Compare and Contrast for me...

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MatthewThompson

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Hi there, first post from a longtime lurker. I'm a working pro looking to get back into MF as a "hobby", as opposed to the techno-brick-Canon I use to pay the bills. If I could go back and shake myself back to sense when Hass gear prices were in the toilet and the 1D was coming out...

Anyway, looking for an RF, hopefully less than 1K, fixed lens is OK. I'm drawn to both the later GS/W Fuji's (6x9, please) and the Bronica RF. Having never placed a finger on either of these units, can anyone here compare and contrast the two? I shoot just about anything, but have a special place in my heart for automotive layouts. I want to use it when I'm shooting for me, I have a wife and little girl, love to be outside and walk a lot. I am happy to work with either format, IE: 645 is no problem. I'm equipped to process and print my own monochrome film, I'm not so sure if the local prolab has a 6x9 carrier. Could be a problem.

I'm thinking the GS690III (or the 670, depending on how hard it will be to have printed) with a DigiSix would work just fine for me, but something draws me in about the Bronica.

Has anyone on RFF owned both?

Kind regards, I hope to post more than lurk in the future.
Matthew.
 
Welcome! I ended up here after deciding that I liked film and when the stockhouses wouldn't take it I thought- well, time to just shoot for me. It is a blast! I've not owned these, but the smaller Fuji's (the 645 folder and 645Zi) and have handled the Bronica- a student had one. The Bronica certainly had great build quality compared to the 645Zi, which I found a little plasticky. The Bronica glass seemed excellent, but the 6x9 Fuji glass is supposed to be as well.

Good luck!
 
Welcome, Matthew! Labs around here can handle 6x7 gracefully but not 6x9; I was surprised as I figure 6x9 is the more mainstream format, or maybe that's history now. They develop the film ok, of course, but furnish two overlapping scans of each frame for me to merge. Ugh.

Anyway, I have a GW670III and a pair of Bronica RF645. And a Fuji GS645S and GA645Wi. All of these are excellent, with the 670 a more recent purchase. Oddly enough, after shooting a couple of rolls with it, it went into the sock drawer. I don't care for it. It's not the film format, as I love the Pentax 67. Fuzzy RF spot (same with GS645S) but nice framelines that adjust field size as well as parallax when focusing. Loud tinny "plink" shutter release, but at least not the major "CLACK" of the GS.

All of these have great lenses, but the Bronica has become a favorite user camera. Controls where I expect them to be, manual or auto options, compact, well-made, quiet, easy to carry everywhere... surely the most modern and advanced medium-format RF, introduced just before the MF market collapsed, unfortunately.

The Fuji GA series is interesting if you can put up with the auto-everything big point'n'shoot nature. My GA645Wi has the 45mm f/4, filling one lapse of the Bronica system... no 45mm framelines in the Bronica finder. I just use the whole window for framing, keeping parallax in mind, rather than use the external finder. The Fuji is great here, with field-size adjustment as well as parallax in the viewfinder for its wide lens, which focuses to 0.7m, an advantage over the Bronica's 1m. Sometimes the AF of the Fuji is nice, sometimes the Bronica manual focus is a relief.

For me the Bronica RF645 is almost perfect; I just wish the viewfinder had a bit lower magnification to comfortably fit 45mm framelines. I wish it had a longer RF baseline to have avoided the 135mm lens debacle. OTOH I use and like the later 100mm lens. I wish the system had been introduced a few years earlier to give it more steam before the collapse. Maybe then there'd be a 30 or 35mm lens too, and the 100 and 135 lenses wouldn't be so scarce.

Sorry I'm not able to say all that much about the big GW670III... Larger neg is certainly advantageous, yet it's a big clunker to have over a shoulder. Two-stroke film advance/cocking, uneven frame spacing with 220. No internal meter for AE, and I do like AE. 🙁 I should give it some more exercise, a fair chance. Hey, here's my suggestion: Get both!

Edit: Here's an "automotive" shot with the GW670III... 🙂
 

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Hello Matthew,

I own a Fuji 670 and recently the Bronica rf.
You say you like walking, get the Bronica rf.
As often said here very good and easy to use.
The 670 is a GREAT camera, also in volume and weight.
One big advantage of the Fuji g(s)w's is they need no battery. If the weight volume thing would be no problem a gw670 with a gsw 690 seems a pretty good combo.
You will hate to work with them and fall in love with the results you get.

The little Bronica dedicated flash is a gem for the traveller for a bit of fill in.

Hope this did some good.
 
I own an original Fuji G690. Having 6x9 and interchangable lenses is very nice, but it weighs a ton. Also, the lens list is limited, they're scarce as hen's teeth, and cost a lot when you do find them. I'd agree with a smaller/lighter camera as walkabout kit. I took mine to Chichen Itza in Mexico. Huge mistake. Well, I learned.
 
i have the 670II, and i think it's the perfect walkaround camera...if you're used to carrying around a small camera bag for a 35mm body and two lenses. i keep my 670 in a bike courier's bag at all times now. the camera is made of plastic, it's nothing like a pentax 67, i find it very light considering the format and lens. no batteries and no meter is fun for me. in college i used a pentax k1000 with no battery (and hence no meter). the finder is big and bright, and the double stroke winding becomes natural after two rolls. the only annoying thing about the camera is the sound of the shutter/counter going off. actually the shutter is whipser quiet (shoot on bulb, and then switch shutter speeds to close the shutter, and you hear how soft). i used the 670 for 5 weeks on a tv show and got wonderful candids. if you must wear it on a stap, i recommend hanging the camera vertical. and the negatives are the most satisfying you'll ever lay eyes on for your trouble. the 8x10 prints rival 4x5 origination. if you search the forum threads, you'll find a guy here using a fuji 670 for a street photography camera, and he's got sample images. i can't say enough great things about this line of cameras.

also, you know the bronica's vertical frame orientation was a big turn off for me, as well as all the data junk in the viewfinder. it is like using an slr sideways all the time.
 
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los said:
also, you know the bronica's vertical frame orientation was a big turn off for me, as well as all the data junk in the viewfinder. it is like using an slr sideways all the time.
Click to expand...
Apparently you're not alone in disliking the normally vertical orientation of 6x4.5 RF cameras. That's pretty much ALL of them, possibly excepting some old folders. Contrarily, all 645 SLRs are built sideways. 😀

6x4.5 is half a 6x9 frame, with the long dimension running cross-wise of the film, making it a "half-frame" camera. You get the same normally vertical orientation with 35mm half-frame too (Olympus Pen for instance), except for the few made to be used with the film running vertically.

If you shoot primarily horizontal or "landscape" orientation, and avoid verticals because you have to turn the camera awkwardly on its side, then it's not surprising that half-frame cameras are annoying to use. OTOH if most of your shots are verticals or "portrait" orientation, then it's more convenient to have the camera offer this orientation as the default. Pick your poison, as they say.

In looking back through my photos, my impression is that they're about equally divided among verticals and horizontals. Strangely, it also seems uneven, as sometimes I'll use a camera turned on its side for most of a roll or two. Frankly, the normal orientation of the camera is just unimportant to me, as I still have to turn the camera sideways for about half the shots regardless! 🙂
 
shutterflower said:
I have to say what I have to say. Bronica RF645 would be my first choice. I am as in love with it today as I have ever been, and will continue to be.

Go see my website for a review of the Bronica. http://www.shutterflower.com/RF645%20review.htm

buy one. The Fuji makes nice negs, but is constricting with only one focal length. ANd it's BIG.
Click to expand...

Now that's a review. If I could make the majority of the web as thorough as that page, I think we'd all be better off.

The Bronica seems the better package for what I like to do with a camera, but I can't seem to get over the sheer, grotesque size of the 6x9 transparency. Having shot a Hassy 500CM (with that oh-so-glorious T* glass), I can attest to more film real estate being a dramatic shock. I still remeber the first roll of Ilford 120 that I developed coming out of the tank. I think I almost fainted, and thought I was going to need corrective surgery to get the goofy grin off my face.

There's some soul searching to be done on my part, and I thank all the members that took the time to reply to this thread.
 
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