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Medium format recommendations?
- Thread starter FishyFish
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excalibur2
My F4's Broken...
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That's sensible, just think what do want to use the camera for e.g. landscapes, street, action, closeups etc and what format you fancy 6X6, 6X7 or 6X4.5, does the weight worry you, and do you want to use flash and of course cost and so on,....good luck
StephenM
I know a Blithering Idiot
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...and you forgeot re Etrs and similar:- interchangeable focussing screens and bellows, extention tubes, for close up work...I would think close up work on a TLR is more difficult
My Mamiya C330 has interchangeable focusing screens and bellows; and if used on a tripod which is no great hardship for close up work, there is a paramender which removes parallax error. I will admit that this wouldn't work with insects.
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Yes, the 55mm lens focuses quite close, 24cm i think. I love my Mamiya, all the lenses are stunning and I use it a lot for tripod work but it is quite heavy and I wouldn't want to carry it for too long.
Rolleicords are rising in price rapidly. I bought a Vb two years ago for £99 now they are waaay more than that, well worth it though a cracking, lightweight camera that has exceptional lenses.
Rolleicords are rising in price rapidly. I bought a Vb two years ago for £99 now they are waaay more than that, well worth it though a cracking, lightweight camera that has exceptional lenses.
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They are heavier and maybe a bit bigger than the Mamiya 7. No option to change the lenses and I've seen a few comments about the rangefinder patches being a bit small and dim. The viewfinder on my old Mamiya 7ii was extremely bright and the rangefinder patch the best I've ever seen. The lens on the Fuji is superb - right up there with the M7 as far as I can tell. They also seem to be simple reliable cameras. I've been tempted to buy one, but have way too many cameras, and I love my Pentax 6x7 too much to be bothered with another system.
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Rolleiflex prices seem to be the same. There are odd bargains to be had, but 3.5F versions frequently go for £750+ and 2.8F for £950+. That's almost double what they were three years ago.
excalibur2
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...but Andy what use is a camera if you can't take the shot you want
for the chimney at the Peak you were either using a TLR or LF and you didn't have the right lens to take the shot
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Nope, it was my Voigtlander Vitomatic II which has a 50mm lens so I shot a top and bottom pano and stitched them together. Shot achieved, there's always a way.
I'm not really sure what point you are trying to make Brian, I was merely agreeing with Stephen about the Mamiya system and giving my thoughts on Rolleicords.
...but Andy what use is a camera if you can't take the shot you want
Nope, it was my Voigtlander Vitomatic II which has a 50mm lens so I shot a top and bottom pano and stitched them together. Shot achieved, there's always a way.
I'm not really sure what point you are trying to make Brian, I was merely agreeing with Stephen about the Mamiya system and giving my thoughts on Rolleicords.
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I've had two an original GW690 and the MkII. They have a stunningly good image quality but they are a bit boxy and large. I didn't have any trouble with the patch, both mine were bright enough but although I took some of my favourite shots with them I just didn't feel the love and sold them.
IQ is excellent though.
Tonquin-Beach-Sunset2 by Andy, on Flickr
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@FishyFish if you make it along to a f&c meet I'm between us all you'll be able to have a go with most variations of medium format cameras.
I'm not sure when the next day out will be but there should be one along soon.
I'm not sure when the next day out will be but there should be one along soon.
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Devon meet is the next one in May I think. Nothing else has been organised. Yet. Are you volunteering?
excalibur2
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Nope, it was my Voigtlander Vitomatic II which has a 50mm lens so I shot a top and bottom pano and stitched them together. Shot achieved, there's always a way.
I'm not really sure what point you are trying to make Brian, I was merely agreeing with Stephen about the Mamiya system and giving my thoughts on Rolleicords.
.....just that you mentioned a Rollei (or similar TLRs)...my joke has always been you need to carry 3 Rolleis:- wide angle, normal, and tele to cover all situations...but my joke might be out of date now using stiching in Photoshop
But still, unless you want a MF for a particular use then you can't beat a system that's versatile for all situations e.g. MF SLRs with WYSIWYG 
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Erm, I've not had problems with kinking, personally. It leads off the top roll, over the back plate, then onto the takeup spool... kind of a C-shaped path?
Mr Badger
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I was thinking along those lines last night, if there was some sort of local(ish) weekend or 1-day Sat or Sun meet I'd be up for attending (if I was invited, that is!
) and if FishyFish could attend I'd be happy to bring a Yashica 635 along for him to try out. We just need the weather to buck its ideas up and for spring to arrive. However, if we just made it a 1 day weekend meet we could always set a date but postpone if the weather outlook wasn't good?
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I had another look at the photos from the automat. I don't think I had issues with kinking, just incompetence at focussing
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I had another look at the photos from the automat. I don't think I had issues with kinking, just incompetence at focussing
I find it helps to do the shooting first, THEN go to the pub afterwards
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I was thinking along those lines last night, if there was some sort of local(ish) weekend or 1-day Sat or Sun meet I'd be up for attending (if I was invited, that is!
Churnet Valley Railway has a steam gala in the last weekend of Feb. That might be a possible meeting point as it is fairly local to a motley collection of film camera owners?
https://www.churnet-valley-railway.co.uk/event/810/winter-steam-gala-2017
Checked the weather for that weekend and it's currently saying dry and reasonable both days so it has time to change. Saturday currently looking slightly better than Sunday.
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I can't do that weekend unfortunately, of course no reason why you can't organise it anyway sounds like a really good day out.
Most of the film meets have been organised enough time in advance to enable folk to make the most of cheap travel options and also we have chosen places that are on the rail network to include as many people as possible regardless of distance and the need for a car or motorcycle.
Over the years we've been to London, Manchester, Bristol (twice), Chester, York, Llandudno and organised weekends in the Lake District, the Peaks and Edinburgh.
And thanks to @ChrisR he reminded me we've also been to Suffolk and the National Arboretum.
Will stick up a post with some likely destinations and dates for March/April and see what we can sort out.
Most of the film meets have been organised enough time in advance to enable folk to make the most of cheap travel options and also we have chosen places that are on the rail network to include as many people as possible regardless of distance and the need for a car or motorcycle.
Over the years we've been to London, Manchester, Bristol (twice), Chester, York, Llandudno and organised weekends in the Lake District, the Peaks and Edinburgh.
And thanks to @ChrisR he reminded me we've also been to Suffolk and the National Arboretum.
Will stick up a post with some likely destinations and dates for March/April and see what we can sort out.
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I'll set the wheels in motion SuzDevon meet is the next one in May I think. Nothing else has been organised. Yet. Are you volunteering?
OP
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That doesn't look to be too far from me, so could be a possibility as long as I'm not already booked by my wife for some task or other that weekend.
It'd definitely be useful to see some cameras in the flesh. Youtube and website reviews are great, but they're no match for actually looking through a viewfinder with your own eyes.
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ChrisR
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Not forgetting Suffolk (Essex?) and that Arboretum...
I quite fancy Northumbria. We could probably strand @Andysnap on Holy Island again if we planned it carefully!
London only once? Maybe another one in London would be simple to organise as most people can get cheap tickets there. I was wondering about going to London this weekend, actually; the wife's away and there just migt be an architecture shot in there somewhere!
excalibur2
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The meet at Whipsnade was good for looking at cameras and probably put a few people off the RB67 for size, seeing it with prism and L grip
Mr Badger
Didymus
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I'll go with the flow, Churnet sounds good and local for an informal 1-day meet, if there's enough lead-in time for people? Not too keen on the London suggestion though... big scary place full of traffic and people, not good for badgers at all! Animal jokes aside, I'm not that keen on busy cities and prefer countryside and villages, but won't be offended if people decide they'd rather do some street photography in The Smoke instead.
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.....just that you mentioned a Rollei (or similar TLRs)...my joke has always been you need to carry 3 Rolleis:- wide angle, normal, and tele to cover all situations...but my joke might be out of date now using stiching in Photoshop
I realise you were joking, but the serious point about MF is a lot of the time you don't really need a long lens because you can crop the negative so much. If you carry a 'flex with a 75mm lens, you effectively have everything from a slightly wide to short tele (image compression aside of course). Very flexible. Flexible. You see what i did there?
excalibur2
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Cos you can get by with one fixed lens, but I bought a tele rollei for portraiture (and it was a piece of crap also very limited but it was for a special use so OK)....Today lenses are cheap for cameras that can swop lenses e.g. I paid £365 for my RB67 65mm lens umpteen years ago...so why be stuck with a camera with a fixed lens. TLRs are so oldie worldie but if they turn you on, that's what matters.
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If you can find one at the price a Hasselblad 205 TCC is a good camera.
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Or your wallet.Now, now, calm down chaps, you know that getting over-excited isn't good for you at your time of life!
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Yeah, a nice camera, but they often cost about 10x the OP's budget and can be very tricky to repair if anything goes wrong. These factors ultimately led to my abandoning the Hasselblad system. It's a shame as I loved my 110mm f/2 lens.
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Who are you calling "oldie worldie"? @Andysnap i wouldn't stand for it Andy he's 'avin a pop
Bl**dy youngsters comin' in here and takin' the pee out of us more senior gents... grrrr
OP
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Presumably that price includes a chap to carry it around and set it up for me?
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