My Baby has a Mother now, thanks Will

http://leonardobarreto.com/GRAFLEX_WEB/index.htm

I don't know what happened to the text of my first post, so this may be redundant, but what I want to say is that Will sent me a Speed graflex that is now the mother of my Baby Century Graphic (6x9 on 120 film)...

Not even Asher has anything to say about the Speed? Its not a Mk III 1Ds, but...

leonardobarreto.com said:

Not even Asher has anything to say about the Speed? Its not a Mk III 1Ds, but...

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Hi Leo!

Nice family!
btw.: you´re the only guy i know to whom the baby came first . .

congratulations, Klaus (do you have a name for the mother yet? ;-) )

Klaus, you can be the godfather.
I got the baby because I wanted to convert it to 4x5. I had not seen one and someone wrote one eBay that they were "easily convertible and had same movements" of the big ones.

I learned two things, first that the Baby Graflex is really nice, compact 6x9 camera and that it was a crime to convert it to anything else. And two: it is not "easily convertible" to 4x5, the lens board is substantially smaller, the bellows and reels are limited to smaller distances too.

So, the best thing is to have the family, keep the Baby as a 6x9 -- not a small format, a lot bigger than Hasselblad--.

Then Will sent me the mother, yes Klaus, after the Baby...

The images that I shot the other day and enlarged to 20 x 25 inch. with the 6x9/Schneider 100mm Symmar are lacking detail, I don't know if it is lack of focus, blurred or just the lens is not sharp enough.

What I want to do now is to get a really good 135mm to use with the 6x9 and the 4x5, but probably I want to do the series with 4x5.

"Klaus, you can be the godfather. "

I feel deeply honoured!

My most favoured lens for 4x5" is a 90mm SuperAngulon.
I have a 5,6/135mm Symmar also - very small thing and very, very sharp. Better as the 5,6/150mm Sironar which came with my Wista.

Try 75/65/47mm on your 4x5" - that´s a world of WA you´ll hardly can have digital without stitching.

best to you and your growing family, Klaus

Klaus, It is NOT a Symmar, sorry, is Xenar. I think that 4 elements. Do you have an easy way to test the resolution of LF lenses?

thanks, Leonardo

Hi, Leonardo,

I'm sure Will's wife, Paula, is grateful to you!

Now all you need is a nice 3-1/4 x 4-1/4 to round out the Three Bears.

leonardobarreto.com said:

Klaus, It is NOT a Symmar, sorry, is Xenar. I think that 4 elements. Do you have an easy way to test the resolution of LF lenses?

thanks, Leonardo

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"Do you have an easy way to test the resolution of LF lenses?"

an 8x magnifier ;-) and some exposures with the whole aperture-range - shot with strobes fand rom a rock-steady tripod.
Get a "Siemens-Stern" test-chard or simply shoot out of the window at a very detailed building.

You´ll realize it very soon.

best, Klaus

Klaus, I just came from the http://www.matthewmarks.com/index.php?n=2&c=7&e=432 Andreas Gursky new show here -- 1 block from where I have my office @ 22st, I'm @20st-- and I came out a bit depressed because everything that we mere mortals do after that is just kids play.

I was looking at the image of the race car teams and for the reflection in the helmets he seams to be using one specular source of light, probably the sun, and a very high speed because there was no movement at all.

In other images there was a lot of definition, but they had plenty of grain. The most fantastic are one where you see what seams to be tracks of high way or racing ring and the series of islands. There is so much detail and the prints are so large that I don't know how hi did it. Probable because the distance reduces the depth of field and may be using wide angles pre focused to infinity.

Anyway, I just wanted to remind you how clever the germans are ... but you probably knew that...

"... but you probably knew that..."

i heard about that . . . but relax: Andreas also needs water for cooking (as we say here . . ) . .
After long time working on 8x10" he´s now heavy in digital as i heard.
Nothing we can´t do by ourselves - it´s the idea. As it is in most arts . . so: be optimistic!

best, Klaus

I'm interested to know more about his modus operandi, -- not to copy him of course--, as I said, in some images I could see the grain, but in others there was just detail for square feet after square feet.

If you sell one image in $3,000,000.00 you can probably afford the best technology in the civilian world, and some of the military as well, plus helicopters, assistants (Jeff Koons has dozens of artists hand painting his canvases) and super computers, scanner, printers etc.

On the other side I think that he is becoming a bit too commercial and sleek looking and may be suffering the same complex as Koons: too much success --something that I have no problem with with 0 success--.

One more thing --for the godfather of my Baby Century-- I'm shopping for a 135mm with 4x5 coverage. I don't have all the money in the world, so, probably your A list will have to wait. I saw on eBay a cheap nice conditionFujinon 135mm W f/5.6 lens and bet on it, but then I went to this site where they have result of tests of lenses http://www.hevanet.com/cperez/testing.html#100mm_thru_163mm and a Fujinon W 135mm had this results

f/11 21 30 60
f/16 33 42 54
f/22 48 54 54
the first column is center/mdl/edge and 80 is about the top.

So I went back and found ANOTHER 135mm this one for $260, so REALY expensive (for me) that is a Schneider 135mm Symmar-S F/5.6

I understand that this is the late model, --later than the one with no S-- but earlier than the APO that would be the contemporary one.

The problem now is that I'm winning the two biddings and may get two similar lenses, but someone said that sometimes the difference between two lenses of the same brand and model is bigger than that between models and brands.

So if I get the two I could compare them and sell the looser (this may be the Fujifilm, but we could organize race track horse betting to see if the poor japanese lens is eaten alive by the semi new semi old german one)

I' let you know, the schneider has 12 hours to go, the other 6 days. I may yet loose one or the two...

I won a Schneider Symmar-S 135mm f/5.6 Lens w/ Copal 0 - AS IS for $224. I know that some people here are going to say that it was way too much for a lens on a barrel (the copal is not working), but the optic is "multicoated" and an Symmar-S. On the other side I have the Copal 0 from my 100mm that may fit.

I just don't want to wait all summer just to get a decent 135mm.

I may also get the Fujinon S that is really cheap because the glass is scratch, so I can use the copal of that too if I get it.

Hi Leonardo,

I'd like to know how the 6x9 works for you with only 8 image per 120 roll versus about the same for a 4x5 readyload pack. For sure the 120 film takes less spece, so that's an advantage.

Asher

Asher, I think that it depends on the subject you are shooting.

I began my project with the 6x9, and made 20 x 24 prints that are ok, but not what they should be. I don't know if that is because the format or the lens, so I will got tomorrow with the camera that Will sent me -- I feel as if I won a prestigious grant for perusing a work in progress, and I don't want to disappoint Will -- and a Fujinon W 180mm that I had from the film times (I sold an 8x10 G-Claron to get my Mamiya AFD, but that is the way life goes) that I think is probably a far superior lens than the 100mm 4 elements that came with the Baby Century.

I'm a bit concerned about framing and focusing this moving ships with a lens that almost twice the focal distance of the 100, -- less depth of field and more prone to movement --, I will be shooting 160 ASA, so that will give me a half stop advantage.

Then for ammunition I will bring 5 holders (I had plenty from the film time) for a total of 10 shots. In my case It should be sufficient for a morning fishing expedition because there is only one or two ship sightings in one sitting, and it takes about five to ten seconds to pass by, so you can probably shoot two shots.

In my case I the enlargeability of the image is important, and I would shoot with the digital back if I was not using that for my business and paying it with my credit card, so all of this are very conditions that depend on the work and working conditions plus the effect that needs to be created.

It is probably the same as for a painter to decide to use oil or acrylic.

This seams like a monologue, me posting reply to my posts. But for me is like a useful debriefing of what I found out in a day's outing.

I left home at 9am and only got to Snug Harbor at 10 something at the same time that an huge automobile transporter was coming in the passage, I could also see a big container ship had passed before, but I missed them and it was only about tree hours after that one more passed by.

Anyway, I had the Speed Graphic that Will Thompson sent me, with the 180 Fijinon-W and five holders of 4x5 160 ASA.

I shot only tree "plates" and at the end I tilted the lens to get focus on the entire river. I will be interesting to enlarge 20 x 24 prints with a larger negative and a better lens. I could even use two papers and make a 48x 20 or a 40 x 24. (I noticed that in the show of the famous Andreas Gursky some of the images had "stitched" paper.

So that's it. If I was shooting digital I could be posting images already, but this is "unplugged" and "acoustic", so...

"This seams like a monologue, me posting reply to my posts. But for me is like a useful debriefing of what I found out in a day's outing."

Hi Leo!

I´m very busy these days - seems to be an interesting theme you rose up here!! I´ll come back after Wednesday! Promised

best, Klaus

Leonardo,

Not a monologue but a way of having us right besides you!

Looking forward to the images. I'll be interested how stable you find the movements of the speed graphic.

4x5 seems to be a good compromise in L.F. Would an 8x10 be too much to schlepp along?

Asher

thank you asher, I know that when the new 1DMk3 is coming out in B&H reading about old view cameras and film is not the hottest topic in town, but I work with digital and have found that the classic instruments are a lot of fun to operate and probably every day will be more and more difficult to do so. For example: there was no ASA 100 film for sale in Adorama, a respectable camera store in New York. -- I'm using 160 -- and in a few years there will probably be no 4x5 or 120 selling of developing anywhere. For the moment the lab has the same $2 per 4x5 that I was used to 10 years ago, and at My Own Color Lab you can print large photographs (they have an 8x10 enlarger) for $11/hour.

I would like to do something in 8x10, that is for sure, definitively C-neg, but I sold my G-Claron to buy the digital back... but for this subject of moving ships I think 4x5 is fine.

The good with 4x5 is that you can shoot one shot and develop that, I used tree this morning but one that I want to check for movement, focus, resolution, depth of field etc, but Monday is holiday, so probably Tuesday I will know what happened... with digital it would be just too easy..

leonardobarreto.com said:

thank you asher, I know that when the new 1DMk3 is coming out in B&H reading about old view cameras and film is not the hottest topic in town, but I work with digital and have found that the classic instruments are a lot of fun to operate and probably every day will be more and more difficult to do so. For example: there was no ASA 100 film for sale in Adorama, a respectable camera store in New York. -- I'm using 160 -- and in a few years there will probably be no 4x5 or 120 selling of developing anywhere. For the moment the lab has the same $2 per 4x5 that I was used to 10 years ago, and at My Own Color Lab you can print large photographs (they have an 8x10 enlarger) for $11/hour.

I would like to do something in 8x10, that is for sure, definitively C-neg, but I sold my G-Claron to buy the digital back... but for this subject of moving ships I think 4x5 is fine.

The good with 4x5 is that you can shoot one shot and develop that, I used tree this morning but one that I want to check for movement, focus, resolution, depth of field etc, but Monday is holiday, so probably Tuesday I will know what happened... with digital it would be just too easy..

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Hi Leo!

Do you have a 4x5" Polaroid-back? If so, try the No.:??? , that´s the B&W with negatives. Georgous!!
And ideal for testing focus!! The negative is rezorsharp and has a wondeful tone-characteristic.

best, Klaus

Klaus Esser said:

Hi Leo!

Do you have a 4x5" Polaroid-back? If so, try the TYPE 55 , that´s the B&W with negatives. Gorgeous!!
And ideal for testing focus!! The negative is razor-sharp and has a wonderful tone-characteristic.

best, Klaus

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And if you do not I can send You one. (#545 4x5 instant sheet film holder)

(Polaroid Type 55 4x5" Instant Black & White Positive/Negative Sheet Film (ISO-50) - 20 Sheet Box)

Or you could use Polaroid TYPE 665 3.25" x 4.25" Instant Black & White Positive/Negative Pack Film (ISO-80) - 10 Exposure Pack.

I have 4x5 holders for this film too. (#405 3.25" x 4.25" instant Pack Film Holder adapter for 4x5)

This just came from eBay, a Multicoating Symmar S 135mm. I got it for $230. In my humble opinion, cheap. Because the compur is not working, but what I did is to use the one of the lens that came with the 100mm -- a COPAL- 0 --

I want to use the 135 an 180 as main 4x5 lenses for my personal work, so I wanted to invest in what I think is a good lens, but the best way to see how good it realy is, is by testing. so I will test drive it tomorrow.

The added value of this is that I can use it on the Baby Century too.

Now I have to see what happens with the apertures. This is a f:5.6 lens and the compur is set for f:3.5

Probably Klaus can explain that.

"This is a f:5.6 lens and the compur is set for f:3.5
Probably Klaus can explain that."

Well - since you can´t get more light out of the lens by putting it in a + one-stop-shutter . . . i suggest you run a test . . best, Klaus