A Hasselblad, more than 40 years after first looking.

After having a longtime on-again, off-again relationship with Hasselblad, I've decided to give it another try....


One More Try by Vince Lupo, on Flickr

The body is a 1957 500C that was a $95 'as-is' special from KEH. Turned out it's a very clean body in good working condition - it's always a bit of a crapshoot when buying these things sight unseen from KEH. The waist-level finder was also from KEH (early version with the small magnifier) and it actually cost more than the body - don't know why these waist-level finders cost so much. The lens and back came from another source - the one surprise was that the back was a 16S and not the 12 that I thought it was going to be. I have a 12 back coming, but actually the 16S is pretty good. I had to make a mask for the finder, but that was easy to do with some black-core matboard and careful use of a utility knife and ruler. Nice thing about using the 16S back with the 50mm lens is that you get the benefit of the close focus but with the cropping equivalent of the 80mm lens, or so it seems.

I just ran one roll through it on Sunday morning, and all seems fine. The rest is up to me now!

Scanned with the Nikon Z7:


Early Morning Beetree Run by Vince Lupo, on Flickr


Riley and Her Bird App by Vince Lupo, on Flickr
 
Great to see that lovely 50mm lens on a foundation year 500C Vince. Nice shots. Sorry I missed your post by so many months.

I was out in the garden today using a 60 and a 250. Too lazy to get the 45 Prism finder but needing a fair bit of height I turned the camera on its side on the tripod to view the image in the WLF from the side. That sure did tax my brain trying to move the lens to the target. For a couple of shots I wanted a very low vantage and the Leitz table top tripod was great for this, and the waist level finder. There was no room for a larger tripod with low angle splayed legs. A couple of shots I wanted with the 60 defeated any stable tripod position so I used the little Leitz stabilised on me, but not my chest, my thighs. Allowed me enough certainty to use mirror pre-release. Results? Maybe next week.
 
I remember lusting for a Hasselblad back in the late 1970s after buying my Canon AE1. To me the Hasselblad 500CM was that out of reach camera that I dreamt about owning. I finally bought one a few years ago and then sold it later when I decide to get a Mamiya 7. I eventually sold the Mamiya 7 due to the fact that it is a crappily built camera with amazing lenses. About a year ago someone donated some Hasselblads and lenses to our local history museum. I recently ended up buying the whole lot and am once again falling in love with my Hasselblad. To me it is the quintessential medium format SLR.
 
DMA1965 said:
I remember lusting for a Hasselblad back in the late 1970s after buying my Canon AE1. To me the Hasselblad 500CM was that out of reach camera that I dreamt about owning. I finally bought one a few years ago and then sold it later when I decide to get a Mamiya 7. I eventually sold the Mamiya 7 due to the fact that it is a crappily built camera with amazing lenses. About a year ago someone donated some Hasselblads and lenses to our local history museum. I recently ended up buying the whole lot and am once again falling in love with my Hasselblad. To me it is the quintessential medium format SLR.
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Thanks DMA. That's quite a journey too. A few, including contributors in this thread who've had Hasselblads, sold out and then bought back in.


kangaroo2012 said:
Hi Richard, Nice review.
I find the hand grip indispensible. Never mastered the required left hand hold.
Cheers
Philip
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Thanks for looking in. I agree with you about the left hand hold. But I am slowly coming round to it and a few times it almost seemed necessary.
 
Thanks for creating this thread. I too have lusted after a Hasselblad, but settled for an SQ system last year for $200. Then I went down the Leica rabbit hole. 😀
 
kangaroo2012 said:
Hi Richard, Nice review.
I find the hand grip indispensible. Never mastered the required left hand hold.
Cheers
Philip
Click to expand...

I find it easy to do. But I do have large hands. The camera sits comfortably in the palm of my left hand. I could see where it could be too difficult with smaller hands. Of course, a small carbon fiber tripod isn't much trouble, and does have its benefits!
 
Richard G said:
The 60 Distagon is a very versatile lens. Amazing close focus distance. This allows isolation of the subject. The out of focus background is magic even with maximum aperture 'only' f 3.5. It is heavier and larger than the 80 Planar though....
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I recently picked up a pristine copy of the 60 Distagon from a member here. And it has really clicked with my landscape photography... the pics below were taken in mid-December in the Santa Cruz mountains, using the Distagon and 500cm on a tripod, with Portra 400...

Rest stop by Steve Macfarlane, on Flickr
A path in the woods by Steve Macfarlane, on Flickr
 
Horatio’s signature quote from Horace is echoed by yours from Mark Twain. Love those 70mm backs. One day.

Steve that Rest Stop photo with those golden leaves is a real gem.
 
Rob-F said:
I find it easy to do. But I do have large hands. The camera sits comfortably in the palm of my left hand. I could see where it could be too difficult with smaller hands. Of course, a small carbon fiber tripod isn't much trouble, and does have its benefits!
Click to expand...

Maybe my struggle with this is mental: pressing the shutter release on the right with the left hand and while it is anatomically just fine for the long flexor of the index finger it just doesn’t seem like it would be. But I’m increasingly persuaded and will keep at it.
 
Richard G said:
Maybe my struggle with this is mental: pressing the shutter release on the right with the left hand and while it is anatomically just fine for the long flexor of the index finger it just doesn’t seem like it would be. But I’m increasingly persuaded and will keep at it.
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And if you look at the right side of the camera body, you'll see a 'cutout' for your other three fingers on your left hand. It actually makes a lot of sense, once you get used to it.

Still loving my 500C, but I'm loving this Hasselblad as well.


Hasselblad 907x Grip by Vince Lupo, on Flickr
 
Richard G said:
Maybe my struggle with this is mental: pressing the shutter release on the right with the left hand and while it is anatomically just fine for the long flexor of the index finger it just doesn’t seem like it would be. But I’m increasingly persuaded and will keep at it.
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It is absolutely natural to me, but your right hand needs to be holding the viewfinder or the lens. Otherwise it would not feel natural. I have never ever taken an out of focus shot taken at 1/15 th with my Hasselblads hand held.
The older CM model has a completely different shutter release to the younger CW model but I soon got used to it and use them both equally now. Beautiful cameras, nothing with the Hasselblad name stamped on it has ever failed me in 37 years of owning the brand. That is not something I can say about any of my other camera systems.
 
Vince Lupo said:
And if you look at the right side of the camera body, you'll see a 'cutout' for your other three fingers on your left hand. It actually makes a lot of sense, once you get used to it.

Still loving my 500C, but I'm loving this Hasselblad as well.
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Thanks Vince. I don't think I ever properly considered that cutout and its role. There for a reason of course.

I am trying to resist the 907X and the digital back. I console myself that it is not square format, and I would swap my negative storage and filing nightmare for a huge hard drive filing nightmare, both solvable of course. And I love the film results, and the process.
 
I finally got my Hasselblad a couple of years ago and I am having a love, hate relationship with mine. I love the look and feel but hate the focusing. The 80mm focus ring is too close to the body to get a good grip and the focus is long, slow and stiff from end to end. I also have a Bronica EC-TL and I must say the focusing on the Bronica is so much easier than the Hasselblad and it looks almost as nice but it is much bigger and heavier. When medium format prices were much lower I started buying, selling and trading my way up to justifying me owning a Hasselblad for the limited amount of film I was doing. Now I have a 500 C/M and a 503CW and I keep going back and forth on which one to sell.
 
campy said:
I finally got my Hasselblad a couple of years ago and I am having a love, hate relationship with mine. I love the look and feel but hate the focusing. The 80mm focus ring is too close to the body to get a good grip and the focus is long, slow and stiff from end to end. I also have a Bronica EC-TL and I must say the focusing on the Bronica is so much easier than the Hasselblad and it looks almost as nice but it is much bigger and heavier. When medium format prices were much lower I started buying, selling and trading my way up to justifying me owning a Hasselblad for the limited amount of film I was doing. Now I have a 500 C/M and a 503CW and I keep going back and forth on which one to sell.
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No connection to the linked-to sale, but your focusing ring complaint has a pretty easy fix -- the aftermarket focusing lever. For instance, see this:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Hasselblad-Focusing-Handle-2-Quick-Focus-Ring-Lever-/153887010737
 
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