AJG

There is also a much bigger market for old lenses that can be used on mirrorless digital cameras than there is for old film using camera bodies.

I've never done this, but I would expect faster times and more contrast. If you're using developing time as a way to control contrast and density then it would be harder to control. Also, a stock solution will keep longer than a diluted solution if it is protected from exposure to air, but a stock solution in a tray would exhaust quickly and thus be more expensive to use.

Just be aware that not all LED lights are created equal-some of them won't have great color output and will create extra work in post if accurate color is necessary.

You want something with a fairly focused narrow beam--a small studio flash with standard 75-80 degree reflector would be my choice.

I think your diagnosis is correct--It looks like uneven developing due to poor agitation. I have successfully used a Gepe sheet film tank but didn't like it since it leaked and took way to long to fill and dump chemistry. My ultimate solution is a Jobo sheet film tank that can do 12 sheets at a time on a Uniroller rolling agitator. 5000+ sheets later it still works and is what I would recommend.

Good luck with your set up--I hope you have a very heavy light stand to hold this or have counterweights that you use to weight the base of the stand with. Since I did a catalog shoot many years ago with some young children running around in my studio I have had 10# lead shot bags wrapped around the base of my light stands to lower the center of gravity. These also make it much harder for me to knock them over when I'm rushing around on my own.

While I am sympathetic to your arguments that slowing down change for the sake of change would be a good thing, I think that the manufacturers are up against a culture that consumes quickly and is ready to move on to the next thing in whatever field you happen to choose. The only camera company seeming to follow your advice at the moment is Pentax, and while I am a satisfied user of their cameras and lenses, their market share is very small. It will be interesting to see if they keep to their commitment to SLR designs and don't make a mirrorless camera any time soon. For my work, their circa 2016 K 1 DSLR does everything that I need and there aren't very many things that I would change about it even if I could. But my needs aren't everybody's, and a mass market product has to have a mass market if the development and production costs are going to be recovered and a profit is going to be made.

It is things like this that give me hope that AI isn't going to take over the universe... Somebody paid something for the ad to reach you and I think I can guess how successful that pitch was.

That cap looks period correct for your Sonnar--the ones from the 1930's say Carl Zeiss Jena, not Germany. Incidentally, the really soft glass was on the 1930's collapsible f/2 version; the f/1.5 versions are reputed to have harder glass for their front elements.

If the hood is the one from the 1950's, it is a great hood but it blocks a lot of the viewfinder. There were two versions--a 40.5 mm screw in and a 42 mm push on. When I have used mine I have used the turret finder in the accessory shoe to have an unobstructed view of the subject.

I have likewise become more of a user/collector over the last ten years, specifically Zeiss Contax cameras and lenses from the 1930's through the 1950's. I have tried to maintain reasonable temperature/humidity levels as well and so far, a least, no major losses. I do keep lenses capped and have good quality (B+W) brass mounted UV filters on all of my old lenses since some of them have very soft glass for the front elements and early lens coatings were not as robust as current lenses. I have expressly avoided the later Carl Zeiss lenses for the Contax because Zeiss went to synthetic epoxy lens cement by the mid 1950's which tends to fail spectacularly and this is very expensive to repair. I likewise have hoods for all of the lenses that will take them, but I have been less interested in authenticity and more interested in protecting the lenses from damage and flare. The Zeiss hoods for the 50 mm Sonnars from the 1950's, for example, block a lot of the viewfinder while inexpensive vented hoods from eBay work much better in practical terms. My more recent Pentax lenses (from the late 1970's and onward) get less care (no UV filters) but have all held up well under similar storage conditions. Almost all of these were purchased new and have received heavy professional use. The barrels are a bit worn from usage, but optically and mechanically they all work as they should.

I meant to say that you could attach a tripod head to the bottom of the column, not another tripod. I probably shouldn't answer these things late at night...

I'm not familiar with this specific model, but many other Manfrotto tripods allow attaching a tripod to the bottom of the center column. It wouldn't be the easiest thing to carry if you did this but it would get you the lower height that you need.

I have never charged a camera battery via cable to the camera since I have always used an external charger anyway, so if this causes camera manufacturers to include an external charger then I am for it. And I have never met a pro or serious amateur photographer who doesn't carry extra batteries at all times. The idea behind the law (that there are a ridiculous number of proprietary charging cables for cell phones and other devices) is a good one. How many people have lost or damaged a dedicated cord only to find that a replacement was either ridiculously expensive or unavailable for an older device? As for leading to the demise of DSLRs in general, I think that ship has already sailed. It is very clear that Nikon and Canon have moved to mirrorless and that they are selling off current models but won't be coming out with new DSLRs. Sony did the same thing years ago, leaving Pentax as the only DSLR maker that has committed to continuing to make them. Since Pentax doesn't release new models that frequently, I'm sure they will take this into account when they design new cameras.

If you like the 135 focal length, the 135 f/4 Sonnar is definitely a good lens. The post war aluminum barrel versions are fairly light weight and focus to a useful 5'.

If your negatives are perfectly exposed and developed then you won't need much in the way of filters with variable contrast paper. But when things aren't perfect, the filters can help a lot. The Ilford Multigrade set is pretty consistent for exposure, with grades 00-3 IIRC being the same exposure--nail a highlight and higher numbers will give you darker low tones and blacks with grades 3 1/2-5 being 1 stop less light thus requiring double the exposure. This isn't fool proof, but it usually does get you most of the way to a decent print. If you're happy with your prints without filters then don't use them.

Nice to see some results from your "new" Contax. Have you been using the shade that you showed on the 50 mm lens? That one is actually for an 85 mm f/4 Triotar or 135 mm f/4 Sonnar, so I wonder if you have had any issue with vignetting. I actually use longer ones with my 85 and 135 lenses to minimize lens flare.

My newest digital camera is a Pentax K 1 which came out in 2016, I think. Like you I have lots of lenses that work perfectly on it and are excellent quality so switching to mirrorless would entail a big expenditure for lenses as well as the camera body and I doubt that I would see significant improvement in the professional work that I do which is largely in my studio where size and weight aren't really a factor. And I am used to all of the controls by now and any new camera will entail a lot of changes to that. The only thing that tempts me is the ability to use my Zeiss Contax lenses on a digital body, which seems more possible now with Nikon's entry into mirrorless with a thinner cover glass over the imaging chip. Early Sony models didn't do well with anything much below 50 mm or longer, and I would love to use my 21 mm Biogon and other Zeiss and Nikkor RF lenses for digital photography. But that can wait...

I use Tamrac straps with quick release attachments for all of my cameras, including 2 Rollei TLRs. The fabric from these will go through the Rollei connector hardware on the camera bodies and they have held up well for 20+ years. Unfortunately, I don't think that Tamrac makes these any more. I would trust Rollei's straps to work as long as the leather of the strap itself was in good condition. Too many vintage cameras have hit the floor because of dried out ancient leather straps.

When I shot color neg films professionally I routinely overexposed by 1/2 stop or more because I found that I got better prints that way. Given that many older cameras with CdS cell metering tend to underexpose as they age it makes sense to me to tell the camera to overexpose routinely. I once managed to forget that I had set a Vivitar 285 to full power manual shooting a wedding and took several frames that way and probably over exposed by 3-4 stops until I realized that the recycling time was way too long for fresh batteries. The machine prints from those negatives were fine. The lesson I took from that was that color neg could take a lot of over exposure before the results would be unusable. Under exposure, on the other hand, quickly leads to smoky green shadows and generally poor print quality. You are right that the ISO should be what the manufacturer rates it to be, but for color neg some over exposure is often helpful, and is easily compensated for in printing.

Our last tomatoes--Pentax K 5 w/50-200 Pentax zoom

I am not a lawyer, but my understanding is that any image of recognizable people that you use for commercial purposes (a business website, for example) will be considered advertising and you will need releases for those images. You can probably skate by without them as long as the pictures are flattering, but your definition of that word may not be the same as the parent of a child in your photo and you could then get sued successfully. We live in a litigious society, unfortunately.

If that were my camera I would bite the bullet and spend the money for one roll of expensive film to try it and then relegate it to shelf queen status. Sandy's link looks pretty daunting to me, and you still need the backing paper from a roll of 828 to pull it off.

After sunset from our deck. Pentax K 5 with 50-200 Pentax zoom

When I have my camera bag in my car it rides in the back seat with the shoulder strap over the headrest so it can't go airborne in the event of a quick stop. With my heavy 4x5 I fasten the seat belt over the custom bag that I made for it.