gene_crumpler6

I saw a grey finish rollei on E-bay last week. This camera was a Rollei T. Does your camera have the wheels to change aperture and shutter speed or does it have levers for this. The levers would indicate a T.

Most any flash will work. The issue is does your SB28 have a way to connect to a standard PC and more important, how do you hang the flash on the beast. The standard pentax wooden handle has a cold shoe for mounting a flash if you plan to shoot a lot of flash pix. I don't find the p67 all that great for what little flash work I do.

 

I did pick up a bracket out of a comera store's junk box for $5, that works well. It uses an old graphlite flash mounting bracket mated to a large platform, that allows for easy off camera flash. I only had to replace the cold shoe with a hot shoe/PC cord unit. My $0.02 worth.

The above suggestion is a good one within certain limits. One, each manufacturer has its own criteria for acceptable DOF. So the DOF markers on a 35mm lens do not correlate with the DOF markers on a MF lens. The MF manufacturer assumes that the bigger negative will be enlarged less. My rule of thumb for my 35mm nikkor lenses is use the DOF markers for one larger stop. For the 67 I use 2 stops.

 

Second, another criteria for "acceptable" sharpness is the viewing distance from the print. A I recall the "correct" viewing distance for a print is the diagonal of the print. Thus for an 8x10, it is about 12 inches and for a 16x20 is is about 25 inches. Using the above example, you would have to hold the 8x10 at a distance of 25 inches.

Hard to do for us complusive grain sniffers! I use a 7x loupe to evaluate my prints! If the image edges under the 7x loupe are not distinct, then it is not really sharp!

 

As usual on this forum, the ultimate advice is to rent or borrow the camera and lens and try it your self!

Douglas:

 

I use the 55mm f4 for landscape work. I don't have the lens with me, but the rule of thumb for 16x20 prints(which is what I use the 6x7 for)is to use the DOF markings for 2 stops less than the actual apreture in use. I've found that with the lens at f22, I can get about 8-10 feet to infinity reasonably sharp. The f4 is the only lens I've ever tested that gives the same lp/mm from f4 to f22, rather unusual! The pentax 55 F4(newest version) is one of the best lenses you can purchase in MF photography. It is the lens that stays on my camera 80-90% of the time. It approaches the sharpness (lp/mm against lp/mm) of my best nikkors).

Also FP4 is not a very fine grained film. Delta should be finer grained. What size MF are you using?, 6x4.5 and 6x6 may give grain in the highlight with large (16x20+) prints from delta 100. I use t-max 100 with 6x7 negative, print to 16x20 size and can only detect grain in any areas with loupe. I've compared condenser, difusion and dichroic and I don't see enought difference to make me give up condensers and the fast printing times and crisp rendition for big blowups. I've never tried cold light as it doesn't work well with VC papers.

 

If all else fails, use Tech Pan. With tech pan, even 35mm negatives will not have objectional grain in 16x20 prints.

I'm not a Hassey user, but if you didn't get what you ordered, I'd send it back mucho pronto on general principles!

Micheal:

 

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Have you tried Tech Pan with Ethol TEC for minox photography? E.I. of 100 and fantastic grain and sharpness. I found out about TEC with Tech Pan from an article on subminiature photography.

I agree with the above posters experience. The new 55 F4 is my lens of preference. I also own the 105 and 200, all new, and the 55 is the hands down winner in the sharpness department, as well as providing adequate DOF for hand held shooting. The most suprising part of the the 55 is the uniform sharpness from f4 to f22. I lose no detectable sharpness at either end of the f-stop range.

Most films are better off with out a stop bath step after development. The best stop for film is a 30 second rinse of plain water. Many developer manufacturers recommend against using acetic acid for films. For prints, the stop should be used to extend the life of the fixer.

Franz:

I don't have the zoom, but have the latest 55, 105 and 200. E-mail me for my test results. I tried to cut and paste them on the server, but got a real mess.

I have two nikon releases that are at least 10 years old. Still look new! They appear to be a life time investment!

I've also found that you have to take a little more care in handling 120 film. I lost 4 shots on a roll a few months ago because the film did not wind tightly onto the take up spool. Loading carefully and evenly and keeping some tension on the feed roll is the key.

Ben has a good point. I've done all of my B&W film and printing for nearly 50 years.

 

I did some testing of 120 films, Tri-x, Tmax 100, Pan F, XP2, Tech Pan, FP4, etc last year. The tri-x was ok, but very grainy(just like the first roll I shot in 1954). The grain is noticable in an 8x10 print from 6x7 negatives!

 

I settled on tmax 100 because of the tight grain structure, high sharpness, ability to print 16x20 + with no visible grain, and reasonable speed with my favorite developer. Tmax developer does not give the clear highlighs and shadow detail that other developers can give. I throw mine out!

 

In B&W work, it is almost a necesity to do your own work to get optimum results. Optimizing and controlling ever step leading up to the final print, will give you the good results that most labs charge premium prices for. I use to teach beginner classes in my camera club and I was always suprised just how bad the commerical B&W work brought in by the students was!!!

I'll put in my vote for the P67 system. I'm a big guy, 6',4", 250+ lbs and I don't find the pentax 67 hard to use at all. Now that I've been using it for 2 years, when I use my nikons, they seem very small in my hands. The lenses(at least the three I have) are excellent as long as I observe the limits of each. I test everything I aquire carefully before accepting it from a vendor and placing it in service.

 

I've owned about 1/2 dozen 6x6 TLRs(including 3 rollei's) and I've never gotten more than a dozen decent shots with any of them in 45 years. I've gotten 100's, perhaps 1,000's with the nikons.

 

I prefer eyelevel cameras and the p67 is one of the few designed as such. Since you have a good meter, I would not recommend the averaging meter prism. You might be able to find a body, prism and a 90 or 105 for close to your limit of -$1,000. Be sure it has MLU. The 6x7 negative is a significant step up from 6x6 cropped typically to 6x4.5. My $0.02 worth.

If the camera does not have a red IF correction mark on the DOF scale, use the near focus F5.6 DOF mark(or your best estimate) to correct for IR.

 

F32 will give you significant diffraction. I'd stay with f16 as the smallest f-stop for max sharpness, if you are going to make big enlargements (say 11x14 or bigger). If you are going to stay at 8x10 or less, them f22 and perhaps f32 will be OK.

Interesting point. With the MF cameras that really run the film back and forth, like the hassey, I understarnd this is an issue. With the cameras that keep the film straight as possible, this is less of an issue. This in some part may explain why, very experiened printers report that the fuji and p67 tend to give the sharpest results of all MF cameras. The p67 is used for astronomical photography for this very characteristic. I am constantly impressed with the wonderful sharpness of my large B&W prints from my p67.

Now it's garbled again! HELP!!

Now its OK! Go figure!

The above post is garbled and missing some stuff. E-mail me at nikonguy@emji.net

Dear F;

 

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All these guys are telling you that you need MF gear and you already told us that you couldn't or don't want to get MF. So try this. Go to the camera store and get 2 rolls of tech pan and a box of technidol developer. Set up and shoot with mirror lock up, optimum apertures, tripod, etc. Bracket arround E.I. of 25. Develop and make some test prints. Then shoot the second roll with the best E. I. Make a couple of 16x20's and judge for your self. I assume you have a good enlarging lens.

 

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In 1985, I went on a 5 year mission to squeeze the max out of my nikons. During that time I experiment with most of the fine grain 35mm films and developers known to man. I ended up with Tech pan and Ethol TEC. TEC gives E. I. of 100 and 16x20 prints. I used the combo for about 8 years and I was happy with the results. I have about 12 lenses for my nikons and only three (100-120 lp/mm) are a match for Tech Pan.

 

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I went to 6x7 MF two years ago. The MF is better, but not ALL that much. I bought and sold a bunch of 6x6 cameras over the years (3 rollei's, 2-C220/C33, old hassey, yashicmat, folders, etc) and wasn't all that impressed with 6x6.

 

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6x7 gives 50% more negative area than 6x6 cropped to 16x20.

 

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Getting the best out of 35mm is like getting to Carnegie Hall. Practice, practice, practice!

I use to use a plastic twirl tank and got inconsistent results. Tossed it 30 years ago and got SS tanks and reels. Easier to load and last forever. I bought all new tops($2.50 each) last year for all three tanks and I'll just keep going for another 3O years!

I saw it recently and don't remember either. However, I now use a search engine site that runs most of the other serrch engines at the same time. It is called, are you ready? dogpile.com. I've done several searchs with it and it turns up lots of stuff from the other seach engines such as yahoo, etc.

A follow up to my post. I looked at Xtol data sheet on Kodak's site. At 5:1 dilution, the E. I is 10. UGH!

I think it is similar to POTA. Look in an older Morgan and Morgan Lab manual for formula. Mine is 1983 version, but is currently in storage.

I've used Ethol TEC in the two solution formula for about 10 years with 35mm Tech Pan 2415 with excellent results. Dilute 30:1, develop for 6 1/2 minutes at 70 F. An E.I. of 100 is bonus with this. Also it is dirt cheap, about $0.06 a roll and the stock solution lasts for 2-3 years with refrigeration. I print with 2 1/2 filter(about 0.6 gamma) on Ilford MF FB.

 

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I also understand that Kodak recommends Xtol at 5:1 dilution. Not sure about the gamma or E.I. expected.