The 45C is a studio camera but I use it in the field. The camera, big old tripod and back pack I lug around weigh about twenty five pounds.
NOTE: I’m omitting technical data regarding the presented images. Write me if you want to know more.
Using a full blow view camera is unlike all other photographic endeavors. There are knobs, levers, gears, tilts, swings, rises, falls. Many adjustments need to be done under a dark cloth so you need to know where things are purely by feel. Ha ! That’s kind of racy.
To say that LF photography is a slow activity is pretty accurate.
90mm f4.5 Super Symmar in Recessed Board
Lenses made for large format (LF) are magnificent. They have for perform well over a lot of film geography. Think about it.
A 50 mm lens for 35mm film has to cover an area a little bigger than a postage stamp. The lens in your silly little cell phone has to cover an area about the size of the eraser on a pencil. Furthermore !
Smallish lenses are designed to perform best in the middle because that’s where the subject usually is. Depending on lens quality, that sweet spot can fade away pretty quickly. Not a problem when you look at small photos.
Lenses produce upside down, circular versions of what you see through your viewfinder or ground glass. This is called “the image circle” and it’s obviously bigger than the film frame or else all your photos would show round images.
Great LF lenses like the 90mm Super Symmar shown above produce big image circles that are sharp over a lot of real estate. LF photographs are usually enlarged to produce large images so they have to behave from edge to edge.
A lot of math and craftsmanship goes into producing such lenses. Lenses that snap that Circle Of Confusion into pinpoint sharpness at just the right spot on the film.
Note the different bellows. Wide angle lenses like a 90mm require more roof for for their Zones Of Confusion when using tilts and swivels, etc.
UMass Barns on Sabin Street
If you like shadows, you should come to New England in November.
Valentine’s Day
