brian berry

<p>Peter, when I scan black and white sheet film negatives, I get grainy and ugly results . . . if you are getting what those negatives ought to produce, please write and tell us how. I am using an Epson 9000.</p>

<p>Spray paint an 11x14 sheet of glass black. Drop a card on the glass before you spray, in exactly the right position to make a clear window to print through. A tape hinge on the top edge (glass hinged to a backing board of cardboard) will let you position the glass consistently on the paper. A cardboard template will let you position the negative easily and quickly. Remove the template, of course, before you expose. You want that negative equally sharp edge to edge in the final print. -- not so easy to do with blades, etc.</p>

<p>Like Lynn, I too did thousands of lantern slides in the 60's for the university where I worked. 3x4 was quick and ideal for that. Kodak T-Max, developed directly to a transparency, would be the modern way. I've kept the backs and the holders because I sometimes use lenses that just barely cover 4x5 on a tiny little Ansco 3x4 view: I gain a little movement, you see, and the camera fits in a lunchbox. The old 90 Angulon, for example, and an 80 WF Ektar. Mostly I use the 127 Ektar on it -- it's sharp corner to corner at f16 on 3x4, even on a landscape with leafless birches right across the image field. And the 81/2 in. Comercial Ektar just barely fits and is ideal for portraits, although I haven't done that in quite a while . . .</p>

<p>Looks like a pinhole leak in a bellows fold, probably toward the lower right of the camera (looking into it from the back).</p>

<p>I have to weigh in here . . . I have (blush) 9 large-format lenses, only two bought new. I use them all regularly, and I am not easy to please. They range in age from 2007 to 1950. There is no, zip, nada, zero difference between a good one from 1950 and and a good one from 2007. Used as they were meant to be used, of course . . . </p>

Demonstration for a lost river that once flowed through downtown Bogota<div></div>

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<p>Oops. Here's that last picture</p><div></div>

<p>Here's the master at work with his 5x7 Graflex in Italy in 1952.</p>

<p>One of Mine: New Haven, 1970, 5x7, 10-inch lens.</p><div></div>

<p>Another one, in Mexico, 1929. This made on 8x10 of course.</p><div></div>

<p>All right, I am going to stretch the thread a little here …<br>

Let’s look at some images by a master, Paul Strand. Made with a 5x7 Graflex SLR, using a 12-inch lens, stopped down to the max, I am sure. Not strictly macro, but up close, and in the field, and without flash or lamps. Image to object ratio, about 1:4 or 1:5, by my estimate.<br>

Very, very hard to duplicate. I really know. And done with film speeds like 100. That is, shutter speeds around one-half to 1 second …<br>

What is he depending on here? Not just depth of field, but also: masterful, revealing light; a tremendous impression of three-dimensionality; and of course, the character of his subjects.<br>

Look up these two books: “Tir a Mhurain” and “Un Paese”. See more of these, all done the same way, technically.<br>

What elements does he use to make these pictures consistently? I think,1, the revealing light of open shade; 2, that light expanded by plus development; 3, a severe choice of backgrounds, with both tonal qualities carefully chosen and limited depth of focus demanded; and 4, a total mastery of abstract composition, that makes each picture fresh even though his technical choices are tightly bound, almost rigid.<br>

How does he make all this work? I think, tremendous discipline in his seeing; a commanding personal presence, to get these subjects where he wanted them, and more or less hypnotise them into holding still; and finally, a very, very clear idea of what he wanted to say about these people and their environments. I don’t think any of this can be reduced to a table or the properties of any lens/format combination.<br>

Food for thought. I would say to Wynn, experiment with the camera you have, its f-stops and its handling on a tripod, and ask yourself the questions in that last paragraph. That will be a trip. Your equipment is excellent for what you want to do. I think the questions may be of more value than any lens/format combinations.<br>

One last attachment – one of mine – done in New Haven in 1970, when I was just beginning to get a handle on these questions. Strandish, for sure, but it still satisfies. 5x7 Cambo, 10-inch Commercial Ektar, f36, 1/8th.</p>

<p> </p><div></div>

<p>Hi John, yes I know the 4-inch Artar. Beautiful lens, exquisitely sharp (but low contrast, takes getting used to) -- but -- it will just cover 2 1/4" square at infinity. In the Artar line, it takes a 150mm to cover 6x9. Think of one of the 127mm Kodak Ektars that are ubiquitous on the famous auction site. An excellent lens, particularly for 6x9, where everything you do will be in the sweetest spot. If you are thinking good images at very small f-stops, like 32, or 45, a 4-inch Dagor will do a better job for you than the Artar...</p>

<p>John, the ground part of the aristophot glass is crisp and bright. The polished part is very bright. Actually you are seeing an aerial image there, the brightest that can be had in any viewing system. I focus with a loupe on the border between ground glass and polished -- very fast and very certain. To view the whole image I pull back (to bifocal range, sadly, under the darkcloth.)</p>

<p>Oops, Goofed. Hre is the one that's intact, the preceding picture is about the way you usually see them.</p><div></div>

<p>John, I got my E2 Rolleiflex back into the front lineup by installing a focusing screen from a Mamiya RB 67. I cut it down, of course, easy to do with an Exacto knife, and carefully checked the focus with a second ground glass at the film gate. I don't remember if I had to shim or not. But I gained 2 to 3 stops in apparent brightness compared to the factory screen. The brightness of ground glass when the Centuries were made simply left a lot to be desired.<br>

All wides look dim in the corners...sad but true.<br>

An alternative plan: for many years on my 4x5 (including rollback work) I use the microfine groundglass made for the Linhof microscope adapter back, known as the Aristophot. Google this and you will see what the unit looks like. As furnished, the glass is 125mm square. I cut it down with a conventional glasscutter. The etched surface of this glass pops the image in and out of focus by contrast change in a way that no American glass I have ever used can approach. Additionally, it has a polished "X" from corner to corner, about 2mm in width, that permits me to focus on the aerial image anywhere on the X. Priceless. My f8 wides are easily seen on this groundglass. These backs come up on the infamous auction site from time to time, often in parts, and they are not too expensive.<br>

I can't help on the finder problem. Good luck to you.</p><div></div>

<p>My very old Toyo, which is on light duty, fits handily in a Kodak slide projector case...these can be had for about $5 at almost any thrift shop. People think they are legal briefcases, but they are deeper front to back.</p>

<p>A typical Medalist image, on Tri-X, f16, 1/125.</p><div></div>

<p>This is the first photo.net listing that comes up when you google Medalist....so, here is a picture of my Medalist II, converted to 120. You can see the size of it. I have owned handier cameras, but the extraordinary quality of the lens, the accuracy of the rangefinder and the superb flatness of the film make this design a prince among cameras. Astonishing, for a 1941 design. My specimen dates from 1947. The lens is good wide open, superb from 5.6 down. Transparencies from this camera compete with any I make using any equipment, old or new.<br>

I have a Planar Rolleiflex, I have Apo-Symmars on a 4x5, I have used and owned Leicas and Nikons and Linhofs -- but this lens in this system produces image quality equal to or better than all. </p>

<p>This is the first photo.net listing that comes up when you google Medalist....so, here is a picture of my Medalist II, converted to 120. You can see the size of it. I have owned handier cameras, but the extraordinary quality of the lens, the accuracy of the rangefinder and the superb flatness of the film make this design a prince among cameras. Astonishing, for a 1941 design. My specimen dates from 1947. The lens is good wide open, superb from 5.6 down. Transparencies from this camera compete with any I make using any equipment, old or new.<br>

I have a Planar Rolleiflex, I have Apo-Symmars on a 4x5, I have used and owned Leicas and Nikons and Linhofs -- but this lens in this system produces image quality equal to or better than all. </p><div></div>

<p>I use the rear group of a 101 mm Kodak anastigmat special. It push-fits into the top of a 35mm film can (Kodak). A second film can (Ilford) fits like a sleeve on the bottom, giving me about 90mm from lens to the rim at the bottom of the tube. I have it adjusted to focus correctly on the ground side of my view camera ground glass. I cut out the bottoms of the film cans. Easy.<br>

This lens group is a doublet. I believe the rear group of any 100 mm tessar type lens will do as well.<br>

My lens, a Kodak anastigmat special, can generally be had on the great auction site for about $10.<br>

I have also used a bargain 135mm enlarging lens (a Wollensak Raptar) for 2x3 groundglasses. It makes for a long chimney though--about six inches.</p>

<p>You might look into this: in the 30's or early 40's, Ed Land, the Polaroid founder, made an 11x14 inch STEREO view camera for a famous art historian. This was Clarence Kennedy of Smith College. Kennedy used a long f4.5 Tessar lens, just one, but employed a waterhouse stop pierced with two very small apertures. The dark chamber of the camera was divided by a fore-and-aft panel. Each exposure produced two 5 1/2' by 7" negatives on a single sheet of film, subsequently contact-printed. <br>

Kennedy photographed Italian sculpture with this camera. He distributed contact prints--stereo pairs--to colleges. I mounted a show of these at Yale in 1968, so I know that the Yale art-history library has a set. He too worked exclusively at very small apertures--45 at least--but of course, he was contact-printing. As I write this, I have in front of me "Photographs by Clarence Kennedy," Published by Smith College in 1967 and printed by Meriden Gravure.<br>

Included in the extensive bibliography of Kennedy's publications are two that probably go into detail on the techniques and principles involved: "Stereoscopic Photography," Kennedy and Willard Morgan, which appeared in Collier's New Encyclopedia, 1961 Edition, Vol 15, pp 365 and 366. Also, "Sculpture Photography," in "The Complete Photographer," National Education Alliance, Inc., 1943, Vol. 9, pp 3190-3199.</p>

<p>I was doing stereo work in those days with a 6-inch Red Dot Artar at magnifications from 1:1 to 4:1. I got the separation by using the sliding front of Linhof Color View. Easy. My subjects weren't moving, and the stereo pairs on 55PN Polaroid were immediately checkable, of course. That Artar was reasonably sharp at f45.</p>

<p>I believe the camera itself was in a Polaroid corp museum as recently as 1979. I heard a rumor recently that the camera has been moved to the Boston Museum of Science in Cambridge.</p>

<p>I never understood the principle of two apertures on a single lens, but then I ever played with it, either. Just my .02 USD. Good luck</p>

<p>I had a lens that looked like this after I let salt spray gather on it and sit. Truly it was only a problem when the sun hit the first element directly. Honeywell declined to recoat it and I never did.</p>

<p>On my 3x4 Tele-Graflex I use a 25 cm Carl Zeiss Jena Tessar f6.3 (uncoated). It has a big lever to stop down to a preset, not spring loaded like the 190 Ektars on Super D's, but it saves leaning over the lens and squinting. I love the look ... but I haven't used it lately because the shutter has expired.</p>

<p>I have had precisely the same problem. The camera worked fine on a Tiltall but the rangefinder hung up on a Majestic. The problem was the length of the tripod screw, or more precisely, the depth of the penetration.</p>