jim_gardner4

<p>Yeah, Mamiya C330 or Bronica. Both very usable. Oh, and if you find you cant get film in 5 years you can, a) show people that you were one of the last to use film in the world, b) ask me for some, c) revert to using a pencil, d) try digital keeping in mind it might be obsolete one day.</p>

<p>Oooo Dan! That one hurt! I do get a bit confused; my passport says British, I live in the UK yet I am English.</p>

<p>When I fill in a new passport application I always put English.</p>

<p>Is someone born in Puru American?</p>

<p>Randy, I posted similar to this a day or two ago. "Come on guys, enough now" (sorry, I dont know how to link). The answers you have received so far are more constructive than some I got. Thats fine, I have broad shoulders but it is getting fairly tiresome that, as you say, so many people seem to feel the need to point out that theirs is better than someone elses, film is dead, etc etc.<br>

Of course, everyone is entitled to an opinion and to share it but maybe its time for a ****vs**** forum <br>

Maybe it is because some people need a little self re-assurance about their chosen make, medium, format, method and to get it, berate all others. Of course, thats only my opinion, but I am sharing it.</p>

<p>Laurence, I dont know how much the V models are but I use a 4990 and am very happy with the results. Its a few years old now but obviously the quality doesnt degrade with age.</p>

<p>I live in England. A lot of you live in America. If I was asked which was better I would say England and I would guess most Americans would say America. We could ask 1000 people from every country on the planet which was the best and <em>most</em> would quite rightly say the one they live in.</p>

<p>So; the film vs digital on-going (and on-going) debate. Please can we end this one now. The film people will <em>generally</em> say film and the digi will <em>generally</em> say digi. As there is no right or wrong answer, is it time to stop debating it? I certainly think so.</p>

<p>There are lots of new posts about Kodak at the moment. They (or their sister, brother,parent or some other company) will stop making film now. No they wont...yes they will...no they wont...yes they will....Its behind you!</p>

<p>The fact is,we do not know and any one who absolutely does know is not saying.</p>

<p>Hollywool, Bollywood, Balsawood or Cricklewood uses more film than digi / digi than film. I doubt if anyone knows the deffinate answer to that and to be honest, it should not make any difference to us.</p>

<p>If you are concerned about the lack of film in the future, the worst thing you can do is tell others (especially new-comers) how bad its all getting.</p>

<p>Do you know what I use mostly? Do you care? Will it alter what you use? I would hope not.</p>

<p>It you want film to stay in production, buy some and use it.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Are you saying you WANT the subject to be zone V11? If so, surely you want to open up 2 stops rather than close down.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>F2AS for the manual option. FM3a for aperture priority.</p>

<p>They are a great meter. Very easy to use and the one I have is very accurate. I inherited mine a few years ago and my father had it for 10-15 or more years before that. He got it 2nd or 3rd hand. Never been callibrated, never been wrong and never changed the battery.</p>

<p>No one can say though, if it will stay accurate or how long it will work for. It may be a couple of months or 40 years. Also, as John said, you may have to pay import duty/vat etc which could mean the total price is nearer £400</p>

<p>Personally I would try and find one in the UK. If there are any problems it will be loads easier to get sorted. Good choice of meter though but a lot of money by the time it gets to you.</p>

<p>Thanks all. The reason for asking is that I have a 2-3 year old 503 and 3 CFi lenses. I am quite precious (some would say far too much) about taking them out on a motorbike, walking through London streets at night etc with them (I had to work very hard to get them) and one day I would like to get a beaten up 500 or 501 with a couple of old lenses for this perpose.</p>

<p>I wanted to be sure lenses and bodies were interchangable.</p>

<p>On page 131 of The Hasselblad Manual by Ernst Wildi, it states that up to 1981 C lenses had a unique barrel design with interlocked aperture and shutter speed rings with automatic depth of field scales, M and X flash sznc, and the built in self timer.</p>

<p>He goes onto say "It is not recommended to use these lenses on newer camera models."</p>

<p>Can anyone tell me why this is?</p>

<p>I only ever pre soak some ultra large format film I have and that is only because if I dont, it turns the developer very dark blue.</p>

<p>I do get the temperature consistent from film to film but to be honest, I never count the inversions, swirls or anything else. After a while I reckon you can almost feel what a film wants-depending on the subject and remembering the contrast of the scene etc-</p>

<p>Also I usually over-expose by at least half a stop and knock 10% off the recomemded dev time. That is not to say you can do whatever you want but you dont have to do exactly what the next person does to get good results.</p>

<p>The only rule I have is if I happen to use a plastic tank with a twisty stick, I never never twist it fast. This always results in extra development on the edges of the film but that may be perculiar to me. Maybe others twist away really fast and have no problem.</p>

<p>As a point of interest, I am unable to dev 5x4 film in the square combi tank. It just doesnt work for me. I have to use a round Jobo tank and gently rotate it on its side.</p>

<p>Quality. Lenses and body etc.<br>

Service, spares, backup.<br>

Useabilty.<br>

Features; to a point, the fewer the better.<br>

I have about 5 MF cameras now so after the above points came things like tlr or slr (mirror to move or not), manual or battery dependant.<br>

Price obviously plays a large part but a very cheap "bad" camera is, in the end, not cheap at all. It will cost lots in wasted film and dissapointment.</p>

<p>Also, apart from film, developer, tripods etc etc, I still firmy believe prime lenses are a must. Zooms have come a long way in the last few years but a decent prime will always far out-perform a zoom in my opinion.</p>

<p>Chris, from my post you may have gathered that I dont use 35mm very much at all now. The reason I moved up to MF and LF was quality. In general terms,the bigger the neg the better the quality. Yes MF cameras are usually bigger than 35mm although I am sure there are some exceptions but the quality is far far better.<br>

I would be confident printing the sizes you mentioned from a 6x6 neg (if the taking lens was good quality) and from a LF neg you could print huge and retain masses of detail.</p>

<p>Try MF when you can, I am sure you will be very pleased.</p>

<p>Stock answer; if more and more of these companies did stop making film, the remaining company/companies would be making all the film used worldwide. Whether its Kodak,Ilford or someone else, there will be one or two companies left making truely huge profits on producing film.</p>

<p>Chris, assuming you are talking about scanning then printing digitaly or even printing traditionaly, the short answer is a s big as you want. The limiting factor is the quality you are happy with. Personaly I rarely printed 35mm bigger than about 12 inches on the long side. Any bigger than that and I felt the grain/lack of sharpness/detail (call it what you will) destoyed the photograph. Having said that I did have 2 35mm negs printed at 24x36 but that was for the wow factor of those particular images.<br>

Your current 21.5x14.5 inches (I am assuming 21.5' as written, means inches) seems huge to me, taking into account a border and frame you surely end up with a 28-30" frame on the long side?<br>

You will get a lot of opinions for your question but I would recomend trying bigger and bigger until you are no longer happy with the result.</p>

<p>Annalee, I would suggest "basic" and "beginners" books. Read them and understand them but importantly, remember the views are only those of the author. No one can tell you what the best photograph is or what is the best way to get to the results you are looking for. You will read lots of "rules" and helpfull tips. Learn these rules first then dont be afraid to break them.<br>

If you do buy a camera in the near future, I would suggest you make it a very cheap basic one. There is a very good chance that if you went out and bought an all singing camera and several lenses now, you would want to change them for some reason as you learn.</p>

<p>Do you know anyone who is into photography? They will probably be very happy to share their knoledge with you.</p>

<p>Phil, Yeah I could but have only just bought it, so it annoys me a little that it is so far out. Still waiting for Hasselblad to look at it.</p>

<p>Q.G Looking at my screen, op the top side at the bottom of the left hand edge, there are 2 small semi circles cut out. Looking at the underside though, I would say the lines are raised.<br>

When holing it to a bare, not frosted bulb, there is a "rainbow/starbust" type effect.<br>

It has a split image.</p>

<p>Good point about wether it is actually a PME51. I have posted it to Hasselblad so cant check now. The screen is the standard one that comes in a 503cw so it would be an acute matt I guess. I am assused a PME51 is compattible with that screen and standard 501 screens but not with 500 cameras.</p>

<p>QG Yes I understand. That is what I meant by the last line of my post.<br>

I.E Film speed set the same of every camera and meter. <br>

2.8 set on the Hass meter for the 80mm planar I was using. D.o.F button not engaged.</p>

<p>Further to my post of a week or so ago, I have now bought a Hasselblad PME51 meterd prism.<br>

However, there is a problem. When I checked it against my seckonic spot meter it read just under 2 stops differnt. My first and obvious thoughts were, which one is correct and is the spot meter reading the same subject as the centre weighted Hass?<br>

I then selected an evenly lit light toned wall and took readings with a Nikon F2AS, a cllibrated Nikon F2A, a Bronica with a meterd prism, a Pentax spot meter and a Seckonic spot meter. The difference between the "largest" and "smallest" measurment was half a stop. OK, now try the Hasselblad and it was approx 1.5 stops away from my average.</p>

<p>So that all seems straight forward, the Hass must be wrong. Next I telephoned Hasselblad to see about sending it in for checking/repair. They said they would check it over but it was very unlightly it would be wrong because it uses "solid state circuitry" (I have no idea what that means) and while it is possible that it may be broken to the point of not showing any reading at all they virtually never show the "wrong" reading.</p>

<p>Doeas anyone have experience of a Hasselblad metered prism showing incorrect readings and if so can they be mended?</p>

<p>I did have the film speed and max app for the lens in use set correctly.</p>

<p>Ken, I have used Ilford film 5 years and more out of date with no problems at all. I also have some 35mm Kodak infrared in the fridge which has not been made for several years but I have heard infrared wont keep past its use by date.</p>

<p>As Steve has said, I would be more concerned about temperature the film was stored at than time past expiery date.</p>

<p>I guess it comes down to price and how important the shots are going to be.</p>

<p>Thanks all for the replys. I will try it when it turns up and possibly try and find a "neutral" lens for it. This is proving difficult in the UK so may also try optitians as QG suggests.</p>

<p>I have just ordered a Hasselblad PME51 45 degree metered prism for use on a 503CW. The prism has a diopter correction lens fitted but I am told the correction amount is so small, anyone who doesnt need it can still focus normally with it.</p>

<p>So my question is, can this correction lens alter the lens focus? i.e if a very strong correction lens was fitted, would someone who doesnt need it be focusing the camera in a different place because their eyes are having to alter focus on the screen?</p>

<p>I hope that makes sense. Thanks in advance.</p>

<p> </p>