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Show us your Tech Cam

ndwgolf

Active member
Neil, there is a wide range of bodies, lenses and backs each with pros and cons - do some research as it will end up costing you a lot of money and possibly for little benefit. How often do you use movements on your sheet film cameras?

john
John
To be honest....not very often mainly because i struggle to get the focus correct when I focus near tilt far and so on.......I do like the idea of the rise and fall and the shift with the digital tech cameras..........I am also pretty competent at stitching to get the perspective correct. But to answer your question about the movements............not very much

Neil
 

dchew

Well-known member
John
To be honest....not very often mainly because i struggle to get the focus correct when I focus near tilt far and so on.......I do like the idea of the rise and fall and the shift with the digital tech cameras..........I am also pretty competent at stitching to get the perspective correct. But to answer your question about the movements............not very much

Neil
Neil,
As you have probably figured out, there is a myriad of options for technical cameras. It helps to evaluate a few things first that will narrow your search. First, are your interests in a technical camera with movements similar to your Chamonix? I think of these as bellows-based technical cameras. The Lindhof Techno, Cambo Actus and Arca-Swiss M-two are some examples. The other option is a helical-based technical camera, like the Alpa STC, Alpa Max, Arca-Swiss rm3di, Arca-Swiss Factum, Cambo WRC400, WRS1600. In general, these have fewer movements but are more compact (up to a point).

Some things to consider in that primary decision:
  • How important are specific movements? Bellows systems are more versatile in the movement category.
  • Will your back have live view? If not, then the helical-based may make more sense, although several here get along just fine with a bellows-based system w/o live view.
  • How many lenses do you want? A helical based system gets expensive and heavy with many lenses, because each lens has its own helical and support structure vs a simple lens board.
  • How important is it to be minimalistic and light? It is hard to beat a small one or two lens helical based system for portability.
In my opinion, once you get past this first decision of bellows vs helical, the decision is a personal one that can only be answered by trying them in the field. These things are more cumbersome to use verses most other camera choices, and certain features that drive workflow seem important to one person yet immaterial to another.

Dave
 
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Audii-Dudii

Active member
I realize this probably doesn't belong here...

because there isn't a medium-format sensor to be seen anywhere, but Hey, it's definitely a "tech cam" and it fits well my present needs / budget, so why not?





The body is a Sony A7R. Surprisingly, for the type of low-light, long-exposure photography that I mostly do*, I find it to be a better performer than the A7RII and A7RIII, so it has been easy to resist upgrading it. I have mounted it to the Mamiya 645 mounting plate that came with the Cambo when I bought it used a few years ago from Steve Hendrix at Capture Integration. (At the time, I intended to use it with my older, Phase One CCD back and Contax 645 lenses, but the lack of live view made this setup too awkward / difficult in use to ever be practical, so I parked it in the back of a closet until I resurrected it for this project in mid-2016.)

To change the A7R orientation from horizontal to vertical, there is a lever that is slid to one side, the mounting plate is removed, rotated 90 degrees, then remounted, and the lever is then slid back to its locked position ... easy-peasy! That said, however, I do plan to revise this to use the rotating mount from a Cambo Actus GFX which is available separately, so the A7R body won't need to be removed from the Cambo to change its orientation, but I haven't gotten around to implementing it yet.

I have also fabricated several lens panels for it, so I can use pretty much any Nikon, Contax, and Pentax-mount lenses with it (although not all of them project sufficiently large image circles to allow for a useful range of rise / fall / shift movements, alas) For the moment, I am happily using several vintage C/Y lenses, which while not the last word in resolution, I nevertheless find to be a welcome alternative to the excessively sterile / clinical lenses -- I'm looking at you, Sigma Art lenses! -- that I had gravitated toward for a time. With a bit of additional work, I should be able to accomodate a Canon EOS lens mount, too, as the 11-24 zoom is potentially very appealilng due to its short focal length range and the generous size of the image circle it projects across that range. (But for a fraction of what the 11-24 costs, I can also buy both the 11mm and 15mm Irix prime lenses in a Nikon mount and they project generously large image circles, too. Decisions, decisions...)

The external monitor is a carryover from my time using a Cambo Actus, because I needed the larger screen to better see the effects of applying tilt and swing movements. Obviously, that isn't an issue with the WDS, but the larger screen does make it much easier to compose and focus photos, especially at night, when reflections from the glossy screen are non-existent, unlike during daylight photography.

I have also rigged a remote battery setup for the A7R because it helps keep the camera slightly cooler in operation (by removing the heat from a discharging battery to outside the body) and I needed to carry one around to power the monitor anyway, so I threw two stones at one bird. A set of four, fully charged 18650 cells will typically last me just under three hours, so one set covers me for most of my outings (although I do carry a second set with me, just in case.)

Oh, and I removed the wooden grip and replaced it with a sturdy one made from .25" aluminum plate, then rotated the Cambo 90 degrees before mounting it on my tripod. This had the effect of swapping the rise / fall movement from the front of the camera to the rear, where it's more useful, because the lens never moves, so I don't need to recompose my images after applying rise or fall movements. Unfortunately, it also had the effect of swapping the shift movement from the rear of the camera to the front, but I don't use this very often, so it's not a huge issue for me. To my surprise, working with the geared movement control knobs located on the front of the WDS body while standing behind it hasn't proved to be a PITA at all ... who knew?!

For my purposes, this camera setup works better overall than my early-vintage Cambo Actus, which, to its credit, is also slightly lighter and more compact. But I've found that it's very difficult to truly zero-out the tilt and swing movements, which I rarely use, especially when I carry the camera mounted on a tripod over my shoulder while walking around on foot, sometimes for several miles. Even though I tightened both movements considerably over how they are set at the factory, I've found they tend to drift over time, presumably from the camera being bounced around on my shoulder while I walk. This is very frustrating, as it's hard to notice small amounts of unintentionally applied tilt or swing movements until after I'm back home again and looking at my photos on the computer, when it's too late to do anything about it / them. (FYI, I have experimented with applying a small amount of fixed tilt to the lens panel of the WDS via shims and this approach seems to work surprisingly well for most photos. I also have an idea for incorporating an adjustable tilt / swing mechanism to the lens panels, but for now, I don't think it's worth the effort.)

So there you go: A traditional tech camera that is built around a 35mm-format sensor and 35mm-format lenses. I doubt that I'm the first person to have ever assembled such a FrankenKamera and I equally doubt that I'll be the last person to do so, because it works so well for certain types of photography. :D

* If you're curious, you can see samples of it here: https://audiidudii.aminus3.com/portfolio/
 
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jagsiva

Active member
Re: I realize this probably doesn't belong here...

because there isn't a medium-format sensor to be seen anywhere, but Hey, it's definitely a "tech cam" and it fits well my present needs / budget,
This breaks every one of Dante’s laws! LUV It!
 

tcdeveau

Well-known member
I think Dante spiked my egg nog over Christmas or something. I got impatient waiting for new XCD lenses and somehow ended up treating myself to these guys to complement the X1D:
9C928431-4C51-48C4-BB25-4D4347631B87.jpeg

Still assembling the kit but I’d like to thank all of you wonderful enablers here without whom I would never have considered a tech cam. Looking forward to contributing some tech cam images in 2018.
 

Geoff

Well-known member
I think Dante spiked my egg nog over Christmas or something. I got impatient waiting for new XCD lenses and somehow ended up treating myself to these guys to complement the X1D:
View attachment 131715

Still assembling the kit but I’d like to thank all of you wonderful enablers here without whom I would never have considered a tech cam. Looking forward to contributing some tech cam images in 2018.
Hunch is you'll be delighted. Something very different about this....
 

dave.gt

Well-known member
Jurgen,

Got one of those fantastic photos with flames? Dante needs flames!:ROTFL:

Seriously great image there!!!!
 

jotloob

Subscriber Member
Dave , sorry , no fire , but a sunrise . Hope this helps . :ROTFL: I hope Dante will understand .

IMG_0002.JPG
 

epforever

Member
Sorry , I posted this in the wrong thread . Should be here .
Jurgen -- any tips on putting together your lens-shade holder? I.e., what are the parts, and where did you get them? I have an Alpa Max with 40mm and 60mm, and I'd like to create something similar that doesn't put weight on the lens.

thank you,
ethan
 
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