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MF Digital Precision

jlm

Workshop Member
in my experience and from what i have heard above, achieving accurate focus, especially when using tilts and swings is the bugaboo of MFD.
it is still incomprehensible to me that the $10k to $45k MFDB cannot achieve the focusing accuracy/simplicity/dexterity of the $500 G1 with it's live view zoomable, tiltable LCD.
 

Francois_A

New member
This was exactly my experience yesterday, shooting table top with a P45+ on a Linhof 679cs with a 90mm Rodenstock. A major PITA to find the optimal tilt compared to shooting 4x5. IMHO 36mm x 48mm is just too small.
Then we had lens cast problems. That was also the case with the back on an Hasselblad V with a 80mm. At least, with the Hasselblad, focusing was accurate and pure joy!
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Hi Tim:

Jack, that's exactly my point: this gear is incredibly more expensive than, let's say a D3X or equivalent and it's heavier, slower and much harder to use. It should therefore deliver results notably in excess of the high-end DSLRs.
Mine does -- and did -- deliver superior results right out of the box as compared to any DSLR I have ever shot. But I respect you had a different experience.


Not at all! Joe has had a roughly equal amount of grief. He's had a lot of kit that is simply not built properly and lost a lot of shots as a result.
Joe had a lot of grief getting a TECH camera system to work the way he wanted and did have some early bad luck with his back being out of spec and one of a friend's he tested being out of spec. He then got bad copies of the 80D and AFD3 body I think too -- so yes, he's had some bad luck as well.

I know where you're coming from on this but I have to say that my Cambo/Schneider 35XL combination seems to be the only way of getting results at wide angle that equal those I get with an 80D or longer. Sure, you have to guess focus, but I can and do get results with it even with this guesswork that are, to my standards, as close to perfect as I expect. I might be speaking too soon here since all the above is true of my WDS and the RS has only just arrived but early signs are promising!
I agree here, that used un-shifted, the Schneider 35 Digitar OR the Rodenstock 35 HR (not the non-HR!) Digital are the best options in the 35mm focal length. But you still have to guess focus, and if you look at your files at 100%, I suspect you'll find that RARELY is your desired focus point hit perfectly -- close enough to work at the chosen aperture yes, but rarely will it be perfectly on point. And of course all this assumes your tech body is true and square, which I am not convinced is a good assumption either ;)

Now back to Mamiya glass. As I have said before, there is variability in glass. I test first, usually multiple copies, then keep the best. I tested 3 copies of the 35AF before settling on the one I currently use. I have three friends that own and use equally good copies. (Guy has one he may be selling soon.) I have not seen ANY copy of a 45 AF that was sharp enough to the corners to satisfy me. The Hartblei is so variable in its performance -- I tried 4 copies -- that with the best one, I could take 4 frames in succession without touching the lens, and one would be excellent and the other three variable from okay to horrible. And personally I cannot see how you put up with it, but then that's me :eek:. My 55AF, and all other folks I know that got one, worked great from the start -- this lens seems an anomaly. The old 80 for the most part was very good but still variable, and the newer one excellent, though there have still been a few reports of bad copies -- I believe you got one and Joe's first one was off too BTW -- but my first copy is stunningly good. The 120 Macro later versions all seem to be very good. Ditto the 150/2.8D, excellent all around, perhaps another anomaly. The older 150 3.5 AF is generally good, but again variable. The 210 is variable -- I've had three versions, one was only okay the other two both excellent. I've only had experience with two 300 f4.5 APO's and both were excellent form wide open, so would assume that's a generally good lens too. Zooms are variable and you should expect to got though a few to find good ones, even with the 75-150D -- the first one I had was okay but did not stun me enough to keep it -- finding a good copy to keep is on my short list. If you are a perfectionist -- and I feel I am -- you should expect to try three of any lens you plan on buying and keep the best.

Note that when you test glass, you need to insure your camera body and back are in perfect alignment too. Here perhaps I have been lucky as my back has performed perfectly on three separate bodies, both in AF and manual focus modes; my first AFD2 body, my Phase AFD3 body and a Mamiya branded AFD3 body all behaved identically with respects to focus.

So in summary, I do rigorously test everything I get before I use it for a critical shoot, and sometimes I test it on a critical shoot without relying on it to deliver any finals. But then, that's my point isn't it? I don't expect EVERY lens or piece of kit I purchase to be perfect -- in fact quite to the contrary I expect to have to try a few copies of everything, so I test each lens I get, return any bad copies and keep going until I get a good one. So you see, we're not all that different in this regard other than in our initial expectations. Though admittedly I have been pleasantly surprised with much of my Phamiya kit -- specifically the P45+/AFD3, 80D and 150D -- on the first try... And perhaps was overly generous in my assumption it was a new norm?

Cheers,
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
PS: Joe and I disagree on the value of the Mamiya 35AF -- our expectations from it are different. I showed him this corner crop from the below pano and he felt it wasn't up to his standard. In my case, while I agree it isn't nearly as good as other lenses I own, it regularly delivers images that look great in print. Note however that Joe also commented it was better than any 35 corner he had seen previously. Also note that Joe is still on a Power PC Mac and as such was not using C1 to convert his raw P45 files, and as such also did not have access to the newest C1's superior conversion for Phase files nor the built in lens corrections for Mamiya lenses. For whatever it's worth, he is currently in the process of updating his computer system to a new MacPro so he can hopefully try the new C1 soon and comment.

Here is the crop of the very corner from my 35 lens as well as a middle crop, then the whole pano for reference as to how small an area (and relative significance or lack thereof) these represent in the final image. Note I had to jpeg 8 these to get them reasonable sizes for upload, so you are seeing some jpeg artifacts in the high-frequency detail that are not in the final file. Note also, that these crops are taken from the processed tiff before the final pano merge and before the CS4 processing, hence the different appearances from the final. These crops represent approximately 2-1/2 x 2-1/2 inch sections of a 24x72 inch print:

lower RH corner of the 3rd frame of the pano:


center of same file:


full pano (4 frames cropped to 3:1 aspect ratio) for reference -- hopefully this illustrates relative sizes of the crops:


Cheers,
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
Ditto.

To me they are all boxes with media at one end and a lens on the other. Each format inherently has it's level of expectations and are selected based on the priorities at hand. MF is selected when IQ is the priority ... it does most all the rest (perhaps a bit more inconveniently,) but IQ is the priority.
But MF very often does not provide that IQ. That's the whole point of this thread: Joe Holmes has tested a large number of backs and lenses and bodies and found that a high proportion of them are not manufactured to the type of tolerances required to provide the image quality one expects at the price. His more scientific enquiries echo my own experience: a lot of this stuff does not work properly.

This is not about the fact that Guy finds the results from a 28D acceptable and I don't. It's about stuff that does not perform to its own spec!
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
Here is the crop of the very corner from my 35 lens as well as a middle crop, then the whole pano for reference as to how small an area (and relative significance or lack thereof) these represent in the final image. Note I had to jpeg 8 these to get them reasonable sizes for upload, so you are seeing some jpeg artifacts in the high-frequency detail that are not in the final file. Note also, that these crops are taken from the processed tiff before the final pano merge and before the CS4 processing, hence the different appearances from the final. These crops represent approximately 2-1/2 x 2-1/2 inch sections of a 24x72 inch print:



Cheers,
The corner crops don't look great on screen but then I totally get that they've been jpegged, and that what matters is how the print looks and that the photographer who made it is happy with it. I don't have the 35 but I do know that plenty of shots from the 28D at F16 on prints 30" wide look less sharp in the corners than those taken on an M8 with the same focal length lens! In other words, there is negative advantage at that print size to having chosen MF in that particular setup. That, I really really would not have expected when I got into MF. However, the Schneider Digitar 35 XL Lens on the Cambo gives me files I can blow up huge. If I set it to F16 and then sharpen appropriately to combat the diffraction, and pull focus forward a tocuh from infinity, then with guess-focus I get very good results from the foreground of a leveled shot on an eye-height tripod to infinity. That's all I ever really wanted!

Best

t
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
I suspect had I used my M8 with an 18mm lens for about the same effective focal as the 35 on my P back in the above pano, those horses would have been rendered as single black and white pixels in the middle of the road --- if even that ;)


Cheers,
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
I suspect had I used my M8 with an 18mm lens for about the same effective focal as the 35 on my P back in the above pano, those horses would have been rendered as single black and white pixels in the middle of the road --- if even that ;)
That's certainly true and not at all incompatible with my observation.

Horses for courses, one might say...

;-)
 

John Black

Active member
I suspect had I used my M8 with an 18mm lens for about the same effective focal as the 35 on my P back in the above pano, those horses would have been rendered as single black and white pixels in the middle of the road --- if even that ;)
But they would be a very sharp dot.
 

PeterA

Well-known member
For clarification: The Schneider 35 to get is called

" Schneider KREUZNACH APO-DIGITAR 5.6/35 XL-102 MC"
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
That's certainly true and not at all incompatible with my observation.

Horses for courses, one might say...

;-)

Yep. But again, it is the worst lens I own for my Mamiya, and given it is also the widest, it serves a purpose for me when nothing else will. Maybe someday when I'm wealthier or start finding a more regular need for that focal, I'll replace it with a Cambo RS and 35 Digitar -- but for now I'll dance with who I brung.

Cheers,
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
Yep. But again, it is the worst lens I own for my Mamiya, and given it is also the widest, it serves a purpose for me when nothing else will. Maybe someday when I'm wealthier or start finding a more regular need for that focal, I'll replace it with a Cambo RS and 35 Digitar -- but for now I'll dance with who I brung.

Cheers,
Don't where I got it from but I thought you were already shooting with an Alpa and glass. It's so hard to keep track of who uses what around here, maybe because we all keep buying and selling!
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Don't where I got it from but I thought you were already shooting with an Alpa and glass. It's so hard to keep track of who uses what around here, maybe because we all keep buying and selling!
Not me, never owned an Alpa. My Mamiya kit plus Helicon Focus and Auto Pano Giga is my current tech camera :D

If I had to choose an actual tech camera kit right now -- and money were no object -- it would probably be the RS with Rodies, the 23 HR, 35 HR, 45HR and 70 HR-W and maybe I'd add the Schneider 120. Though before I laid down any cash, I'd want to get a Silvestri in my hands for a few days and demo it. If I found it rigid enough and it reliably zeroed, I would consider it over the RS.

But then more seriously, I'd want live focus in my back (even if it was just a histo) before getting into a tech camera with tilts or longer lenses. Having been there with the Betterlight scanning back and a set of the best lenses available, I can assure you there is no way to get reliable focus from a high-resolution back mounted to a camera with movements without it. We have not even started discussing the problems of overcoming issues like curvature of field and focus shift...

Cheers,
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
Not me, never owned an Alpa. My Mamiya kit plus Helicon Focus and Auto Pano Giga is my current tech camera :D

If I had to choose an actual tech camera kit right now -- and money were no object -- it would probably be the RS with Rodies, the 23 HR, 35 HR, 45HR and 70 HR-W and maybe I'd add the Schneider 120. Though before I laid down any cash, I'd want to get a Silvestri in my hands for a few days and demo it. If I found it rigid enough and it reliably zeroed, I would consider it over the RS.

But then more seriously, I'd want live focus in my back (even if it was just a histo) before getting into a tech camera with tilts or longer lenses. Having been there with the Betterlight scanning back and a set of the best lenses available, I can assure you there is no way to get reliable focus from a high-resolution back mounted to a camera with movements without it. We have not even started discussing the problems of overcoming issues like curvature of field and focus shift...

Cheers,
I tried the flexicam which IMHO is structurally and in engineering terms not up to the job. The bicam might cut it for some but the one I ordered was so out of whack on delivery that I decided two unfocussed silvestris in a row did not bode well and I returned it. The Cambo WDS is a bargain. It is rigid as hell and only 200 grammes heavier than the RS. I actually prefer its mechanics too. But it's a bit too big for me to have in my expanding travel kit!

The Schneider 35XL Digitar is an amazing lens and you really do not need to focus other than by distance scale as long as you're shooting landscapes with small apertures. But I won't bother trying lenses longer than 35mm on it til there's real live view.

Best

T
 

Guy Mancuso

Administrator, Instructor
Jack lost my original post as he was trying to quote me but lets see if i can remember it.

I find tech cameras to be somewhat boring as hell in use. I'm a very mobile shooter and like to shoot than move on to a different angle or prospective. I really don't consider myself a landscape shooter at all , although I enjoy it my patient level of sitting it out for a hour and my camera height does not thrill me . half the time i am laying on the ground in a tree or whatever. I'm more like a butterfly and shoot than move on to a different spot or something around a subject. I find the tech camera just are not fluid enough for me. Some folks they have the patience and love shooting with them and get awesome results . To me it's like using a 4x8 sheet of plywood. I like to actually see my focus and see my framing in camera to get what i want than move and get another look at something. Guessing at focusing is just not my way of why i spent all this money on something. I want to know I have it before packing it in. But that is me and more a float like a butterfly type shooter and than sting like a bee when I see what I want. I had the Alpa TC and awesome little camera and I even got great results but just did not fit me at the end of the day.
 

tashley

Subscriber Member
Jack lost my original post as he was trying to quote me but lets see if i can remember it.

I find tech cameras to be somewhat boring as hell in use. I'm a very mobile shooter and like to shoot than move on to a different angle or prospective. I really don't consider myself a landscape shooter at all , although I enjoy it my patient level of sitting it out for a hour and my camera height does not thrill me . half the time i am laying on the ground in a tree or whatever. I'm more like a butterfly and shoot than move on to a different spot or something around a subject. I find the tech camera just are not fluid enough for me. Some folks they have the patience and love shooting with them and get awesome results . To me it's like using a 4x8 sheet of plywood. I like to actually see my focus and see my framing in camera to get what i want than move and get another look at something. Guessing at focusing is just not my way of why i spent all this money on something. I want to know I have it before packing it in. But that is me and more a float like a butterfly type shooter and than sting like a bee when I see what I want. I had the Alpa TC and awesome little camera and I even got great results but just did not fit me at the end of the day.
I like to move around a lot too but maybe, being more landscape inclined than you, it's easier for me to put up with the constraints of a tech camera.

Every shot I take is made with the possibility of large exhibition prints. That's why the M8 and 1DSIII weren't enough, brilliant though they are. But I absolutely cannot see the point of the 28D on a Phamiya. At any aperture that is not diffraction limited its corners are too soft, always, and even the best corner sharpening routines do not quite get them good enough. By the time you have cropped to the sharp zone you have a file with not many more pixels than a Canon file made with a good lens (Leica R glass for example). Hell, I will even restate what I said to Jack: the 28D corners are so soft that even for a medium sized print (say 24" wide) a shot from an M8 with 28 Cron, uncropped, will be better than from a Phamiya with a 28D uncropped. It doesn't matter that the centre portion of the Phamiya shot will look better in larger prints, because the print is only as good as its weakest spot.

So for me all the advantage is gone at that point. I would actively get better results for less money and less carry around weight with a Leica, let alone a 5DII or 1DSIII. There is no doubt in my mind whatsoever about this.

However, put the P45+ back on a Cambo and the story changes radically. The results are astounding, hugely enlargeable, and exactly what I paid for with money and time when I got into all this - i.e. a LOT better than with anything I have used before and even better than my old 4x5 film camera.

We all experience these things differently but I would strongly suggest to any landscape shooters thinking of making the move to get a tech camera before they get a Phamiya if their most favoured focal lengths are wides. And even then they'd have to test, test and test again to make sure that the stuff their dealer delivers is adjusted to spec.

Best

Tim
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Jack: the 28D corners are so soft that even for a medium sized print (say 24" wide) a shot from an M8 with 28 Cron, uncropped, will be better than from a Phamiya with a 28D uncropped. It doesn't matter that the centre portion of the Phamiya shot will look better in larger prints, because the print is only as good as its weakest spot.
Tim: First I find it interesting you had trouble dealing with the 28 D's curvature of field issues, the primary reason for its soft corners *at the plane of focus*, yet you put up with the performance variability in the Hartblei... With careful composition, the vagaries of the 28D can be used to advantage (much like forward tilt), or at least it's defects significantly mitigated... Yet I found the Hartblei is so variable in its performance as to be essentially useless.

Second, I heartily disagree that all prints are only as good as their weakest spot. In fact to the contrary, I think selective focus can be a significant benefit to many images, in print or otherwise. I suspect this is one area where your and my thinking differs significantly. Again, your needs are different from mine...

~~~
A FWIW to the posterity of this thread: Personally, I don't own a 28D because of the curvature issue combined with the price. But if I needed a lens that wide with any regularity, I would consider one, save for the cost; for the cost I can get a fair bit of the way into a Cambo RS with the 23HR, and that's more likely how I'd go for that focal. Ditto adding a 35 if I used my Mamiya version more than I do... (Another option for landscape wides from a cost versus performance standpoint would be film in a 6x9 view camera and a good scanner.)

As it stands however, about 85% of my landscapes are shot using 55 through 150 mm focals on the P45+, and I have stellar glass for that -- in fact multiple copies of stellar glass in that range -- that deliver direct capture results on par with the quality I used to get from scanned 4x5 film. And then I manage to get by with the other focals I have for the remaining 15% of my images with that system ;). Which hopefully explains why I have yet to bother with a tech camera solution for MF digital...

Cheers,
 

Guy Mancuso

Administrator, Instructor
Tim sorry I disagree as a 30mm lens it is extremely good and i have made LARGE prints. To get a wide angle that is any better start adding the numbers and you know them well it starts at least 10k for a body and a Rodenstock 28mm. Is it worth over twice as much. Not a chance seen it and it is not ,better yes but not twice the price better. I can step back 2 ft if I really need that corner and crop slightly. Tim once again I have a great copy of this 28mm and I have proved it on every post made with the images from it. Sorry but that 10k extra can be better used somewhere else. The tech cameras are great but critical focus is never achieved without being tethered. When there is money on the line I guess at nothing and not everything is shot at F16. I can't shoot any work with a tech camera when there is people involved. Landscape work is not why i bought a 28mm lens. It's advertising with subjects and such, no tech camera is going to help me there.
 
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