Great to see you here. Join our insightful photographic forum today and start tapping into a huge wealth of photographic knowledge. Completing our simple registration process will allow you to gain access to exclusive content, add your own topics and posts, share your work and connect with other members through your own private inbox! And don’t forget to say hi!
Jae, meant to get back to you sooner...there are two modes - one with the optical finder, and the second via ultrasonic.
Jae, I meant that you can still use the Leica Disto 5 or similar device, and use the DoF readings off the EMC. This gives you a far more granular and accurate helical setting than the look up charts you get with the R-mounted lenses.
.That is amazingly sexy and I don't even know what it is. I love how small the entire thing is.If you do not mind a doublepost, here's my tiny marvel....
Okay, now it's time for a view camera!
It's my Linhof Techno with an Leaf Aptus 75 digital back and Schneider Apo-Digitar lenses.
I'm an amateur photographer that shoot landscapes and like to hike with my camera, so portability is important. The first image shows yours truly equipped for a day out in the winter, carrying the camera backpack and tripod. I can attach the tripod on the backpack, but actually I carry it over my shoulders as shown in the picture most of the time
I plan to eventually replace the manfrotto junior geared head with an Arca-Swiss D4, but there's other gear on queue before it. The manfrotto head works, but barely so and is a bit heavy.
In total the backpack weighs 9 kg and tripod with head 3.6 kg, so about 13 kg / 30 lbs to carry in total. Not too bad I think.
With that I get the camera body with both bellows (wide+normal), sliding back, digital back, batteries, five lenses (35, 47, 72, 90, 120), a number of filters (including grad filters and holder) and a few extras. I plan to expand the kit with one to three longer lenses (150, 180, 210). I use more long lenses than short in my shooting style so only having 120mm as the longest feels a bit limiting currently. On the wide end I only occassionally use the 35mm actually, instead the 47mm is the favourite all-around lens (which gives a 35mm FoV in 135 terms with my 48x36mm back).
The backpack is a boblbee 500 xt, with sidewinder extensions. Without sidewinders I can only carry three lenses. It's a quite small backpack though which I hope can be seen on the pictures, the Techno system can be made surprisingly compact.
I like that the Schneider lenses are so small and light, and mounted on a lens board also the long lenses are small. This means I can hike with many lenses, which is important to my shooting style. I also prefer the look of the simple symmetric lens designs, zero or near zero distortion, and the foggy smooth bokeh. Optimization for f/11 also make sense for my shooting style, the more recent lenses made for peak performance at larger apertures is just too short DoF for me.
I have still the standard ground glass, and will evenutally get the newly introduced bright ground glass from Linhof. It's not absolutely necessary, but as the ground glass is a central part of the view camera experience I'll get that. The tiny loupe laying on top of the digital back on the image where the ground glass is visible is my 20x critical focus loupe. For me a high magnification loupe has proven to be a key factor for consistent focusing.
I have short shutter release cables attached to all my lenses to speed up setup and lens changing. I have a small mechanical stop watch to time shutter speeds over one second.
I picked a view camera ahead of a more popular pancake camera partly due to financial reasons, while the Techno is actually more expensive than a Rm3di, the low cost lens mount makes a real difference when you start acquiring lenses. The longer lenses also get more compact and lighter so I suspect that my gear is lighter to carry too. The flexible tilt, swing and shifting was also important to me, as I wanted to have something more flexible than my Canon TS-Es rather than less. That said I don't use tilt and swing simultaneously very often, but it does happen.
I like the Leaf Aptus 75 back and it's a great starter back for those that buy gear second hand. I've been unfortunate though and have had lots and lots of cold weather trouble with it, which I'm trying to resolve with Leaf. The 33 megapixel resolution is okay although I'd like to have a bit more in the future, the sensor has accurate colors, tech cam integration is great (no wakeup, just flash sync and go!), and I also like the user interface, a sharpness check that actually works is unusual for a back this old.
David, yes I do use both grip and handstrap. Thing is.....I love to experiment and frequently try out various configurations. When I shoot waistlevel then the grip does not help, in the way I hold it. But using the sportsfinder, then the grip is great!
I agree :thumbup: Alpa TC, Schneider 35 XL and Leaf Aptus II 5.
Sure. It's actually not that tightly packed. In the main compartment there's the sliding back laying flat in the bottom (had I bought the Techno today I'd pick the short back, this is the full length back and it is on the centimeter that it fits into the bag) with the digital back and viewing shade permanently attached, I also keep the sync cable attached to the back, so I can do a quicker setup. Setup means tripod up, attach body to tripod, change lens if not the desired is on, remove lens caps, attach sliding back to tripod, attach sync cable to lens. Ready to compose and shoot.
Peter,
