david_senesac

For you that are suggesting that I might be off and are offering advice, that is not the case haha. There are reasons why a spirit level on top of a pentaprism or embeded in the body of a camera might not be too accurate. But lets not digress into mechanical design here. My sense of levelness is quite accurate and yes I have a bunch of levels, can easily notice slight unlevelness, and already verified the ones in my camera body are not to be trusted. By the way, four of my brothers are carpenters. Also I am content about the way and speed at which I level my own camera.

 

...David

www.davidsenesac.com

Was wondering how in the field, others on our forum mechanically

adjust their field camera rear standards so frames are horizontally

level?

 

I for one am very careful to expend effort on each shot to keep my

rear standard horizontal. I expend much less effort on keeping the

back to front perpendicular to vertical, so this question is about

the former. Every view camera model and its groundglass is a bit

different so I would expect answers to vary considerably. Many

camera bodies have various bubble levels right in the structure and

mine has three. However I've learned not to trust the levels and

likewise never had much confidence years before when using 35mm

cameras with spirit levels placed atop the pentaprisms.

 

After figuring out where to set up my tripod, I usually begin by

pointing the camera in the subject direction, leveling the bed, then

adjusting the front standard shift to get the lens in the ballpark of

where it ought to be. Then usual considerable focus work to have the

front standard tilt or swing adjusted. At that point I am nearing

the final stages of adjustment so this is where I tweak the

horizontal leveling. Of course any such adjustment at this point may

throw off things like where the frame was positioned, so tweaking is

likely to be slight in order to not waste effort.

 

To do so, I will remove my head from underneath the dark cloth and

regain a sense of normality by looking out while standing in a

comfortable stance at the scene. Moving my head and neck up and down

a bit to get a feel for gravity vertical. Then I simply open up the

dark cloth so I can see the groundglass vertical graticule lines, and

tweak the bed level a bit from side to side as necessary for those

lines to be perpendicular. Although I might readjust the ballhead

slightly, such is problematic as more movement than intended can

easily occur. Thus I tend to instead adjust one of my tripod legs

slightly. I use a Gitzo G1325 so just loosen one of the side leg

locks and by subtle feel alone allow it to move a fraction of a

millimeter up or down. Then repeat the evaluation of the graticule

lines until it looks good. Upon looking at my spirit levels, such

adjustment is almost always consistent and I feel considerably more

accurate. However a friend of mine, I often shoot with, is hopeless

using his eyesight on the groundglass so just uses the spirit

levels. I seem to have a keen sense of frame vertical and readily

immediately notice such being off when looking into other's

groundglasses.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

No I remove film grain or digital artifacts with a vengence. Although such doesn't seem to bother many, I dislike seeing those aberatations on my or others prints.

 

I shoot 4x5 Provia. Images I intend to print get 300mb Tango scans. So scans are a bit more than 2000 pixels per inch which shows up as little grain on the output. In photoshop my aim is to reproduce the natural experience recorded on my transparencies with good fidelity of which film grain or oversharpening artifact are unnatural. Thus am careful to not magnify it in Photoshop by too much sharpening. To that end I usually create tedious masks for sky or other even colored portions of landscapes since such are the most likely areas for grain and digital artifacts caused by sharpening to appear.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

Geoff you sound like someone just now taking a look at what is going on. This has all been hashed around for many years especially since Velveta came out and was embraced by legions of outdoor photographers. Overwhelmingly the saturators and manipulators dominate these day. Of course vast numbers of new photographers playing with their new digital toys are just coming on the scene and maybe you are one of them. From the way many post on photog forums it is obvious by far they embrace photography as just another mode of creative art instead of the capture of traditional realistic nature. There was a day when a photograph meant something captured close to real but those days are long long gone.

 

There are many reputable pros that have long essentially droned the line that since it is impossible to really capture reality given limitations of photographic technology, it is nonsense to strive to capture such. Personally I don't buy the necessity of that attitude at all because if one uses equipment and film readily available with the intent of capturing nature with fairly accurate fidelity, then reasonable results can be attained. The throwing the baby out with the bathwater fallacy. That said, there are certainly types of natual subjects which cannot be captured as our eyes see. For instance macros or flash closeups.

 

Each of we photographers decides what style of work we will produce. For some everything goes and if one is honest about that approach when representing their work, it is perfectly legitimate and ethical. Unfortunately because saturation and manipulation are the status quo now, those who do so don't feel any need to explain. In other words people expect that is what is going on. For others like me that strive to capture natural landscapes as accurately as is reasonable and define my work so, such is also valid. I am up front about my own styles and attitude, eager to distance my work from the dominant pack, and hope some people will find greater value in knowing my work is realistic. Also I value work of other landscape photographers with a similar attitude more than those that produce images though manipulated to be aesthetic did not really occur. From my perspective, our natural world which I enjoy immensely is just fine the way it is.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

Would not categorize it as funny looks but rather curious looks. Constantly if in public. Most people just observe my wooden Wisner a bit as a curiosity. Other photographers of lesser formats come up to me while I'm working and first open with a statement complementing how fine or great looking a camera I have and inquire, "What is it?" One can hear many adults in passing just whispering to others in their party. Non-photographer women often can be heard whispering "antique" while their men may quietly chirp in "large format" and "pro". Kids of course may just walk up and blurt out something funny like "Is that an old camera?" or "Why do you put your head in there?"

I use a digital 5-degree spot and incident meter for my large format work. I tend meter landscapes both incident and spot and note readings in EV values. Even though the results of my exposures have been surprisingly accurate I feel it is wise for a landscape photographer to continue gaining regular experience and skill at estimating proper exposures because such can be the most critical part of the photography process. Also the variety of landscape and nature lighting is vast and complex for which a human mind has the potential to improve on any robotic scheme that ever might be devised. I've gotten skilled enough that by my eyes alone I can usually guess pretty accurately what the incident EV reading will show unless it is overcast or early or late in the day.

 

 

For digital work one can take and immediately look at saved results and then tweak exposure on followup shots. But for conventional film like the Provia 100F I use, one either must bracket or guess accurately. And because 4x5 sheet film and development is pricy, I often choose not to bracket and rather rely on being accurate with just one shot. Just metering parts of a landscape and mathimatically combining the results won't guarantee good results. Landscapes tend to have a considerable range in brightness values. And of course evenly illuminated different colors all meter differently than 18% gray. Also the different colors meter differently if the sun is front lighting the subject or one is using the range of side lighting. Depending on what one considers the important elements in a scene, will also influence an exposure setting. I prefer to read out and think in EV values and later set shutter speed and aperature because relating single numbers to lighting is mentally simple leading to a better grasp for natural lighting. I tend to pay more attention to perpendicular to the sun incident readings because that provides a general indication of the overall lighting from which other readings and scene specifics can be modified. That is especially useful early and late when spot metering off objects or skies can be tricky. Of course one must always rely on comparing the results of exposed film to what settings one used in order to fine tune one's ...guessing.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

One will see a lot of photographers claiming they can print to this and that (impressive) enlargement size that looks good (to them) though such statement are often meaningless unless qualified. I see a lot of prints even in high end fine print galleries that I would never consider printing to personally because to me they just do not look as sharp as I like to see up close. That does not mean there isn't a place for printing large and less sharp. Perfect for billboards for instance. Go look at the fine detail from a quality 4x5 transparency drum scanned to say 300mb then quality printed to say 28x35 and then compare to that as a baseline to what you can enlarge. Guaranteed a lot of the "I can print to blah blahs" won't be so impressive.

Stephen H >>>"You know, now that I think about, after hiking all over RMNP, I don't believe I've ever seen anyone out any distance on a trail with LF equipment- few even bring a tripod. I'm sure it's been done, but very few people with that kind of gear want to tote it 20 miles."

 

I've been a Sierra backpacking photographer since 1980 getting several backpacks in each year to the backcountry. And I have rarely even seen tripods. Much less medium format and almost never large format. However I have noticed increasing numbers of tripods on the sides of backpacks this last decade. And in the last five years many many more cameras simply due to all the tiny digitals. The surprising reality is very very few large format color photographers of the last few decades have wondered very far beyond roads.

 

...David

www.davidsenesac.com

Sep, indeed that would make a 5x7 print on your little ink jet and your Mom will love it haha. But on a low res printer since the web image has just 864 pixels in width which is just one-fourteenth the width of the real image. On a quality 300 ppi printer the width would be less than 3 inches. So indeed per my thread question what is that worth? Someone could make a business card from it of course but that again is small change. About your other comment referring to Muench's teenee images. I don't think anyone seeing one of those images is going to doubt the quality behind the few pixels. But if he tried selling the same stuff without his name at a no-name business site I'd expect the only business would be from newspaper comic strip editors. And you are right about even the larger images not being able to reasonably tell a customer about what the real image is like since any image displayable wholy on a monitor is still going to be far smaller than a fine art master file. But on the other hand the larger displayed image will almost always look more interesting and show more detail.

 

Allen's comment about not letting thieves mug us without resistance rings with some common sense, but for such tiny images I just don't see much an issue. My site does of course have obvious Copyright notices all over. If some business stole an image with enough money involved to interest a lawyer for free, I would likely become interested. But that is not going to happen with a small internet business like mine if one of the myriad peon surfers on the internet grabs something to make a t-shirt for his art and wine festival booth. If I saw something like that, I'd say BOO, making a empty threat and that is as far as it would likely go.

 

As for Steve's comment about protection, yes one can get protection from the ignorant masses but anything that displays on a monitor if not simply picked off the screen with <Alt><PrintScreen>could otherwise be picked off the video board frame grabber with simple consumer available pc hardware.

BG, true about the current broadband market penetration though it is rapidly gaining share. More importantly though those customers that are looking for fine art prints are more likely to be within that group versus the average web surfer.

 

SS, that site has an excellent method of display. I liked the time gauge at bottom which helps show the loading speed and position. Of course that has been a complementing downloading display mechanism for years. I like the concept and might implement such at some time.

 

BN >>>"Even with a large monitor, which I count as a 17" unit, 800 pixels of height is the maximum you can see without scrolling..."

 

Its a bit more complicated than your brief comment of course depending on specifics. The following is on the "Tips" section on my website:

 

"Monitors are specified in the diagonal screen dimension. For standard 4:3 aspect monitors, the horizontal screen dimension equals 80% of the diagonal and the height 60%. However only roughly 90% of those lengths are viewable between monitor housings. That reduces numbers to about 72% and 54% respectively. So for a 17 inch diagonal monitor, the usable screen might be: 0.54*17*100 = 9.18 inches by 12.24 inches. Given a 100 pixel per inch phosphor dot pitch, the screen size would be 1224 by 918 pixels. For such a screen 1024x768 XVGA would fit well and 1240x1024 SXVGA would moderately increase information viewable. UVGA at 1600x1200 would add no new information even if the mode was allowed."

 

Thus with a 17" monitor running Windows with the Display setting for SXVGA, one ought to be able to view at least a 1000 pixel widths even taking into account some overhead for browser scroll bars and window edges. Of course all this depends on what Display setting has been selected. If that selection is the more usual XVGA, your numbers of course look fine. I do think as bandwidths continue to rise and LCD prices continue to plummet, in the next few years we will be seeing monitor sizes continue to grow so 20 inch sizes will be more the norm. A more detailed image view will always be preferable given a choice. With images now being such a growth boon for the internet that marketing pressure will accellerate the increase.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

In the field, I frequently charge my three lithium-ion Coolpix batteries via a 250 inverter plugged into the cigaret lighter outlet into which plugs the custom Nikon charger. Beware of using too powerful an inverter as it could blow the typical 20 ampere fuse likely to be in series with the battery if one plugged in other electrical items that were drew too much current. And wise to carry some spare fuse of course. For example, 12 volts times 20 amperes equals 240 watts. Therefore a 200 watt inverter would be a safe choice.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

Film of course doesn't have the ability to capture such a dynamic range of light as one's eyes do. Around the mid point of ones camera exposure setting, dark areas will film darker and light areas lighter than one's eyes see. Thus there are many situations in which it is impossible to adequately expose all elements in a scene. In fact one of the tasks of a wise photographer is being able to evaluate what their camera and film can and cannot expose adequately. Knowing when to not bother and when one can adjust whatever is available to compensate as well as possible. If your friend stands in front of the sun as a silhouette, you can either compensate the exposure to allow your friend to expose correctly or expose for the sky which would end up making your friend look very dark. Likewise your situation of snowy peaks presumably at midday requires a decision on whether to expose for the background peaks or the othe closer scene elements. When snowy peaks are not too distant and the air is clear, it may be impossible to bring all scene elements in at midday. As has been suggested, one might use a split neutral density filter, however that imposes a limitation on the geometry of framing. A more natural approach is to simply expect to photograph such scenes early or late enough in the day when the contrast between scene elements is lower. I love shooting scenery with snowy mountains in the background, and can readily do so here in California during the summer till mid morning. After 9am standard time, that increasingly becomes more difficult. Try bracketing exposure on some shots and record your camera settings for later comparison.

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.

I recently built my web site and went live on our World Wide Web.

Before doing so I spent considerable time reviewing the latest

visuals on a lot of pro photographer sites on the web. Especially

those who sell large format as fine art prints since that is the main

thrust of my offerings. The internet has now been around with market

presence for a dozen or so years. During this period all facets of

the medium have evolved rapidly with increasing maturity now slowing

the pace of change. For those offering photographic prints, three

initial limitations influenced our web page displays. One was the

slow dial up phone connection modem speed of the bulk of users that

made larger images annoyingly slow to load onto one's monitor. Hence

small images were normal for most web sites of any kind across the

internet. The second minor issue was that average monitor size used

to be smaller. Displaying an image larger than can fit on ones

monitor screen is a poor way for anyone to evaluate an image's

aesthetic. The third issue was that any monitor displayable images

are easily illegally copied ala <Alt><PrintScreen> and many other

ways. Or downloadable larger images required sophisticated

safeguards to guarantee a customer was real. Thus photographers

displaying images online were caught between wanting to display their

images large enough to provide a reasonable sense of the aesthetic

and quality of the image while not wanting to display too large of

sizes such that their images were taken illegally. Large stock

agencies were able to provide access to larger size images online

because they had the legal machinery, money clout, sophisticated

access software, and technical search resources, to guarantee their

images were not being used commercially. However for the vast

numbers of small businesses such was not practical so photographers

displaying images became used to using thumbnails and small VGA or

sized images for display. For large format images the issue of being

limited to displaying only small images forces us to compete on the

same playing field of a vast pool of smaller format photographers.

The same subjects taken with a puny 1mp digital camera can look just

as good as one taken with an 8x10.

 

Today two of those issues have definitely changed though from what

I've seen, photographer web sites continue to display mostly small

images. With broadband connectivity rapidly gaining dominance, we

no longer have to worry about displaying somewhat larger sized images

simply because we don't want to annoy visitors with slow page loading

times. In fact for those selling prints at the high end, the

probability is most of our potential customers are those with both

broadband and larger monitors. Monitor size still is a limitation

however most photographer gallery images still display far smaller

than such widths. Displaying a larger image will almost always

benefit the aesthetic of any quality image. And for we with large

format that impact is even more apparent. The other issue of

worrying about internet users copying images off their screens is

probably not an issue of photographers on this forum selling fine art

prints? Do I care if someone doubles the size of my displayed images

and tries to market the result as a screen saver? Or someone makes

some cutesy 2x2.5 inch images they stick on coffee cups or t-shirts?

Of course not because all that is low end chicken feed. A ten-inch

wide display at 72 ppi is only going to make for a 3-inch wide image

from any serious printer. I can understand concern with those who

are just selling little stock images because that stuff often ends up

being small in commercial use. But for we who are offering high

quality prints, that ought not matter or am I missing something?

 

...David

 

www.davidsenesac.com

I would choose Sonoma Coast State Beach over Point Reyes for someone unfamilliar with the area because the highway follows right beside the coast for 8 miles with numerous small beaches and rocky headlands. One can just pull off beside the road, walk short distances, and shoot. Most better spots at Point Reyes require a fair amount of hiking. Also SCSB has more sea stack rocks and islands than any place on the California coast. But don't bother with a trip to the coast at all if it is either going to be foggy or windy.

Getting into LF is going to cost way more than $1000 unless you just dip your toe in. I've shot 35mm, 6x7, and 4x5. A drum scanned 4x5 Provia Lightjet printed to 30x37.5 blows away the unit area detail from a 35mm Kodachrome Lightjet printed at 12x18 inches. If one uses optical enlargement the differences are not as great. But when using the best digital processes out there, that huge film area really does make all the difference the ratios of film area provide. And if one puts lens movements to work correctly on appropriate geometry of target scenes, the whole frame can be impressive fine detail. And I was surprised how much better 4x5 was than 6x7 too.

R Jackson >>>"I don't think attaching a loaded camera bag to the back of a loaded backpack is the answer. This would throw the center of gravity too far back, increasing the stress on the shoulders and upsetting your hiking balance ..."

 

The pack balance issue is one for small format and lightweights. I've backpacked a great deal for over 3 decades. Actually its the crushing 65 to 80 pounds I'm carrying that is a far greater issue than optimal balance. My camera daypack is usually 22 to 24 pounds with gear and add another 6 for my G1325 Gitzo. (4x5 stuff) I'm a little guy at 133#. And am imfamous for carrying my heavy pack in ugly ugly crosscountry places.

I've used my old 35mm SLR spot meter in the past. Much more prone to error because one always needs to translate readings into f-stops and shutter speeds at film speed. Also bulky and awkward workflow. Here is a little known modern design, digital spot meter I use without all the useless commercial flash photography functionality of other units. Priced well below other spot meters. Besides relative 5 degree spot readings, it also has an ambient sensor. And I tend to use the ambient sensor far more than spot modes outodoors because it tells one how much sun and reflected light is about.

 

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=NavBar&A=getItemDetail&Q=&sku=247140&is=REG&si=spec#goto_itemInfo

If you are going to do that, you ought to expect to generally not use results for making larger quality sized prints. And since that is the case, you might as well use a tiny digital and really get freedom.

Same thread has come up before a few times. Most responses will be from photographers that use a "photo backpack" just for day hiking who don't seem to realize your question is not about carrying gear on day hikes but rather about bringing the gear out on overnight backpacking trips into the backcountry. Suggest customizing a daypack/"photo backpack" that holds all your gear to mount to the back of your backpack with common Quickrelease latches.

Well not at all for me But maybe part of the reason is that I have evolved as a photographer. And another reason is that the technologies of photography have always been gradually evolving to higher levels. I've been concentrating on landscapes for a couple dozen years. You young people would laugh at what we had to do even just twenty years ago. A decade ago, I was on the first wave of digital processing and today its like everybody else has arrived to the point it feels like its been around for ages. Technology wise we who live in this day and age are on a knee that will be unlike any generations before or after.

 

I just picked up an expensive stack of 30x38 inch Lightjet prints from results of a recent 22-day Utah trip. Superior without question to what you might have seen using best processes a decade ago. I'm really excited that I can make such incredible prints these days that were impossible years ago.

 

So no I am not bored, I can hardly wait to get back out the door.

 

One thing in your comments, I have to laugh at. As I see it a large proportion of nature and landscape photographers are caught up in using overly saturated color films which often only work well with early, late, stormy, or overcast conditions. Thus you all spend time running around in dim light while I am out there shooting normal saturation film mostly when the sun is well up. I don't need blazing colors because nature's usual hues, shades, and tones are just fine the way they are without enhancements. And as far as landscapes go, there is an absolutely vast amount of great landscapes in the west that have never seen a serious camera lens. Go half a mile away from roads or trails almost anywhere and you may be the first person to do so. ...David

Here is what I do. I backpack during all months, winter ski, and backcountry ski a lot so have a -5 degree REI Elements high loft down sleeping bag. During the summer it has a second purpose so I usually carry two sleeping bags in my vehicle. Just as down can insulate one's body to keep heat inside, it can also keep cool things cool. A lot better than an ordinary cooler since down is the best insulator. Thus I put film in the foot of the down bag and fold the bag around itself into a ball. On hot days anything in my ordinary foam cooler will become warm as temperatures in a car can easily get above 110 degrees F for hours if a car is in the sun and ambient temperatures are above 80 degrees. Since I have a sedan, I put the sleeping bag in the trunk and will cover it up with some blue tarps to further buffer it from the top of the vehicle which is hottest. Generally, whether in the trunk or passenger compartment, items placed low against the floor or bed will see the least heat.

 

Sometimes I will use the REI bag for summer sleeping, especially in higher mountains. If so I will usually will set it out in the open air after rising in the morning to try and let it cool off. Temperatures always cool more or less during the night, typically reaching minimums before sunrise. Sometimes before retiring in the evening, I will find a nice big clean dense rock. During the night it will cool off with like everything else outside. In the morning by putting the rock inside the bag along with film, it provides considerably more mass to keep the inside cool longer. There is nothing special about water or ice. Its all a matter of mass and rocks have advantages of not getting items wet.

How do you protect your film from summer heat inside a vehicle out on

the road during field trips? One's where you have to bring all your

gear in the vehicle and are doing say dayhikes to one place or

another.

 

Of course if a trip is short, one can just take all the film along

inside a pack or bag. But as a road trip gets longer, at a certain

point there is too much film to lug it all along on each day's field

work. Weight and space. In my case such is much more the case as I

shoot 4x5 these days which makes the space issue considerable. I

have a pretty effective and simple system but first am interested in

what others have to say. We recently returned from a 22 day Utah

trip where it baked outside at times and my film never saw more than

80 degree F temps.

There have been a few of these threads on the forums before and it always seems to get the same responses at first. Most of these answers are by people using a camera "backpack" to dayhike and not actually backpack. Yes for those few who don't understand, backpacking is the outdoor activity where one goes off hiking usually more than a mile from trailheads with all the gear required to overnight in the backcountry. And not car campers that camp beside a road at a campground or whatever and then day hike out into backcountry. I'm not a big person. And carry a huge pack when out for a week or more. Certainly there are not going to be many view camera users that can take the physical demands carrying big loads up mountain trails.

 

Camera backpacks are not intended to also carry basic backpacking gear. Of course one can strap a sleeping bag on one of them and do a half-a overnighter, but such is not a serious solution. I've backpacked a great deal for three decades. A couple dozen as a serious photographer of 35mm then 6x7 and then 4x5. For my own solution I have always used a concept of using a camera daypack which either fits inside or piggybacks onto a larger conventional backpack. Personally I have always used custom piggyback systems using Quickrelease latches. The advantage of that strategy is flexibility. When hiking down a trail with the full gear, if I wish to wander off from the trail to do some photo work, it is simply a matter of unlatching the daypack and off I quickly go. On return it is likewise simple to snap on the Quickreleases. Note I carry a big 6pound Gitzo 1325/Foba and about 20 pounds of camera gear. My field camera goes into a dirt cheap $1.84 ordinary10x10x6 inch corrugated paper shipping box and three lenses into 4x4x4 inch like boxes. Those boxes, film, and the rest all go into my 2200 cubic inch climbers daypack. No sections just a big compartment. I just had to replace the box for the field camera after a year of heavy field use because the corners were starting to soften up structurally. Afraid it might get crushed I bet? Lens boxes too? Believe me I am not Mr Gentle with my gear. I take my pack off and it drops to the ground without much nonsense. When I set my gear up in the field, I often just turn the whole pack upsidedown and it all just spills out onto the ground. A lightweight shipping box will do just fine in a daypack unless one whips it over a cliff.

We did three week mid to late May between Capitol Reef and Moab. I'm not enthusiastic about shooting much of the sandstone landscape too early in the morning or late in the afternoon. Generally colorful rock anywhere just doesn't peak in saturation until the sun is high enough in the sky to bring out the color. The exception is the off white Navahoe Sandstone formations which look best early/late. Most of the best light is thus about 2 to 3 hours after sunrise or 2 to 3 hours before sunset when there is a balance between rock saturation and enough off axis shadowing of landscape features. The blue sky is always saturated better then too. I shoot Provia. One will see a majority of postcards and gallery images of the Colorado Plateau areas taken during early and late warm light which ironically lack the natural beautiful colors that people go to those places to see.

I've always disliked Velvia and other highly saturated films. Provia has proven to be a great film for me because I prefer natural color fidelity. Would recommend it to any landscape photographers that want to get back to taking shots that look real. Can take great shots throughout the day if one exposes correctly. I shoot 4x5 and use a digital light meter. However not good for shadowy early and light light or for boosting saturation beyond natural.