First and Second 5"x7" images

After having my new to me Plaubel Peco Profia 5"x7" monorail for over a week and not being able to use it due to a) the poor weather, b) not having any film holders and c) only having one lensboard (although I could have used up to a 150mm in it's Copal 0 sized hole).

I decided to spend the evening on Friday adapting the single lensboard that came with the camera to take a Linhof to Horseman adapter that I had ordered from ebay and that had arrived that morning. I discovered that the adapter had an additional square flange on it's rear which was 110mm square, this meant that if I could fashion a 110mm square hole on the Plaubel lens board, a combination of some super glue (to hold it in position) and some pop rivets to give a mechanical joint should see me alright. I used a Fein Multimaster to cut the square hole and finished it off with a file, although it took a hell of a lot longer to do that it has to type.

This now meant I could use all my lenses on the Plaubel as I already had them all mounted into Linhof Technica plates to enable their use on my Walker SF45, my Horseman Woodman and also my Horseman LX (with another Linhof to Horseman adapter).

Whan my Grandchildren arrived on Saturday, I suggested that Lucas pose with his new glasses on, he is very proud of them for some reason unfathomable to me (as when I was a kid no one wanted to have to wear glasses), and he sees himself either as the Milky-Bar Kid or Harry Potter depending on when you ask him (strangely enough no one wanted to be known as the Milky-Bar kid when I was a youngster either).

I shot this image on a 360mm Rodagon Apo-Ronar from about 8 feet away and at 1/30th @ f11 on Arista Edu 100 which I had ordered from the US. The film was processed in a Jobo processor using Prescysol EF.

After fixing and drying it was scanned at 2400dpi on an Epson V750 Pro scanner and a minimal amount of PP (cropping and spotting) was done in CS5 before some localised burning/dodging was done in Nik Silver EFEX Pro 2 before being toned and a vignette added.


A tale of two firsts: 1st 5"x7" negative, 1st Image with the 360mm Apo-Ronar. by Ed Bray, on Flickr

The second image and much more my favourite is better as the eyes have opened up and Lucas is engaging in conversation with me.


Lucus 2nd 5x7 by Ed Bray, on Flickr

What a great looking little character, #2 certainly gives him a much better 'typical little boy' look - don't kids vary in the acceptance of specs

I've absolutely no idea what 95% of your post means (yeah I know-digital heathen! ) but I really like those portraits.

I'm not so sure about the magenta toning though- it's a touch on the marmite side.

Can I be rude and ask what the originals were like before you stuck them through Silver Effects?

Thanks for the comments Gents,

Mark,

I don't know why they look Magenta, they are supposed to look copper toned (a sort of a red/brown sepia) this only happenned after sending them to Flickr. Perhaps I uploaded them in the wrong colour space?

Yes, before Silver efex they were normal B&W images.

I did learn a couple of important things, firstly a 5x7 negative is much, much more impressive than a 4x5, and secondly and much more importantly don't leave them out on the table overnight, I have never done so much spotting in one go, not even when I shot film for a living.

Ah, it could well be Flickr's rendering of the original image then!

The second image looks really expressive, nice one Ed.
The toning whether or not deliberate looks OK to me on my monitor.
Could I ask where you got your film dark slides from please ?
I agree 5x7 doesn't really need enlarging either, nice size contact prints.

C

Beautiful quality, Ed, the results are amazing! Really like how he has engaged with you in the second shot.

Thanks gents, PM sent Ceejay.

Excellent quality and density

Maybe I don't understand what you said, but how did you get that background with f11???

cambsno said:

Maybe I don't understand what you said, but how did you get that background with f11???

Click to expand...

It was shot on a large format negative (so the negative/image area is actually 5x7"). The larger the format, the smaller the depth of field at a given aperture - which is why small sensored P&Ss tend to have everything in focus and then on the other side images like this, even at f/11, have an out of focus background.

cambsno said:

Maybe I don't understand what you said, but how did you get that background with f11???

Click to expand...

As stated above, it is just a fact of the larger the captue medium (film/digital sensor) the lower the depth of field. The 360mm lens used has a maximum aperture of f9, so I had only closed it down by 2/3rds of a stop.

The thing is that the Rodagon Apo-Ronar series of lenses are high quality process lenses, this means that the lens was originally designed for close up 'flat field' work ie the reproduction of maps and suchlike where corner to corner 2D sharpness is required. The lens was not really intended for 'normal photography' where the items captured are typically three dimensional.

Lenses for large format cameras can be obtained in many forms, some of the most sought after are old brass projection lenses which make very good portrait lenses albeit with only a single aperture. These can be used with a seperate shutter or aperture control, and frequently the exposure times are long enough to allow the use of such shutters as a hat, dark slide or lens cap. Apertures if required can be made from bits of card with the correct sized hole cut into them and stuck to the front of the lens with bluetac or gaffer tape.

Most usually lenses for large format are sold 'in shutter' which means they are already fitted into a shutter which also has an inbuilt aperture control. They typically come in one of 3 sizes which are known as Copal 0, Copal 1 & Copal 3 (there are also Copal 00 and Copal 2 sizes but these are pretty uncommon).

Many large format cameras have their own type of lens mount, these then have the appropriate sized hole drilled into them and the lens fitted onto the board. One of the most common types of board is the Linhof Technika Type which as it is only 96x99mm in size which apart from being lighter than other boards means that adapters for other mounts can be easily made. I have four Large Format cameras and have either adapted them to take Linhof boards or they already did take them allowing me to use all my lenses across all the cameras if I feel the need and they cover the format.

Jus to explain the covering of the format, large format lenses have a 'field of coverage' which is the size of the image circle that the lens can provide. Different makes/type of lenses even with the same focal length can have different image circles (typically taken at f22) and some will cover a format, other will not. Typically (but not always) the larger the image circle, the larger the lens.

Hope this explains some of the 'tech speak' in the original post.