gary_deal
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Posts posted by gary_deal
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First things first:
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- How much magnification do you want to produce on the film? Or, what size object would you like to fill the film frame with?
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- Do you actually need a 4x5 film image? It's much easier to get the equivalent on 35mm film. (I haven't managed to afford myself a digital camera that would do this job)
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The complex microscope setups are nice, but expensive. Back around 1990 I cobbled up a setup that would do 40x on the film, with sharpness that went all the way down to the film grain in Ektar25 (yeah, I'm getting old). Aside from the bellows, the setup probably cost me less than thirty dollars and some time hand-making some parts.
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<A HREF="http://www.9000shops.com/me/biref.html"> http://www.9000shops.com/me/biref.html</A>
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It's a thing of beauty, isn't it?
I don't think the rails should be loose.
Be sure and clean the contact areas of those rails first, all kinds of stuff can find it's way in there over the course of decades. I usually just go straight to the acetone and cotton swabs, but it'll depend on what's in there. For lubrication I personally prefer RemOil, an ultralight oil that's supposed to have teflon microparticles in it, that would be found with shooting-related supplies. Put a drop on a cotton swab and wipe it into the mating surfaces for a very light coating, then move the rails back and forth to work it in. Ron's suggestion of the caliper lube sounds useful too, I'll be adding that to my shopping list.
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If that's the guy I'm thinking of, he made Images in Paris and Rome the same way. It appeared that some time and care was taken to select the room for not only it's vantage point, but for the qualities of the room itself. I found the overall effect to be very interesting, with a potential for versatility. (and motel advertising)
This looks like his site, too much data for my dumpy dialup connection here at work:
Another interesting thread here on photo.net:
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I'm not near my stuff right now, but I think that's a coarser thread than the usual 86mm, and I think Tiffen refers to it as "86C" thread. I also think it's possible to get a "regular" filter to stick on there well enough to not fall off easily. Again, not near my stuff right now so can't check.
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Uh, a 480mm Rodagon-G? 24 inch Apo-Ronal CL? 890mm Apo-Nikkor? And a couple of long Artars?
Donna, these guys are probably trying to be conserative in their replies, I hope you haven't accepted a lowball offer off-list.
Ebay seller Dagor77 could probably get enough for this set to buy a decent used car, or a week in Hawaii. Perhaps you should look him up and check with him - I've seen him sell another person's things occasionally.
Ebay is the way to go, they're as far from being doorstops as that NYC guy's kidneys. Good sharp photos of all sides and the best description you can come up with (listed in the right area) will get you the best prices, and don't throw anything away until you've made sure that nobody will pay a dollar plus shipping for it. I have a machine that takes small collets that would comfortably fit in my nose, and those collets are several hundred bucks new - on ebay they're fifty and up. You never know when a small, seemingly insignificant item will pull lots of money - kinda like diamonds.
Geez, I hope you guys aren't this much help with *my* estate, "yeah, that 360 Symmar-S with perfect glass oughta be worth at least forty bucks..."s
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I'm the guy that's been selling the $15 repro Busch boards on ebay over the last couple of years.
Andy, nice work, are you up for making the smaller board for Anton?
If not, Anton, where are you located?
-Gary
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Hey, that *is* cheap!
The developer does influence the final image contrast. For example, consider the lamented Kodak Technical Pan film, aka "TechPan". You could expose it at around asa/iso 100-200 and develop in dektol or HC110 dil.A and get litho-type high contrast, or you could expose it in the 12 - 50 range and develop in technidol or POTA and get a long tonal range that might even be called low contrast - and everything in between.
When you receive your film, read whatever data sheets are included with it and consider the development recommendations thoroughly. There's special two-part litho developers that should be mixed immediately before use and will oxidize quickly, those will usually produce the highest contrast and give the best edge effects (results in even higher contrast at light/dark boundaries). Then there's things like Kodak D19, a single part but still high energy developer, and a few steps down the list would be straight Dektol or it's equivalent, which is a b/w paper developer that's usually diluted for use (try it straight). If you want to try doing actual pictorial work with it, something like D76 diluted 1:1 with water would be a place to start, or you can treat it like paper and enlarge negatives onto it for transparencies and develop in diluted dektol.
Since dektol is so available and easy to work with, I'd suggest you start with a package of that. Cut a sheet of film into smaller pieces to do your exposure and development time testing. Yes, development time matters too, shoot for two minutes unless otherwise indicated by the data sheet or your tests. If holes/bubbles appear in the developed films, either dilute your stop bath by about 50% or switch to plain water.
Oh, and when making etching masks, make sure to set up so that the emulsion side of the film will be in contact with the photoresist, that's probably both the dumbest and easiest mistake to make. I still have to think hard to get that right.
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Yes.
One of the thngs I "collected" was a roll of IR imagesetting film, and after a couple of shots I arrived at a (seat-of-my-pants) film speed of about asa/iso 1 behind a Red 25 filter. Eight minutes in 1:1 D76 gave me a reduction in contrast and a contact-printable neg. I didn't like it at first, but left it laying on a table and it kind of grew on me and now I really like it. The contrast needs to be pulled a bit and the film has to be hand cut on it's rather thin substrate, but at a few cents for a 5x7 sheet of very fine gained IR film it's got potential. I consider exposures of one second at f:16 to be manageable. The IR effect is more pronounced behind an 87C filter, but requires at least another four stops of exposure. I didn't like the results from the 89B.
That's yet another of my neglected projects.
I also have some rolls of red-sensitive imagesetting film, and I made a huge crude box camera to take full-width pieces of the stuff. I call it the BSC (Big Stupid Camera), it's format is about 12x20 inches, and it's single-sheet loaded. It's an awkward beast with an 18" lens and the huge pieces of film require close to a liter of D76, and the whole thing makes for a lot of work for huge but not terribly exciting negs. I might get more excited about it if I tried contact printing one, but there's that contrast problem as well as having to cobble up a printing frame. Imagesetting film acts differently than pictorial film, it really tries to kick over to full density, and that stuff seems more insistent than the IR film.
Then there's the Agfa Cronex I got, nice 8x10 sheets with a heavy clear-based substrate, film speed looks to be around 25 unfiltered, tonal range in the couple of test shots looks pretty good, and while the grain might be a little rough it doesn't matter much in 5x7 and 8x10. Now I just need some motivation to drag myself and the various monsters outside and across the countryside.
And yes, I do have conventional films for the big cameras, I just have this innate need to try something else.
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I will asume that you're planning on using a photoresist and etching your own circuit boards.
Films generally referred to as "Ortho-Litho" would be appropriate for this, they are designed for ultra-high contrast with extreme density in the exposed areas and near-zero density in the unexposed areas. Unfortunately Kodak discontinued their ortho-litho film. If you can get some cheaply, "imagesetting" films are very similar though they tend to be on very thin base materials.
"Ortho" films, by definition, have little sensitivity to red light. You'll need to check how "safe" your safelight is by masking part of a sheet of film and holding it closer to the safelight than you will normally work, for longer than you'll normally work. Half the distance and twice the time is a start. Unmask and develop the film, if you can tell where the mask was you need a better safelight. If there's just slight density, keeping the film in your shadow can help.
I'm not familiar with the PL25, check to see if it's supposed to be a continuous-tone pictorial film, or a high-contrast film. Even if it's intended for continuous-tone, you might still be able to work with it after some developer experimentation.
While I've used special litho-developers, for quick work I'll usually just go with undiluted dektol and develop by inspection and the results of the previous sheet that wasn't dense enough. You'll have to do at least a couple of tests, but you want the black areas to be **completely** black, so you can't see through them.
I've made quick/dirty masters by printing on cheap matte coated paper (one step up from plain) at "high quality", and then rubbing some vegetable oil into the paper to increase it's transparency. Rub the oil off thoroughly and it's ready to go into the contact frame with the film. If your traces and pads are large, it's even possible to use the oiled-paper print as the mask, with additional testing (2-5 times the exposure for film).
While my methods are crude, they do work as long as the traces aren't too fine.
There is an alternative - use a service bureau to output films on their imagesetters. We can have an 11x14 inch sheet done for $18, and that's the regular pricing - we email them the appropriate vector files. That's why any of the stuff I do myself is only for quick one-offs. If you don't already have all the required stuff, you're probably better off having it done by professionals.
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I just checked mine against a little #0-sized prontor-s and it does screw right in, the overall length looks right, and the blades all appear to clear the optics. Yours will probably work fine. Thanks for adding a whole 'nuther group of things to my list...
The lens will not cover 4x5 at infinity, I'd have to root around and find those negs but as I recall the image circle just barely reached the narrow sides of a 4x5 sheet. However, that still gives you a tremedous cropping potential as well as the possibilities of closer subjects
I recall reading that the 60mm was based on a biogon design, anybody know anything about that?
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Hey Pico, you're willing to make custom stuff for money, right? What sorts of items and materials do you usually make and work with? What kind of shop machinery are you working with? Got photos of stuff? Got a list of things you already know how to make?
(ok, that's about as big an opening as I can give you, jump on in)
"And all for only $19.95? WOW!"
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ray, be sure and take a closer look at the new Intel-based Macs, they'll run XP directly and you can buy with everything already installed. Check out www.smalldog.com, they're doing plenty of them. And no, I don't work for them.
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Hi David, got that Wista in your hands now? Did you find a lensboard for it yet? Without a lens I guess you haven't seen an image on the groundglass yet, if you haven't seen that in person before you're in for an "Oh My God!" moment. =8D I hope you're getting a good tripod lined up to put under it.
Jason's right, avoid that one, there's plenty of 150mm Symmars (in proper Compur shutters), and probably Symmar-S (in Copal shutters) in that price range. Like, ebay # 7621592115 (Linhof), 7623104232, 7623835613...
John's got a good point as well, not all ebay sellers know what they're talking about (or are entirely truthful) and return policies may be nil, an actual establishment has advantages. However, some ebay sellers are quite good/reputable.
When I first read your post and saw "needing to economize", I thought real low end. If you've blown your wad on the camera (looks like a nice piece of machinery by the way) and want some cheap fodder to burn black/white film with, keep an eye out for Zeiss Jena Tessars that look like the one in ebay #7621893998 (there's a good picture of the lens/shutter, but don't buy the camera for the lens). Look at but ignore the one in #7624358785, it has no aperture blades(?) and no returns. With these, stick with 13.5cm (135mm) and longer, I don't know if anything shorter will cover 4x5.
Then there's the 127mm Rodenstock Ysarex that was on the Polaroid 110b cameras, but sometimes they're funky from poor storage conditions.
None of the auction numbers noted above are mine or related to me in any way, and some of you may call me an idiot for suggesting that David hang such antiques on his fine new camera, but I've always liked these old tessars myself. They're also a great way to check out different focal lengths and fit nicely in closed press cameras.
-Gary, in SW Kansas
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Rowland/Ron, I'm sure I'd enjoy your workshop, if only to expand the number of things I know how to do but seldom actually perform. All those pieces of information can often be useful elsewhere.
I was asking about the aluminum and which layer was lifting because of some aspects of commercial anodized aluminum. The anodized layer, particularly if it's been colored/dyed, is often treated with additional materials to enhance it's appearance and durability. These additional materials could prevent good adhesion of the emulsion (like trying to get the emulsion to stick to wax). A stronger or harsher detergent might be able to remove enough of the material. Sodium Hydroxide will strip the anodizing, so it should be avoided (read labels). A sulfuric acid wash (NOT hydrochloric) might remove the added materials, but may also destroy coloring dyes and can be nasty to work with.
If the emulsion's lifting is because of a post-anodizing treatment performed on the material, adjusting the emulsion and it's processing may be of little help. On the other hand, if it is the emulsion acting up (re: my question regarding the base coat), then the anodizing details are mostly meaningless.
I have a project that I'd like to get back to this year, directly photosensitizing anodized aluminum (no emulsion), which requires that I do the anodizing myself. I've had technical success, but it needs a lot of improvement. Wish me luck.
-Gary
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Merritt, I take it you're buying the anodized aluminum plates as opposed to anodizing them yourself? Are they intended for the application of photo emulsions?
When you've used a base coat, does the base coat separate from the aluminum or is the emulsion separating from the base coat?
-Gary
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Funny, I was thinking about that again today...
My 5x7 2-D all closed up sits at 3.935" from the front of a flat lensboard to the GG, so would require some recess on the 4.5" square boards.
If that's a replacement back assembly rather than a slide-in, the .350" body-to-holder-plane distance could make a big difference in required lensboard recess.
Question: Are the published flange-to-film distances accurate these days? I did a custom board for a torpedo camera and a 121 SA recently and there was a substantial difference between the old specs and the actual lens. Just one more thing for you to be concerned with....
-Gary
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A perfectly reasonable question, especially if you're "new"
It's *possible*, just not real simple.
If you don't care about the Pressman's rotating back feature, then it wouldn't be all the difficult, but it would be ugly because the Graflok back I have here is notably taller than the back of my Pressman. Shaving down the top and bottom of the Graflok frame would increase the amount of work involved, and the attaching holes would have to be moved.
If you do like the rotating back, then the cool thing would be to make an adapter plate that mates with the rotation mechanism on the Pressman, shave down the frame to match the body, and attach the three together. Quite a bit more work involved there, more of a job for a machinist. If you're not a machinist, having the adapter plate made would probably cost as much as a whole graphic with a Graflok back already on it.
Being new to LF you wouldn't know this yet, but you need more than one one camera. Even if there's no *really*good reason for it that you could explain to, say, your wife (bring up *shoes*), but for example:
"I like this one better for 4x5 but it doesn't have a graflok back and this other one does but those two have smaller front standards and won't accept this rather large lens I got so I need this other one because it has a larger front standard opening and it's a lot lighter than the other one with the larger front standard opening that has the graflok back, and the monorail has way more movements and huge lens clearance but it can be a horrible beast to lug around outside."
I've got about four 4x5 cameras (maybe five), after having sold the Graphic and the Linhof. I've also still got a few of the repro Pressman lensboards available.
-Gary
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Got an old Linhof Symmar 210 on ebay, circa 1963, looks very nice but the shutter was real sticky. I've cleaned out those
old compurs before, but this one wouldn't let go of the front cell. The rear cell was snug, but the front cell won't budge at all,
in either direction.
Now, having seen some overkill on the part of Linhof engineering, and not having had this particular configuration of
shutter before (black anodized dress ring on the front that seems to be slightly "sprung" from behind, with "LINHOF" engraved
on it as well as the dual aperture scale, shutter goes to 1/400), I'm wondering if those Linhof engineers added some "feature"
that's keeping the front cell from unscrewing.
Is there some trick for getting that front cell off? Does the black dress ring need to be pushed down (really hard), is there
a hidden set screw somewhere, or did some previous fool put threadlocker in there?
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How clean is your glass? Try soaking it in undiluted laundry bleach overnight, then "scrubbing" it with a sponge.
You might need to "sub" the glass, so there's something for the gelatin to physically stick to. When I've stripped kodak plates there's always one side that looks smooth, but has some drag when rubbing a cloth on it - that would be the subbed side. You might also need to harden the gelatin, see first link below.
While these links may not be specific to what you're doing, read them and note the references to "silane":
http://cabd0.tripod.com/holograms/id3.html
http://www.ihcworld.com/_technical_tips/prevent_section_fall.htm
And, a source or premixed silane:
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Peter, glad you liked it - a few might be offended by it because I wasn't really taking the format seriously.
Since the imagesettng film is rather slow, an accurate mechanical shutter isn't really necessary. I set up the camera, put any handy object that weighs a couple of pounds on top of it to keep it from moving (no tripod mount on that thing), and I pull the lenscap while starting a stopwatch with the other hand. After the alotted time, I replace the lenscap. An sixteen second exposure isn't unusual, so half-second of manual inaccuracy doesn't mean much.
For film with a bit of speed (~100) it's helpful to stop down to a point where your exposure is about one full second, and whipping the cap off and back on with an open time of a second may take just a little practice. If you want/need to use a shutter on the cheap, get a packard shutter that has an "instant" setting. I believe that's supposed to be about 1/15 second and they do work.
Since I have yet to put together a contact printer big enough to make a contact print, there's no prints. No scans either, and the thing is difficult to deal with so I've only taken a couple of shots with it. (lug awkward large unbalanced box into the basement, cut and load big piece of roll film under dark green safelight, tape it all shut, lug same awkward thing back upstairs and outside, make exposure, lug back into basement, untape box and develop/stop/fix film [inspection method] in rather large tray, again a ways from very dark green safelight. It makes 8x10 seem easy to deal with.)
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Peter, thanks for the shot of the sliding-box camera, I might be able to use that concept the next time I cycle back around to the "making some ridiculous cameras just because I can" project.
The Kowa Graphic lenses have a bit of a following, in fact most of the adequate process lenses pull higher prices than they did a couple of years ago. Apo-Gerogons will work, I think the 270mm will cover 8x10 at infinity but can't promise that right now. The Konica Hexanon GRII 210 will do it, and so on. The 305mm Apo-Nikkor will do a very nice job and seems to pull about the lowest final bids of all the Apo-Nikkors. Actually, that's the one I'd probably suggest with my admittedly limited experience.
If your exposures will be a second or more, a shutter doesn't really matter much. You can pull a lenscap in one direction, count a careful second, and replace it from the other direction, right? Even if the lenscap is made of black construction paper and masking tape? If you do that with a flourish it'll look like you know what you're doing.
Paper will work (pick one with no manufacturer's printing on the back), as will pinhole setups, and a pinhole camera and a package of paper is a good place to start. Film is better, but far better if you have a real lens on the front. There are some cheaper ways to do film if you just want to "do stuff" (like me) but they have their drawbacks, like limited/odd sensitivity, slow speed, extreme contrast requiring special pictorial development, having to cut from rolls, and so on. However, last summer I was shooting 5x7 IR with extremely fine grain at minimal cost (asa/iso = approx. 1 behind an R25 filter).
Setting up focus can be done several ways. You can set up for infinity, hyperfocal, or do a variety of measurements and work up a scale to apply to the outside of the camera so that you can align marks to focus.
On this bit of foolishness, I stuck my head inside the end of the box and kept adjusting until I had something approximating hyperfocal: http://www.9000shops.com/bsc/index.html
Have fun...
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Plenty of good advice above, in the meantime..
I got a 5x7 2D that looked like it had sat open on display for 40 years. They shipped it open and extended as they were afraid to try and close it, and I'm glad they did. The outer covering (leather?) was extremely dry and very fragile. I laid on two thick coats of Lexol with a brush and let it sit until the next day, when I was able to close it without the covering flaking away like a thousand moths.
Many of the corners had holes big enough to read through, but the coarse cloth liner was intact. I got a can of Rubberize-It, and figuring I really had nothing to lose, started applying thin coats to the inside of the holes with a flux brush. Once the really large holes were mostly sealed off, I diluted the black stuff with paint thinner per the notes on the can and applied more thin coats of that. It took probably six sessions over two weekends, all done with the bellows mostly but not completely extended so that the seals would be under stress while it was closed instead of open, and I only closed the camera after I was completely sure that all the rubberizing compound had dried (another week or so). I had also applied thin coats to the outside of the liner where it was visible, making sure to get under the edges of the cracked liner.
The camera will still close and fold up, the bellows is flexible enough for normal use (not a lot of movements anyway), and so far I've only found a couple of holes that I missed. The bellows looks scary from the outside, but looks just fine on the inside and I've shot a bunch of oddball IR film in it with no problems. I've since found that I really like the 5x7 format for a number of reasons.
I keep requesting the spray version of the Rubberize-It stuff at the hardware store, but have yet to see any.
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Yeah, what Scott said, except, if it seems slow or sticky, hold off on opening it up until you've cocked and fired it a couple dozen times on all the settings. If it improves noticeably, keep doing that and see if it gets to a point where it seems to operate normally. I've got a Prontor-S that I got as new-old-stock and it was really sticky out of the box but now works quite well and will keep working fine after sitting unused for a year. Opening shutters can be a little tricky, especially for the non-mechanically inclined.
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The correct answer will depend on what shutter you have, but, make sure you haven't set the shutter speed to "T" or "B" (some won't cock in that position), try operating the firing mechanism, move the available settings around and try cocking and/or operating the firing mechanism, and if all else fails, take it back to the guy that was showing it to you and say "Ok, what am I doing wrong?". Don't be too embarrassed, stuff happens.
Replacement Monorail
in Large Format
Posted