop

and I haven't used Jobo equipment since that time so I may be wrong on

the details but I do remember adding unexposed film to the drums to

fill them to their film capacity. Maybe someone who uses Jobo

equipment could comment, elaborate, or correct me on this. Brian

Before you get the Lee hood, try to make sure that there is

sufficient clearance between the bottom of the hood and your

camera bed to permit the hood to be screwed onto your lenses.

With my Tachihara the Lee hood worked with fine. With my Linhof

Technika V it is very incovenient because with lenses the front of

which don't extend beyond the front of the camera bed (in my case

only my 210 mm lens extends beyond the front of the bed) there isn't

enough clearance between the lenses and the bed to allow the hood to

be screwed onto the lenses. To get the hood to work with this camera I

have to go through various contortions such as using front rise and/or

dropping the bed and tilting the lens. Bummer, because the Lee hood

works well on the right camera, costs a lot less than most cmpendium

shades, and with Lee filters provides a compact, light way of

carrying a lot of filters in a small space. I highly recomend the

Lee hood and filters, if (big if) your camera will accept them

conveniently. Brian

Robert - I was with you all the way until the part about the

"recomended minimum aperture" being F32 for 4x5. I studied the same

articles you're talking about and have been using the method described

in them on two different cameras with good results for about three

years now but I don't recall anything about a recomended minimum

aperture. One of the good things about using the system the authors

discuss in the articles is that you actually get the "optimum"

aperture, "optimum" in this case being that aperture which will give

you both the necessary depth of field, based on the distance between

the near and far focus points, and that will also produce minimum

diffraction. If all we ever wanted was maximum depth of field we'd all

just stop down to F64 every time and be done with it. We don't do this

of course, in part because of diffraction. So I thought the real

benefit of using the method outlined in the articles was the fact that

you end up with the necessary depth of field and also with the minimum

diffraction. In some cases, when the distance between the near and far

focus points is very small (say a mm or so) the aperture that you end

up with if you use the method discussed in the articles is something

like F 11 or F 16. Anyhow, I was just curious about this "minimum

recomended aperture" business - recomended by who and for what

purpose? Brian

I use and like the MXT (with an Aristo 4500 VCL). The motorized head

is a very nice convenience feature. Once you get used to this it's

hard to use an enlarger without it. I do find it a little difficult to

align the negative stage even though I have the latest version that is

supposed to be easier to align. With respect to using the upper

bellows to adjust for different formats, Beseler sells a little

gizmo that can be attached next to the bellows and that tells you

exactly how far to raise the bellows for each format. Brian

Are you sure it's a "Wista" Zone VI? I know that years ago there was a

connection between Wisner and Zone VI so that some of the earlier Zone

VI cameras might be called "Wisner/Zone VI" but I've never heard of a

connection between Wista and Zone VI. Then again, there's lots of

things I've never heard of. If it's a Wisner/Zone VI then I think it

has to be pretty old, as is the lens. This doesn't mean either are

necessarily bad but I would try to buy with the right to return for

any reason within ten or so days and then give both the camera and the

lens a thorough test. If the lens is any good, and if the camera is in

good shape, $1,000 doesn't seem out of line. If I remember

correctly I've seen used Zone VI cameras alone offered for not much

less than that.

How are you storing the holders and carrying them in the bag? For me,

the dust problem was greatly minimized when I began keeping the

holders in plastic zip lock bags. When not in use I keep the holders

in the bags. When loading film, I first brush the holders with an

anti-static brush, load the film, and put the holder back in the bag.

It stays in the bag until I'm ready to make the photograph. As soon as

the photograph is made the holder goes back in the bag, not to be

removed until processing. This hasn't completely eliminated dust

(Readyload, et al would do that but T Max in Readyload costs twice as

much as non-Readyload) but it has eliminated probably 90%.

If your reason for considering a telephoto is limited bellows

extension, and if cost of the Nikon T is a concern, you might consider

the Fuji 400 telephoto. I bought mine through The F Stops Here for

about $1,100 as I recall (more than the 300 mm Nikon M but less than

the 360 Nikon T). It worked very well on my Tachihara with a 13" draw.

As a bonus, you get an extra 40 mm compared to the Nikon T. With

landscape work I found no significant differences between using this

telephoto lens and using a "normal" lens.

With respect to Alec's answer, I think the point he was trying to

make was that light meters tend to be sensitive to infrared light

but film is not (unless, of course, the film is infrared film). With a

reflected light meter and negative film, this leads to an underexposed

negative with a subject that reflects a lot of infrared light such as

green foliage. The meter sees the light, takes it into account in

giving the exposure information, but the film doesn't see the light.

Hence the film tends to be underexposed because the light that the

meter took into account in determining the exposure never reached the

film. However, I wouldn't think this phenomenon would have

any effect when using an incident light meter since with this type

meter you're not measuring the light reflected by the subject but

rather are measuring the light falling on the subject. Brian

Your best bet for learning all about this process probably is to

access the archives of the alt.process newsgroup. There's a wealth of

information about all aspects of the common alternative processes in

those archives. If you go to Bengt's home page (do a search for

"Bengt") and then scroll down to the heading "New Groups" you'll see

an alt.process group. Access it and then post a question about how to

get into the archives (sorry I can't tell you how to do it myself - I

book marked them several years ago and forget how I originally got to

them). Mike Ware's home page mentioned by someone else is supposed to

be very good for cyanotype. There's also an article on cyanotype in

the first or second issue of "The World Journal of Post Factory

Photography." If you're interested in this new periodical

(there have been three issues to far) devoted to alternative

processes, send an e mail to "info@post-factory.org." BTW, the "Ansel

Adams" book mentioned by someone else is terrible, riddled with

errors. The gum bichromate section alone has something like fifty or

so mistakes (the book was reviewed in the second or third issue of

"Post Factory Photography" if you want to see a discussion of some of

its numerous errors). When you get to the alt.process news group, you

might ask for a recommendation for a good book that deals with

cyanotype. "Keepers of the Light" by William Crawford has a section on

cyanotype and is a very interesting book overall but others in the

group may know of a better one.

Sorry for the above useless response. I see "Phillips" and I think

8x10 camera since they just started making 4x5s a short while ago. I

didn't see that you were asking about the 4x5 until after I posted the

message. Sorry. Brian

I don't have much personal experience but since no one else has

responded, here goes. Phillips made, or at least used to make, at

least three different models of 8x10 cameras. Unfortunately I don't

remember which model used which name. However, the least expensive

model (the "Explorer" maybe?) was an amazingly light 8x10 camera that

would be wonderful for back packing. I believe it weighed around 6

pounds or so. It did have two downsides. First, the back couldn't be

rotated from horizontal to vertical so if you wanted to do a vertical

photograph the only way was to turn the camera on its side on the

tripod, a little scary with an 8x10 camera, even one this light. The

other was a short bellows for an 8x10 camera- I think something in the

20 inch range. If you could live with these two drawbacks, it was a

great 8x10 for back packing. The other two models were more expensive

and were more like "normal" 8x10s - the back could be rotated, the

bellows was longer, the weight and cost were more. I've never seen

these two models so I have no experience with them. There was a review

of all Phillips 8x10 cameras in "View Camera" magazine a few years ago

but I no longer have the magazine so I can't give you a cite.

Hopefully someone will be able to provide you with more detailed

information than this. I saw the basic model for sale by Mike Jones, I

think in the photo.net large format section, a month or so ago but I

don't know if it's still available.

There is such a group in the Tampa area. I posted a private message to

Tim with information about it. If anyone else is interested send me an

e mail and I'll give you the details. Brian

The particular camera that you use may be relevant to your dark cloth

choice. I used to own a Tachihara 4x5 and the Darkroom Innovations

cloth worked very well with it. I now own a Linhof Technika V and the

Darkroom Innovations cloth isn't quite as convenient with it as it was

with the Tachihara. With the Technika I can't loosen the four knobs

necessary to swing or tilt the back with the DI cloth on the camera.

If I decide to swing or tilt the back I have to first remove the

cloth, loosen the four knobs, put the cloth back on, and then adjust

the back. The DI cloth is still usable, just not as convenient as it

was on the Tachihara.

From an optical standpoint there's certainly nothing wrong with using

a "normal" lens for portraiture. The principal reason longer lenses

are usually suggested is to be able to get a head and shoulders shot

without having to get so close that you make the

subject uncomforatable.

 

<p>

 

If you're Cecil Beaton or Richard Avedon et al I guess the subjects

wouldn't care if you put the camera on their nose. If you're Joe Blow

it might bother them.

First, you can purchase used hinged infinity stops for the Graphic

from Clayton Camera (they advertise in "Shutterbug")in St. Lous. You

can use a mark on the focusing rail and save the cost of the stops but

I kind of like being able to raise the hinges on the stops and zip the

lens out to the stops, rather than having to try to eyeball the front

of the lens and get it perfectly aligned with a pencil mark on the

focusing rail. Many people do, however, use a pencil or some other

kind of mark and it works fine if it is properly located on the

focusing rail. Which leads to the next point concerning the location

of the infinity stop or pencil mark. If you want to get it really

right (as opposed to being in the very general ball park) it isn't

overly difficult but it's also not necessarily simple. With respect to

measuring from the film plane to "the lens," the problem is

determining where on "the lens" you measure to. Focal lengths are

determined by measuring to the nodal point of the lens. The nodal

point is usually somewhere in the general vicinity of the center of

the lens (except on telephoto lenses) but I don't know how you would

go about finding it and measuring from it even if you could find it,

though maybe there's some way of doing this that I don't know about.

Secondly, lenses are seldom in fact the exact focal length as they are

quoted. Manufacturers typically round their numbers. Thus a 150 mm

lens (for example) is most likely really 148 mms or 152 mms when

properly measured, not really 150 mms. For these reasons I personally

wouldn't try to determine the infinity setting by measuring a distance

equal to the quoted focal length from the film plane to "the lens." A

better (IMHO) way is by looking at the ground glass but I think you

need to focus on something farther away than a couple blocks. Infinity

is a good bit farther than that. The recommendation that I've seen

several times is something a mile away. Unless you live in the wide

open spaces, finding an unobstructed view of something large enough to

focus on that is a mile away isn't easy (or at least it wasn't for

me). If you were going to use the rangefinder, and so needed cams and

infinity stops and wanted to everything absolutely right, I think the

thing to do would be to find a camera repair facility that has the

necessary equipment to do it right. Marflex, the Linhof repair

facility here in the United States, will place cams and infinity stops

on Linhof cameras and there presumably are other repair facilities

that can do this for other cameras. However, if you're not going to

use the rangefinder I think the ground glass method should be

sufficiently accurate for your purposes, if you can find something

that is far enough away and large enough to focus on.

With respect to an inexpensive IR-proof camera, I did a fair amount of

IR work with my Tachihara and had no light leak problems. The

Tachihara costs around $550. With respect to the problem with your

existing camera,have you tested to see if you have a light leak? If

your problem is simply that the bellows construction/material isn't

sufficiently light proof for infrared film then of course you would

have to try the aliminum foil or some similar method. However, if

could be that you just have one or two small pin hole leaks that

haven't presented a problem with normal film but that create a problem

with infrared because of its greater sensitivity to light and/or

because you've been using longer than normal exposures with your

infrared film.

With base tilt cameras I've been told that you focus first on the far,

then on the near. With axis tilt cameras you focus first on the near,

then on the far. At least that's what I was taught in Tom McCartney's

large format workshop. Having said that, the easiest way I've found to

focus a view camera is the method outlined in a "Photo Techniques"

article several years ago. This method requires that you attach a

milimeter scale and a small pointer of some sort to your camera in a

manner such that you can see the difference, in milimeters, between

the near and the far focus points. Technika and Tachihara cameras have

places on the camera where it is very easy to do this. I don't know

about other cameras. You then split the difference (i.e. focus at a

point that is exactly midway between the near and the far points on

the milimeter scale). You can then try a small tilt (or any other

adjustment) to see if the distance between the two points decreases.

If it does, continue the tilt (or other adjustment) until the distance

between the two points stops decreasing. That is the point at which

you have achieved maximum benefit from the tilt or other adjustment

and you then can use the widest possible aperture (to maximize shutter

speed and minimize diffraction) that will produce enough depth of

field to make everything appear to be in focus (assuming, of course,

that you want everything in focus). This is a synopsis, and slight

oversimplification, of the method outlined in the article. Steve

Simmons recommends focusing in a manner such that the near and the

far are equally out of focus. Very experienced large format

photographers can perhaps do this by looking at the ground glass. The

method I'm describing is, I believe, just a more scientific way of

achieving that goal and it can be used without a lot of experience. I

don't have a citation to the article handy but if you're interested

send me an e ail and I'll dig it out.

Whether this response is helpful probably depends on how badly you

want to pursue the answers to your questions. FWIW, several years ago

an instructor in a photography class showed us a long, maybe two hour,

videotape about Richard Avedon's career. I believe the tape originated

as a PBS or some other network television program. It included a

segment on his Western portraits and as I recall it showed him making

some of the portraits. If you can find this video tape it probably

would give you some idea of his techniques. Calumet and B&H both have

a pretty extensive library of photography related video tapes so they

might be good places at which to start.

As others have said, T Max films work well as long as everything

remains constant (time, temp, agitation, etc.) Since you talk about

standing for 20 minutes in the dark, I assume that you are developing

in trays. I've never tried trays but in my darkroom it would be

difficult to keep temperatures constant for 20 minutes session after

session. With roll film in tanks I found that unless I keep the tank

in a water bath at around 64 degrees, the temperature of the developer

in the tank increases from 68 degrees to 72 - 75 degrees in the course

of eleven minutes. With 4x5 film I use the BTZS tubes in the BTZS

water tray and this keeps the developer temperature constant and has

the side benefit of permitting the processing to be done in room

light.

I've seen all sorts of suggestions over the years. Most recently,

Richard Sullivan of Bostick and Sullivan has been raving about some

sort of glue-like substance (that he sells). If you go to the Bostick

and Sullivan web site I think you'll see something about it or, if

not, you could send Richard an e mail. One thing that I think gets

overlooked sometimes with bellows repairs. Unless the original leaks

were caused by an accident of some sort, there's a reason why the

leaks developed and it's a virtual certainty that they'll continue to

develop. Unfortunately, after repairing the original leaks you won't

be aware of the new leaks until you've ruined some photographs.

Inevitably, the ruined photographs will be the best, most

important, most valuable photographs you've ever made in your life. I

would recommend replacing the bellows if you really like the camera.

I use the Lee lens hood/filter system. With my recently acquired Linhof Technika V 4x5 camera I've found that there isn't enough clearance between my lenses and the camera bed to permit the hood to be screwed onto the lens, i.e. the corners of the hood bump into the bed. I have to either use a lot of front rise to increase the clearance, or drop the bad and tilt the front standard backwards, or (in the case of the 150 mm G Claron) both. This is something of a pain to say the least, particularly since I have to remember which lens requires which solution. I'm wondering whether anyone else uses the Lee system with this camera and has any suggestions or what other types of hoods/filter systems people use. Thanks. Brian

It certainly sounds like a light leak. If the dark areas are at the

bottom of the negative, this means that the light is coming in through

the top of the holder since the image is reversed on the

negative. The leak could be caused by any of the tings that others

have suggested. I would just like to second the suggestion that you

keep the holder covered by the darkcloth for the entire time it is in

the camera. When I first got into large format I had similar problems.

I was putting the holder in the camera and it sometimes would sit

there for five or ten minutes while I went through all the other large

format gyrations. Even with the dark slide in the holder, this can

cause light leaks particularly if the camera is in sun light. I now

cover the top of the holder with my dark cloth as soon as the holder

is placed in the camera and I leave it there until the photograph has

been made. When pulling and replacing the dark slide I keep the

darkcloth in my hand and grasp the slide with the dark cloth over the

holder. Since I started doing this I've had no light leaks.

I've used Type 55 film only once but for other Polaroid films you move

the lever from "L" to "P" before pulling the film out for processing.

I thought I did the same for Type 55 film on the one occasion when I

used it but it's been a while so maybe my memory is wrong. In any

event, are you sure you're supposed to leave the lever at "L" when

you pull the film out? If so, this is different from all other

Polaroid films with which I'm familiar. Brian

Steve Grimes also makes adapter rings for lenses that have diameters

for which Lee doesn't make a standard adapter. He made one for my 150

mm G Claron, which has a weird filter diameter. He charged about $70

as I recall. I don't know how that compares with Lee's prices for

special order adapters.

This is not a topic on which you find a whole lot of agreement.

However, I think it is fairly well accepted that using Readyload film

in the Polaroid holder isn't a good idea, even though Kodak includes

instructions for doing so with Readyload film. There is less agreement

on Readyload holders. Many people seem to hate them, others

seem to love them. There apparently have been several models made. The

current version seems to be the best so I wouldn't try to save money

by getting a used one. They only cost about $50 new as I recall. I've

had no problems with mine. It is important, I think, to follow the

instructions meticulously. I believe that some of the problems are

attributable to people just trying to jam the film into the holder

without paying attention to the instructions. I've seen almost no

negative comments about the Fuji holder. I've never used one but

virtually everyone who has seems to like them.