chrish
Chris H
My mom is looking for a film camera that can take exposures up to 1 minute and has a lens wider than 35mm. Wider the better. Those are the only requirements besides being cheap. It can be any type, fixed lens, scale focus, interchangable lens, point and shoot, something with an aux lens... whatever is wide, cheap, and can expose up to 1 minute.
Any recommendations? Thanks!
Any recommendations? Thanks!
payasam
a.k.a. Mukul Dube
The Bessa L and one of the CV wides. All depends on the precise meaning of "cheap".
ferider
Veteran
Olympus XA4. Or beater OM2 with 28/3.5. Around US 100 for either.
If 35mm still works Olympus XA. Less than US 50.
Roland.
If 35mm still works Olympus XA. Less than US 50.
Roland.
mfogiel
Veteran
If you are talking about something really wide, then any screwmount fsu camera with the CV 15/4,5 would be the best performance/price combo, if you really do not need to go that wide and if image quality is not critical, you can find a myriad of old SLR's on the bay on the cheap, and most of them will have a 28mm lens you can attach.
chrish
Chris H
I'm hoping to find something under $200 total.
ferider
Veteran
chrish said:
Assuming you mean auto expose, not too many cameras can do that. This
is why I mentioned Olympus cameras.
If US 200 is OK there is not much better than a good OM2n with a slower
Zuiko 24mm (wider than that gets expensive).
The OM2n can auto-expose up to 4 minutes.
Roland.
chrish
Chris H
ferider said:
Something with a Bulb mode would probably be easiest.
I'll look at the om2 though. Thanks.
payasam
a.k.a. Mukul Dube
Why one minute?
chrish
Chris H
payasam said:
pictures of stars without trails. After one minute movement starts to show up more.
Bryce
Well-known
How wide would you like?
I ask because stars are a funny thing- their brightness on film is related to the entrance pupil of the lens, not the F/ number. In short, while wide lenses extend the time you can leave the shutter open without perceptible trailing, they also make stars appear very dim.
I had to learn this the hard way... Using the CV 15mm wide open for a minute or so will show only the brightest stars. I tried shooting an auroral display, and found that while the aurora was visible in the slides, the rest of the star field was nearly blank. So having a large portion of the sky in the frame had seemed like a good way to record the event, but the images really don't have any punch or even allow the viewer to piece together what direction the camera was pointed.
So, could you be a little more specific as to your plans? Looking to image meteors, aurora, satellites maybe? Or nighttime architecture shots without trailed stars? Huge DOF, letting you get 'all sharp' images of a nearby object and background stars?
I ask because stars are a funny thing- their brightness on film is related to the entrance pupil of the lens, not the F/ number. In short, while wide lenses extend the time you can leave the shutter open without perceptible trailing, they also make stars appear very dim.
I had to learn this the hard way... Using the CV 15mm wide open for a minute or so will show only the brightest stars. I tried shooting an auroral display, and found that while the aurora was visible in the slides, the rest of the star field was nearly blank. So having a large portion of the sky in the frame had seemed like a good way to record the event, but the images really don't have any punch or even allow the viewer to piece together what direction the camera was pointed.
So, could you be a little more specific as to your plans? Looking to image meteors, aurora, satellites maybe? Or nighttime architecture shots without trailed stars? Huge DOF, letting you get 'all sharp' images of a nearby object and background stars?
chrish
Chris H
For wideness i was thinking something between 21 and 35. I've taken pictures of star fields with my 35 but would like something just a little wider than that.
DOF isnt an issue nothing in the picture would be closer than like 40'
My mom is going to be in some remote portion of mexico where the milky way is very visible as well as a lot of stars and she wanted to run a roll through on just the sky with maybe some mountains in the background but wasnt interested in having any trails.
DOF isnt an issue nothing in the picture would be closer than like 40'
My mom is going to be in some remote portion of mexico where the milky way is very visible as well as a lot of stars and she wanted to run a roll through on just the sky with maybe some mountains in the background but wasnt interested in having any trails.
ZeissFan
Veteran
I'd probably look for some screw mount camera and maybe a Vivitar, Tokina, Sigma or some other third-party Japanese lens. These should do the job.
And if she's looking for long exposures, I wouldn't want a battery-dependent camera. And get a cable release -- a few bucks at a camera store.
And if she's looking for long exposures, I wouldn't want a battery-dependent camera. And get a cable release -- a few bucks at a camera store.
keithwms
Established
Bryce is right, if you want star trails then you usually don't want a wide lens. The stars are point sources, not broad sources for which the usual exposure reasoning applies. Thus one has to think in terms of point source magnitudes. A quick rule of thumb is that you want a big ratio of focal length to f/#. Something like roughly 100mm f/4 would be very good and give you lots of nice, bright trails. 35mm f/4 would not, you'd miss most of the trails unless you shot at high ISO, and then the sky just starts to look noisy. N.b. I like fuji 64T best for star trails, and for that i pick a moderate tele and shoot it almost wide open, focused carefully at infinity.
Another thing to bear in mind, which you probably already thought about but I'll say it anyway just in case: if you shoot really wide then most of your trails won't look like arcs until you expose for a long time (>30 minutes). But if you frame your shot around polaris with a short tele, you'll have nice long arcs after only a few minutes (10 or so).
For trails I generally use something like a short tele. If I were to use a superwide or ultrawide and try to get reasonable arcs, I think I'd set up the shot for around an hour or so at least.
Again, even if you don't want trails, 64T gives really delicious deep blue night skies if you do long exposures, try it!
Another thing to bear in mind, which you probably already thought about but I'll say it anyway just in case: if you shoot really wide then most of your trails won't look like arcs until you expose for a long time (>30 minutes). But if you frame your shot around polaris with a short tele, you'll have nice long arcs after only a few minutes (10 or so).
For trails I generally use something like a short tele. If I were to use a superwide or ultrawide and try to get reasonable arcs, I think I'd set up the shot for around an hour or so at least.
Again, even if you don't want trails, 64T gives really delicious deep blue night skies if you do long exposures, try it!
Bryce
Well-known
Ah, I see. Maybe what you're after is a camera tracking gizmo? Instead of star trails in your time exposures, you'll get a 'landscape trail'... but the stars will be nice and bright, Milky Way and all...
http://www.jlc.net/~force5/Astro/ATM/Barndoor/barndoor.html
Regardless, aperture size rather than F/ number will determine star image brightness, so a longer lens will generally outperform a shorter one. Seems kinda unfair, but that is just how it is.
http://www.jlc.net/~force5/Astro/ATM/Barndoor/barndoor.html
Regardless, aperture size rather than F/ number will determine star image brightness, so a longer lens will generally outperform a shorter one. Seems kinda unfair, but that is just how it is.