Technical Camera use in landscape photography

[jamesdfloyd]

This might seem like a simpleton question, or asked already, but here goes.

I am fully aware of why & how you would use a true technical camera for architectural photography, but I am wondering about it’s uses in landscape.

Now, before quick responses, I have seen a few YouTube videos showing Alpa, Schneider & Phase One combinations, but I am having a hard time understanding the total benefit – plus those videos never say “why”. With Phase One releasing Schneider glass lens, in the 28mm & 35mm size, as well as the benefit of motion reduction by using leaf shutter & mirror up, I wonder what is the benefit.

Not being snarky, I am just curious because I want to take the best landscapes I can, and the price of a technical camera, and lens is not an issue for me. Buy a technical, or invest in Phase One Schneider lens?

Thanks!

 

[wding109]

It depends on your landscape photography style. Did you use large format camera before? If you did and you want to try a digital working flow, technical camera may suit you. If you never bother not having rise/fall/tilt/shift when shooting, you may not need a technical camera. But I have to admit, the unique look of technical camera is also an important factor for some people making their choice (e.g., myself)

 

[Jamgolf]

Why technical camera for landscape photography:

Ability to tilt:
By applying the principles of our friend Mr Theodore Scheimpflug we can maximize the depth of field in a typical typical landscape while using the lens in its aperture sweet spot e.g. f5.6 or f8 for Rodenstock. Alternatives to using tilt are:
1. Stopping down to very small apertures at the cost of (a) Diffraction (loss of detail/sharpness/quality) (b) Having to shoot at slower shutter speeds to allow for the smaller aperture (higher f-stop).
2. Focus stacking at the cost of (a) extra post processing steps (b) non-viable for moving subjects

Tilt-Example-1: You have you camera level to horizon and are shooting a vast scenery with interesting elements in foreground, middle and background. With 1º-5º of tilt (depending on lens) you can have everything sharply in focus.
Tilt-Example-2: You have an interesting subject matter on the ground e.g. texture, ground cover, flowers, leaves etc. - with some camera tilt combines with some lens tilt you can frame a detailed corner-to-corner sharp image.

Ability to rise/fall:
While this is considered a must have for architecture, it is also quite useful for landscapes. It allows not only for keeping vertical straight lines but more importantly allows for selective framing.
Fall-Example-1: If you are shooting with a 90mm or 150mm lens with its focus set at infinity (no tilt), on a normal height tripod there will be a lot of foreground in the frame that would be out of focus. By using back-fall of ~10-15mm you would eliminate the soft foreground and frame/compose an image which is sharp.
Fall-Example-2: If you are shooting a close-mid distance subject which is higher than you, using some back-fall you would be capturing an image as if it was at your eye level (or close to you eye level at a minimum).
Rise-Example-1: You may even combine some rise/fall with Tilt-Example-2 for even more controlled framing e.g. you are framing the bed of death valley and shooting at normal tripod height. back-rise would allow you to frame areas very close to the tripod.

Ability to shift:
In addition to framing this allows seamless flat stitching for panoramas. The alternative is to use a pano-head or rotate about the nodal point. These alternatives are viable and most panorama/stitching software can handle the parallax issues. But flat stitching is possibly only via the ability to shift. Now if you are creating a multi row pano, then combining shift with rise/fall rules out nodal-point rotation option.

Size of camera/lenses:
Technical cameras are really simple and rather thin in comparison to the bulkier XF/H6D/DF/HX etc. camera.
Most technical camera lenses are much smaller in comparison to their XF/DF/HX counterparts.
Makes for a much lighter, smaller kit.

Shutter vibrations:
Unlike HX/DF type cameras, technical camera do not suffer from shutter vibrations.

Lens quality:
I think the gap has narrowed with the blue ring Schneider lenses for XF and some of the newer Hasselblad lenses, but generally speaking Rodenstock and Schneider lenses for tech cameras are optically very very good.

etc.
etc.

Hope this helps.
Cheers!

 

[Paul2660]

I believe it can go either way now.

I have and use an Arca rm3di, and with a Phase back, I see some advantages over the XF/lenses.

1. Movements, huge advantage, especially if you are attempting to increase perceived DOF with tilt. MF has a shallower DOF and the use of
tilt can help.

2. Shifting, makes creation of short pano type shots much easier. 15mm of shift can get quite a nice shot, and there will be no parallax
issues and problems aligning the files. You can have the camera pretty much at any angle, you are shifting the back.

3. No shutter on the tech camera, only the leaf shutter on the lens being used, once you get used it the workflow. Considerably less
vibration.

4. Weight, the XF and 35mm or 40-80 is a lot to carry in the field, required 105mm filters. A lot can be done with just one lens on a tech
camera, like the 40mm HR-W rodenstock

5. Rise/Fall, goes back to movements, but can help a lot with shots where you can't keep the camera totally level working to keep
perspective in line.

Optically the modern Schneider LS lenses IMO are very close if not the same degree of optical excellence of the Rodenstock/Schneider lenses. They don't have a very good hyperlocal range, unless you are in the F11 to F16 range (if that matters).

Advantages I see to the XF/lenses

1. No LCC color cast issues, and with the 60MP to 100MP chips from Phase, color cast is an issue, and with the CMOS chips, it takes on an even greater issue. You have to work in the LCC with a tech and that just takes a lot more time.

2. Faster to setup, at least for me. The Tech route takes a lot longer each time you pull it out of the bag to put everything together

3. Modern pano software make creating a pano from the XF/lenses much easier than it was a few years ago, but you still need to be as
level as possible, and as close to nodal for the best results.

4. XF offers several nice tools, such as focus stacking, bracketing, etc. Much easier to implement than on a tech camera

5. Nice integration between camera and back in use, not the case with the tech camera.

Either solution will get the job done and depending on where I am headed really makes the decision for me which camera/lenses I will bring.

Paul C

 

[JeRuFo]

I use movements for pretty much every shot. I use rise and fall in forests and anything with verticals (that includes shooting down on lighthouses on cliffs etc) if the horizon is in the frame I generally set the camera up level and use rise or fall to put it where I want it in the frame. Another nice feature to have is tilt, both on the front and the back, to put the plane of focus where you want (often eliminating the need for stacking, sometimes with some swing thrown in) and getting the foreground to fit. But i shoot large format film and using reasonable movements has no consequences. On digital it is a bit different, lens cast and other trouble comes into play. So not only the way of shooting is slower, your post-processing will slow down a lot too.

The big question is what your shooting style is. If a technical camera will make you late for every shot or distract you from looking at the landscape, then just go with a more integrated system. If you like every detail to be right and don't mind putting the time in then why not. My photography improved a lot by having a few more limitations. I switched to LF and never looked back.

Edit: wow, seems like a lot of people were typing at the same time.

 

[jamesdfloyd]

I should have added to my original post...

All the technical cameras I have looked at have only Rise & Fall, so Tilt is really not in the equation, or I would go with a digital back on a 4x5...which I tried, and got so frustrated with I sold it within a month of buying it.

And when I write "technical camera" I truly mean something like an Alpa, and not a full movements 4x5.

 

[torger]

I should have added to my original post...

All the technical cameras I have looked at have only Rise & Fall, so Tilt is really not in the equation, or I would go with a digital back on a 4x5...which I tried, and got so frustrated with I sold it within a month of buying it.

If you want a 4x5 experience without the frustration you should take a look into the Linhof Techno, it's basically a drop-in replacement for a 4x5 field camera but with geared movements and tilt/swing built-in. I use that myself.

Anyway, with the new high resolution backs, focus stacking feature, availability of ultra-wide lenses and ability to correct perspective in post the need for movements is not as strong as before. Instead of rise/fall you can crop, or tilt the camera and perspective-correct in post. Instead of tilt/swing you can focus-stack. The best tech cam lenses are still considered sharper on the widest end, and some use tech cams solely for that reason, but the Schneider LS lenses are really good too.

So I think it comes down to how you want to make your images. With a tech cam the shooting experience is more traditional, and you create more in-camera and less in post-production. To me the shooting process is why I use a tech cam, and as I look at it now I rather go to large format film than going to an SLR without movements.

 

[wding109]

I don't get this. Which technical camera have you looked at? Arca has built-in tilt, Alpa and Cambo have tilt adapter option for each lens.
Traditional LF camera is not suitable in the digital world simply because of the precision requirement on digital backs.

I should have added to my original post...

All the technical cameras I have looked at have only Rise & Fall, so Tilt is really not in the equation, or I would go with a digital back on a 4x5...which I tried, and got so frustrated with I sold it within a month of buying it.

And when I write "technical camera" I truly mean something like an Alpa, and not a full movements 4x5.

 

[Jamgolf]

Arca has built-in tilt, Alpa and Cambo have tilt adapter option for each lens.

Minor correction. Alpa offer tilt adapters but Cambo lenses are either tilt/shift panel or not. So it's a "at the time of purchase" decision.

 

[Jamgolf]

I should have added to my original post...

All the technical cameras I have looked at have only Rise & Fall, so Tilt is really not in the equation

If tilt is not part of the equation then argument for a technical camera (Arca/Alpa/Cambo/Linhof) becomes a much weaker argument.

 

[jamesdfloyd]

Let me clarify again.

Not looking for tilt-shift, not looking for 4x5, not looking for a specific brand. If I were to have considered a technical camera, it would only have been rise-fall, as I was not aware that technical cameras had tilt-shirt.

But, the core of my question is; without regard to the issue of brands, what would be advantage of technical camera be, if it where not a "typical" LF camera with full movements?

Sorry for the confusion due to the length of this string. And thanks to those of you who provided responses.

 

[JeRuFo]

I think the Linhof Techno was an excellent advice. It is a bit quicker to setup and use with movements than something like an Alpa and has easy control of the front standard, which is really all you need. You can simulate back movements if needed (not that often on film and probably even less used on a digital back, as they are not the biggest fan of complex movements.) Having the certainty of having the rear standard at 90 degrees to the bed is much more useful.
But again, if you are a quick shooter and change locations or lenses often on a shoot, it is better to spend the time in post instead of in the field as Torger suggested.

Edit: sorry, typing too slow again on my tablet.

Any technical camera worth its salt has at least a tilt option (unless you count traditional portrait cameras which had to carry huge lenses), whether they be built into the body like with Arca, on a lens tube with Alpa, or more traditionally with the lens on a front standard separated from the recording medium by bellows like on a linhof or any view camera since the dawn of photography. Besides perspective control with rise and fall, control over the plane of focus is important for most types of photography on formats larger than 35mm. This gives you the advantage of using a larger aperture while still getting everything needed in focus, thus eliminating image degredation due to excessive diffraction.

 

[dchew]

Let me clarify again.

Not looking for tilt-shift, not looking for 4x5, not looking for a specific brand. If I were to have considered a technical camera, it would only have been rise-fall, as I was not aware that technical cameras had tilt-shirt.

But, the core of my question is; without regard to the issue of brands, what would be advantage of technical camera be, if it where not a "typical" LF camera with full movements?

Sorry for the confusion due to the length of this string. And thanks to those of you who provided responses.

Hmm. If you are not looking for tilt or shift then the only advantage of a technical camera I can think of would be if the workflow fits your shooting style. But asking what are the benefits of any product, then eliminating the primary benefits of the product from the equation, kinda defeats the purpose of the question.

I do think weight and size is another advantage. Part of the weight advantage of a technical camera is the fact that shifting can turn a prime lens into a dual-focal length "zoom". For example, I sometimes take only my 60 and 90 mm lenses. But if I use them with vertical shifts, then in 135 format I almost have a 28-60 range. Add the 150mm and I cover ~28-100mm, with just a few small gaps in that range (missing 39-44mm and 58-72mm). A small amount of cropping fills those gaps. Add the 40mm and the wide end goes down to 20mm. This all assumes a 15.6mm shift.

Now of course you can shift with any lens by moving the lens, but some prefer to shift the back as opposed to moving the lens around, which changes perspective. With no interest in shifting this is all moot.

I would not recommend anyone use a technical camera for quality reasons alone. For example, I think very few people would benefit from the Alpa TC as their only MF camera. Some might like it for size reasons, but the X1D just put that into question! I never really understood the Phase One A-series, but that is probably because I look at it myopically.

Dave

 

[dchew]

Here is a classic example of using shift in landscapes. This could be done two other ways: Shoot with a much wider lens and crop, or point the camera up then use perspective correction software in post.

The first option would have cropped at least half the image away so I don't really like that option. I find using perspective correction difficult on a shot like this because there are no straight lines for reference like there are in architecture. Certainly some might be fine with that method. Again you would be cropping away some of the image during the perspective correction.

Dave

 

[JeRuFo]

Easiest way that I can illustrate why I use a tech cam is with a quick pic from a few years back. This photo is quite a good advocate for using one.

Because I wanted to keep the lighthouse, however small in the frame, perfectly vertical I used quite a bit of fall. To keep the background, green part of the cliff and the lighthouse in focus, I used a bit of front shift to tip the plane of focus forward and a bit of swing to rotate it a bit clockwise. The resulting image has all the major components in good sharpness, the rocks in the foreground, the lighthouse ofcourse, the green bit on the left and the water at the base of the cliff. The only bits that are out of focus are the rock in the water right next to the rocks in the foreground and the outermost rock on the lower right. Although it would be nice to have those in focus too, it is far more useful to me to be able to capture this in one frame without having to worry about shifting water, clouds etc.
If I had to capture this with an MF slr, it would take at least 5 or 6 photos stacked to get everything sharp. Since the sunlight only lasted less than a minute before it went behind the clouds again, I was very happy I spent the 5 or 10 minutes earlier setting up my movements just so and being able to just press the shutter at the right moment.

Note: the 100% crops are from a not terribly good flatbed scan from a 4x5 sheet of Velvia at around 100MP.

 

[schuster]

I use rise and/or tilt in about 10% of my images, but as far as being out in the boonies is concerned, there's nothing that I know of that's as small, light and straightforward easy to use as the ArcBody.

 

[torger]

I use rise or fall in about 95% of my landscape shots. Tilt in some, swing in even fewer. Horizontal shift is rare, but it has happened. In architecture work horizontal shift is more common than in landscape. If you stitch you use it often of course (I don't stitch). How much you use particular movements is a lot dependent on your shooting style. I do quite much "intimate landscape scenes", and less of grand open landscape scenery. In the grand open scenery tilt is used often.

If you're a macro guy you would use tilt/swing combined a lot, but using a tech cam close to the ground is *not* ergonomic (I've tried), so I wouldn't recommend it primarily for outdoor macro. Tech cams are a bit like large format, you preferably used them in comfortable standing positions.

The Linhof Techno is a heavy bulky camera, but as it has lens boards each lens is light. I carry seven lenses from 35mm to 180mm, that would be much heavier in an SLR system. I appreciate having that many lenses, but I admit it's not common to set up a system like that, most tech cam users have around 3 lenses or so, and crop/stitch to cover the inbetweeners.

As said I use rise/fall in almost every shot. This is because the camera is almost always set level, and the position of the horizon is adjusted with rise&fall. This leads to a "strict" perspective with upright features. However generally you can keep rise/fall at zero and instead tilt the camera quite much before it becomes "ugly". Wide angle forests/architecture is the worst case where it quickly becomes ugly with leaning features, while longer focal lengths and no trees etc you can tilt the camera instead without ugliness.

But if you like me appreciate also the subtleness of camera movements, that stricter perspective that is not immediately apparent to the layman, you will appreciate rise/fall etc in the "unnecessary" cases too. I think much of the classic "large format look" does not really come from lenses or format size or resolution, but that stricter perspective.

Below I've attached an example image that would look perfectly alright without using back rise (or lens fall), but by using shift to look down you get that stricter perspective. As said in my previous post you can achieve the same effect by keystone correction, but it requires ultra-wide lenses and laborious cropping as you loose a lot of the frame when keystoning. So if you like to have movements as an integral part of your style you surely want a tech cam, but if you would only use it rarely time to time, you may prefer the SLR.

 

[gmfotografie]

and not to forget using a tech camera or a largeformat cam - it slows you down ... for me that is an important point in landscape photogrpahy!

 

[torger]

and not to forget using a tech camera or a largeformat cam - it slows you down ... for me that is an important point in landscape photogrpahy!

I agree. Of course you can be disciplined and shoot just as few images with a SLR, but for some of us it doesn't work like that. A tech cam is flexible in terms of moments but otherwise a very limited camera. Although there are people that use an ALPA TC for zone-focused street photography, the typical use case is that for each shot you make you mount the tripod, take the camera out of the backpack and mount it, compose focus and shoot. It's a several minutes process.

You won't make wild-life shots with it, the genre is narrowed down. I like this as it makes me more focused on my particular shooting style.

However, say if I was into capturing fast-moving light, rainbows etc, using my Linhof would be a bit frustrating at times. It has happened that I have missed shots because I was not fast enough setting up the camera. I rarely shoot those type of things, and in fact one of my favorite conditions is overcast where I can think really long and slow about a composition.

But it's a matter of taste and style, some go crazy by this slowness and choose an SLR for this reason. It should also be said that speed and shooting style flexibility vary between tech cams too. The Linhof Techno can't be hand-held at all, it requires a tripod (and I'm fine with that), while an ALPA TC is perfectly hand-holdable. There's loads of different tech cams with various types of tradeoffs. It can be a challenge to choose one that fits your shooting style.

And of course, there are shooting styles that won't work well with a tech cam at all, such as if your landscape photography mixes in some wildlife.

 

[jagsiva]

All of the above, and people move out of your way when you are shooting