Constructing the definitive DSLR scanning setup. Communal effort!

[DrTebi]

My current setup:

• Leica M-D + Summicron-M 50mm + BEOON copy stand
• Small color-balanced LED light box (about 5x7 inches in size)
• 1/4" thick piece of glass the size of the light box
• 2 strips of 300gsm paper
• Black construction paper
• Artist's Tape

Handles 35mm to 6x9 negative strips with the M-D.

1. tape the light box onto my work table.
2. carefully clean the light box's diffusing surface (ANR proven)
3. tape two strips of 300gsm paper down on the light box at the right width to allow a film strip of the chosen film to move between them.
4. tape black construction paper over the rest of the light box diffusing surface
5. tape the glass to the light box
6. slide a strip of negatives into the channel made by the paper strips sandwiched between light box and glass, and center a negative on the light box
7. fit lens to the BEOON
8. using the BEOON magnifying focus tool, focus and align the BEOON to the negative. Mark the edge of the frame on the glass with a bit of tape so you can slide negatives through the channel and align them accurately.
9. tape the BEOON to the glass carefully, without moving it or changing the focus
10. fit Leica M-D body and cable release
11. stop lens down to f/11, set ISO to 200 and exposure on auto

Now you have a jig and copy camera setup which is stable and negatives in strips can be fed through the channel, exposures made one after the other. Makes 16 Mpixel square scans of 6x6 and 24 Mpixel scans of 35mm.

Hint: Darken the room when making exposures to eliminate extraneous flare and light reflections. A construction paper tunnel surrounding the lens and negative stage is also helpful for this.​

Of course, I can substitute any other TTL viewing camera and lens, and any other nice, rigid, small copy stand to do the same thing. The BEOON simply makes it very easy to use a Leica M body, since I have one, and is delightfully compact and easy to store when the kit is not in use. The Summicron-M 50mm lens, although not specifically designed as a macro lens, produces amazingly good results when put to use this way ... as does a Color Skopar 50mm f/2.5 as well.

For example, I can also use a Leica CL body with an M-mount adapter on it, and set the capture to about 1:2 magnification for 35mm. However, with that format, I need about 1:3.5 magnification for 6x6 which is out of range of the BEOON. That's when a Novoflex Magic Studio Macro-Repro Stand and a bellows mount for a lens becomes a lot more flexible to use. It's not cheap, but it is similarly very precise, strong, and rigid, and packs down small enough to store away easily when not in use.

Thanks for the update!

I am pretty sure I have seen your BEOON setup. Just not your "jig" for the negatives. Could you post an image? It sounds interesting.

I have actually come up with a new solution to hold negatives as well, forgot to mention that above. I will post a picture later...

 

[DrTebi]

Negative Holder Update

Negative Holder Update

Well, I forgot to mention my negative holder update. This was quite a bit of work, but also quite an improvement, although I haven't reached the "final" version yet.

My inspiration came from the Diaspeed HT-XYZ slide mounts. These ingenious mounts take advantage of the perforation of 35mm negatives. Negatives are press-fit into an array of notches on top and bottom. The clue is, that the frame where these are fit into, is ever so slightly to small, so you have to bend the frame a bit to make the negative fit. The result is, that the spring-back of the frame will tighten, and therefore flatten, the negative perfectly. This frame is then mounted into an outer frame, that fits most slide projectors.
No glass, not AN, just a perfectly flat slide. I have used these, and they are really as perfect as can be... with a Leitz Colorplan 2.5/90 you get edge-to-edge sharpness on your screen.

So I figured, for the DSLR scanner, let's get rid of the glass as well ☺. To do so, I had to come up with a way to mount a negative on top and bottom tightly, and a way to "stretch" the strip in between those mounts. This would work also for medium format negatives, although there is less area to clamp down on top and bottom.

At first I build this slide holder, out of some hard plastic I had around (here a 6×7 slide is mounted):

The slide is sandwiched on top and bottom, the little pins that you see on the top piece help aligning the slide. Once tight down on both sides you can carefully pull back the bottom piece to put tension onto the slide and thus flatten it; finally you have to tighten down the entire bottom piece.

However, plastic was the wrong choice. The problem was, that the slide tended to slip out of the mount. Further, once tension was put on, the entire plastic piece (the bottom part with the diffuser) bent as well!

So I went back to the drawing board and made this improved version:

All made from steel... I did my best to flatten the pieces, so that no slippage could occur. I also mounted the bottom plastic piece with the diffuser to a wooden board, so that it wouldn't bend anymore.

Here a side view:

The nice knurled knobs (available at McMaster Carr) are spring loaded. This way it is easy to unmount a negative strip, and slide in a new one.

The only problem I had with the steel was, that the bottom pieces reflected light. So I ground an angle onto them, as can hopefully be seen in this image:

This works really well. For medium format slides, I have to remount the bottom piece to adjust for the 60mm height.

What I like about it is: No glass. Nothing in between the lens and the slide. Easy to dust (with compressed air or similar methods). Fairly quick to mount, no tape necessary. But best of all, it is pretty damn flat:

There is certainly room for improvement though. I would like to enlarge everything, and mount it onto a linear slide, so that I can easily move from one image to the next; currently I have to remount the strip for each shot, since my diffusion glass does not cover the entire six negatives.


I should also add some pins to the bottom piece, to make alignment and inserting of strips easier.

By the way—you may think that there are too many reflections coming from the steel parts, but after several tests, I concluded that only the bottom pieces reflected some light; as mentioned, these now have an angle ground to them, and the problem is solved. I don't even think that it is necessary to put a mask over each negative—I did a few tests, and could not notice a difference between masked off negatives and not masked ones (this may depend on your lens as well though).

I do however turn off all other light in the room when making scans.

What do you think? Any other improvement ideas? Any criticism?

 

[DrTebi]

Well, sorry, of course you want to see some results!
Here are two shots from my recent trip to Bordeaux.

Please note the two links below each image:

- The first link is to the original, unsharpened, full-size image (as a JPG).
- The second link is to a sharpened version, resized to fit 4K resolution.

This way you can see what a "raw" result, without sharpening looks like, and what you can achieve with a bit of sharpening in Rawtherapee (or whatever your favorite editor is).

Camera: Yashica Electro 35 GSN
Film: Fujifilm Provia 100F
Lab: Photoworks SF
DSLR Scanner: Nikon D810 with Nikon AF Micro Nikkor 60mm f/2.8 AF-D
Software: Rawtherapee (Linux)

Place de la Bourse, Bordeaux, France
Original, non-sharpened Image
Sharpened image, resized to fit 4K resolution

Tramway de Bordeaux, Bordeaux, France
Original, non-sharpened Image
Sharpened image, resized to fit 4K resolution

 

[Godfrey]

Thanks for the update!

I am pretty sure I have seen your BEOON setup. Just not your "jig" for the negatives. Could you post an image? It sounds interesting.

I have actually come up with a new solution to hold negatives as well, forgot to mention that above. I will post a picture later...

It's pretty simple, really. I still had it set up from the last set of 6x6 negs I captured with it so:

This was kind of a sloppy setup for a quick capture of a junk roll of film I pulled out of a Rolleiflex before sending it off for service a year or two back. I'm usually a little more meticulous about getting everything straight and clean.

Because the setup is so quick to capture negs with, I don't set it up very often. It's more efficient to gather up a few rolls of film and scan them all at one time. I can scan 12 frames of 120 film in about two minutes once I get the setup right and test the exposure, or a roll of 35mm (four strips of six) in about five minutes.

Here's that frame, captured and rendered quickly for proofing:

Not bad for a quickie! 😀

 

[DrTebi]

Looks good...

I assume you have anti-newton glass on top and bottom?

It would be nice to see a full resolution scan, if you can upload it somewhere?

 

[Godfrey]

Looks good...

I assume you have anti-newton glass on top and bottom?

It would be nice to see a full resolution scan, if you can upload it somewhere?

The surface of the light box is a diffuser made of finely patterned acrylic plastic. The cover glass is just a piece of thick, heavy glass. I've not had any problems with newton rings.

I'm not entirely sure why a full resolution rendering of this junk negative is so interesting, but it's not an issue to show it:

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1769/42366704945_5eb03625ce_o.jpg

The taking camera body in this case was a Leica SL, the lens was the Color Skopar 50mm f/2.5—ISO 50 @ f/11 @ 1/5 sec.

 

[DrTebi]

The surface of the light box is a diffuser made of finely patterned acrylic plastic. The cover glass is just a piece of thick, heavy glass. I've not had any problems with newton rings.

I'm not entirely sure why a full resolution rendering of this junk negative is so interesting, but it's not an issue to show it:

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1769/42366704945_5eb03625ce_o.jpg

The taking camera body in this case was a Leica SL, the lens was the Color Skopar 50mm f/2.5—ISO 50 @ f/11 @ 1/5 sec.

Thanks for that. I am just trying to get an idea of how much detail you can capture. Of course, if you would like to post a full-size image of your favorite shot, then that might be more interesting...


I thought you had a different Leica camera? Maybe you could squeeze even more detail out of negatives with a higher resolution sensor, or stitched shots... if that is in your interest at all, maybe you are completely happy with that, and I am too much of a pixel-peeper!

 

[Godfrey]

Thanks for that. I am just trying to get an idea of how much detail you can capture. Of course, if you would like to post a full-size image of your favorite shot, then that might be more interesting...

I thought you had a different Leica camera? Maybe you could squeeze even more detail out of negatives with a higher resolution sensor, or stitched shots... if that is in your interest at all, maybe you are completely happy with that, and I am too much of a pixel-peeper!

I have had several digital Ms (M9, M-P 240, M-D typ 262), and still have the M-D. I've also had an SL system, but it's now at a dealer for sale on consignment for lack of use. I'll be replacing it with a CL body so that I'll have another 24Mpixel TTL/EVF body for this kind of macro/tabletop work (that will use my M and R lenses and accessories to best advantage). I've done this work with FourThirds cameras as well (and still have a nice 16Mpixel Olympus E-M1 to work with) but I'm not interested in expanding my equipment cabinet with more in that system at the present time.

24MPixel has been my personal gold standard for a digital camera in this format range since 2000 or so, based on the notions that a 15-16x magnification of a 35mm negative is about as much as the film format can take. I don't print to gigunda sizes: I'm more interested in hand-holdable books and prints up to the 11x17 inch range. 6000 x 4000 pixels covers that range nicely for 35mm format images; 4000 x 4000 pixels does as well for square format photos up to 13x13 inch printed at 300 ppi. So-called APS-C format and 35mm "full-format" digital sensors are just fine for this capture resolution. I'd go for a Hasselblad X1D with its 50Mpixel sensor and lovely 120mm macro lens ... but it's more than I need for what I want to produce, and would only really get more useful data from 645 and larger format film since IMO 35mm film is at its limits with 24Mpixel capture.

As you can see from the full rez photo I posted, the grain structure of the film is very visible and clearly defined. The photo was made with the camera either sitting on the counter or on a tripod, and was focused with the magnifier in the hood, so it's as sharp as it's ever going to be. There is no finer detail in that image than that.

With a finer grained, higher acutance film, like Technical Pan, specifically processed for acutance and resolution, maybe more pixels would extract more useful data. If I wanted to produce 24x24 or 50x50 inch prints, more pixels would be useful ... But that's not my photography, that's someone else's. I don't need it. 😀

G

 

[DrTebi]

I have had several digital Ms (M9, M-P 240, M-D typ 262), and still have the M-D. I've also had an SL system, but it's now at a dealer for sale on consignment for lack of use. I'll be replacing it with a CL body so that I'll have another 24Mpixel TTL/EVF body for this kind of macro/tabletop work (that will use my M and R lenses and accessories to best advantage). I've done this work with FourThirds cameras as well (and still have a nice 16Mpixel Olympus E-M1 to work with) but I'm not interested in expanding my equipment cabinet with more in that system at the present time.

24MPixel has been my personal gold standard for a digital camera in this format range since 2000 or so, based on the notions that a 15-16x magnification of a 35mm negative is about as much as the film format can take. I don't print to gigunda sizes: I'm more interested in hand-holdable books and prints up to the 11x17 inch range. 6000 x 4000 pixels covers that range nicely for 35mm format images; 4000 x 4000 pixels does as well for square format photos up to 13x13 inch printed at 300 ppi. So-called APS-C format and 35mm "full-format" digital sensors are just fine for this capture resolution. I'd go for a Hasselblad X1D with its 50Mpixel sensor and lovely 120mm macro lens ... but it's more than I need for what I want to produce, and would only really get more useful data from 645 and larger format film since IMO 35mm film is at its limits with 24Mpixel capture.

As you can see from the full rez photo I posted, the grain structure of the film is very visible and clearly defined. The photo was made with the camera either sitting on the counter or on a tripod, and was focused with the magnifier in the hood, so it's as sharp as it's ever going to be. There is no finer detail in that image than that.

With a finer grained, higher acutance film, like Technical Pan, specifically processed for acutance and resolution, maybe more pixels would extract more useful data. If I wanted to produce 24x24 or 50x50 inch prints, more pixels would be useful ... But that's not my photography, that's someone else's. I don't need it. 😀

G

While I agree with you that for most of us the resolution that can be captured with a 24MP camera is sufficient apart from gigantic sized prints, I do not think that 24MP is the limit of film.


I have done several experiments with extension tubes to get more than a 1:1 magnification of 35mm negatives, and most often noticed more detail. There are a few people who take two, three, or even six shots of a 35mm negative and stitch these together in software. Cumbersome, but it appears to be worth it if all you are after is more resolution.


As an example, take a look at this example (un-sharpened):
http://drtebi.com/dump/rangefinderforum/Nikon-N90--Oregon_not-sharpened.jpg


That's what comes out of the Nikon D810 with it's 36MP sensor, converted with ColorPerfect and only exposure and white balance adjusted. The taking-camera was a Nikon N-70 with the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 on Fujifilm Superia 100.


I can see astonishing detail when zooming in, I do not believe that 24MP could resolve as much.


Not trying to start an argument, just showing some examples from my own experience.

 

[Huss]

This is how much detail I capture with a D850 and Nikon 60 2.8 lens, the pano image using a Lomo DIGITILIZA film holder, $150 copy stand and $20 lightpad from Amazon.
The shoe shot using the D850/60mm 2.8/Nikon ES-2 film holder/$20 Amazon light pad.

I think you are making this far more complicated than it needs be.

Noblex 135 Sport, Fuji C200, D850





1:1 crop from left corner, showing how sharp the Noblex 135 is (and of course the D850 scan!), and how flat the Lomo Digitiliza holds the film:



Nikon F6, Sigma Art 50, Portra 400 @400, D850 scan



1:1 crop:

 

[Godfrey]

While I agree with you that for most of us the resolution that can be captured with a 24MP camera is sufficient apart from gigantic sized prints, I do not think that 24MP is the limit of film.

I have done several experiments with extension tubes to get more than a 1:1 magnification of 35mm negatives, and most often noticed more detail. There are a few people who take two, three, or even six shots of a 35mm negative and stitch these together in software. Cumbersome, but it appears to be worth it if all you are after is more resolution.

As an example, take a look at this example (un-sharpened):
http://drtebi.com/dump/rangefinderforum/Nikon-N90--Oregon_not-sharpened.jpg

That's what comes out of the Nikon D810 with it's 36MP sensor, converted with ColorPerfect and only exposure and white balance adjusted. The taking-camera was a Nikon N-70 with the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 on Fujifilm Superia 100.

I can see astonishing detail when zooming in, I do not believe that 24MP could resolve as much.

Not trying to start an argument, just showing some examples from my own experience.

No one can zoom in on a print, so all that additional detail, if any, is useless unless it’s exposed in a gigantic print.

The max theoretical difference in resolution between 36 and 24 mpixel is the ratio of the difference between the square roots of the two resolutions, or about 22% at maximum; or said another way, if the 24mpixel capture achieves 20lp/mm, 36mpixel could net a maximum of about 24-25lp/mm... great if your photography needs that kind of additional detailing. But maxima like that are only rarely achieved and highly dependent upon subject type, capture quality, and film acutance ... all of which are highly variable.

By and large, my photography aesthetic has never been so dependent upon such ultimate detailing and, as stated, I don’t make gigunda prints that need it as a rule. The number of 35mm negatives that are worth printing at greater than 15x magnification is vanishingly small in my experience too (obviously, there’s a lot more to be had from 6x6 with 3.6x the area, but I never have really gotten near using it all). That’s why I set my resolution standards the way I do.

It’s the photograph that matters most to me, it’s achieved expression and aesthetic rather than just how much detail it contains. “A sharp photograph of a blurry idea is never as good as a blurry photograph of a sharp idea” and all that. 🙂

 

[Huss]

The downside about using a 36 or 47mp camera vs 24 is the file size become absolutely huge in comparison.

As an example, using a D850 the NEF (raw file) is 55mb. The TIF that I get back from NikFx (I use the pro-contrast setting there to adjust colour balance) is 272mb! When I export that as a jpeg, it is about 35-40mb.
Once I have the jpeg for printing, I delete the NEF and TIFF from my computer as it just takes up waaaay too much memory and slows things down. And my printers do not accept files that big. Plus I still have the actual film if I ever need to revisit the image.

 

[rfaspen]

Godfrey,

What tube combination do you use with a 50mm lens and Leica MD to scan 6x6 negatives?

I also want to scan 6x6, and have a similar list of kit (M240 in my case).

Thanks!

I was going to PM you this question, but thought maybe others were curious too.

My current setup:

• Leica M-D + Summicron-M 50mm + BEOON copy stand
• Small color-balanced LED light box (about 5x7 inches in size)
• 1/4" thick piece of glass the size of the light box
• 2 strips of 300gsm paper
• Black construction paper
• Artist's Tape

Handles 35mm to 6x9 negative strips with the M-D.

1. tape the light box onto my work table.
2. carefully clean the light box's diffusing surface (ANR proven)
3. tape two strips of 300gsm paper down on the light box at the right width to allow a film strip of the chosen film to move between them.
4. tape black construction paper over the rest of the light box diffusing surface
5. tape the glass to the light box
6. slide a strip of negatives into the channel made by the paper strips sandwiched between light box and glass, and center a negative on the light box
7. fit lens to the BEOON
8. using the BEOON magnifying focus tool, focus and align the BEOON to the negative. Mark the edge of the frame on the glass with a bit of tape so you can slide negatives through the channel and align them accurately.
9. tape the BEOON to the glass carefully, without moving it or changing the focus
10. fit Leica M-D body and cable release
11. stop lens down to f/11, set ISO to 200 and exposure on auto

Now you have a jig and copy camera setup which is stable and negatives in strips can be fed through the channel, exposures made one after the other. Makes 16 Mpixel square scans of 6x6 and 24 Mpixel scans of 35mm.

Hint: Darken the room when making exposures to eliminate extraneous flare and light reflections. A construction paper tunnel surrounding the lens and negative stage is also helpful for this.​

Of course, I can substitute any other TTL viewing camera and lens, and any other nice, rigid, small copy stand to do the same thing. The BEOON simply makes it very easy to use a Leica M body, since I have one, and is delightfully compact and easy to store when the kit is not in use. The Summicron-M 50mm lens, although not specifically designed as a macro lens, produces amazingly good results when put to use this way ... as does a Color Skopar 50mm f/2.5 as well.

For example, I can also use a Leica CL body with an M-mount adapter on it, and set the capture to about 1:2 magnification for 35mm. However, with that format, I need about 1:3.5 magnification for 6x6 which is out of range of the BEOON. That's when a Novoflex Magic Studio Macro-Repro Stand and a bellows mount for a lens becomes a lot more flexible to use. It's not cheap, but it is similarly very precise, strong, and rigid, and packs down small enough to store away easily when not in use.

 

[Huss]

I think this thread would be great if people could post 100% crops of their scans in the center and in the corners, so we can more accurately know what each persons' setup is capable of.

I did that earlier, here is another example.

Leica M5 w/ CV 35 1.2, Portra 400. D850 scan, with right center edge 1:1 enlargement to show the detail.

 

[Godfrey]

...
What tube combination do you use with a 50mm lens and Leica MD to scan 6x6 negatives?...

To image 6x6 onto 24x36mm with a Summicron-M 50mm lens with the BEOON and a Leica M:

1. Fit the lens to the BEOON using the A tube.
2. Set the post to approximately a third of the way from 1:2 to 1:3.
3. Set the focusing helicoid of the lens to about 0.8 to 1 m.
4. Move the post height and the focusing helicoid adjustment using the BEOON magnifier until you get good sharpness on center in the magnifier.
5. Adjust the position of the BEOON to center the negative in the field with the edges parallel to the BEOON stage frame.
6. Lock all settings.
7. Tape the BEOON down to the cover glass (if you're using my setup).
8. Remove the magnifier and swap the camera body into place.

If you have an M/M-P typ 240 or an M10, you can do a final check of the focus and negative alignment with Live View. With any digital M body other than the M-D, you can make an exposure and check the alignment and focus using review. M-D and film bodies ... you just have to believe. 🙂

Set f/11 or f/16 for the exposure to minimize focus error and get the greatest flatness of field.

G

 

[rfaspen]

Thanks.
I'm confused by what is mean in step 2; set post approx third of way from 1:2 to 1:3. Perhaps you have markings on your BEOON that I don't.

One thing that gives me problems with attempting to get the right tube combo and post height -- the ground glass magnifier does not show me the same extent as the camera sensor sees. In other words, I can't tell where the edge of the image will be. Makes the ground glass magnifier good for only checking focus, not much else.

Are you using any of the metal frame masks? My guess is not, but I haven't checked yet.

And thanks for your response.

To image 6x6 onto 24x36mm with a Summicron-M 50mm lens with the BEOON and a Leica M:

1. Fit the lens to the BEOON using the A tube.
2. Set the post to approximately a third of the way from 1:2 to 1:3.
3. Set the focusing helicoid of the lens to about 0.8 to 1 m.
4. Move the post height and the focusing helicoid adjustment using the BEOON magnifier until you get good sharpness on center in the magnifier.
5. Adjust the position of the BEOON to center the negative in the field with the edges parallel to the BEOON stage frame.
6. Lock all settings.
7. Tape the BEOON down to the cover glass (if you're using my setup).
8. Remove the magnifier and swap the camera body into place.

If you have an M/M-P typ 240 or an M10, you can do a final check of the focus and negative alignment with Live View. With any digital M body other than the M-D, you can make an exposure and check the alignment and focus using review. M-D and film bodies ... you just have to believe. 🙂

Set f/11 or f/16 for the exposure to minimize focus error and get the greatest flatness of field.

G

 

[danitoma]

My setup

My setup

Thiis is the setup I build.



IT is made mostly from with stuff I already had, or could get from friends and relatives. I spend about 40 dollar on the mdf (cut to size) and about 20 on an old kaiser enlarger. If you need to buy all this stuff it will get (a lot) more expensive of course!

The baseplate from the enlarger was damaged by water, so needed to be replaced. To get a more comfortable working heigth, I turned an old kitchen cupboard my grandma had laying around in to a sort of baseplate/table thing



Kaiser still makes camera adpaters for their enlargers, luckily it came with mine.

 

[danitoma]

my setup 2

my setup 2

A friend had some old pc fans, which are used to blow any dust in the air away from the film, quite effectively.


Because I wanted to be able to stictch multiple shots for larger film formats, I made multiple mdf plates that gllide over each other. The larger bottom plate can be moved forward and backward, and locked in place with the left and right screws. The smaller plate inside it, with the film holder, can be moved left and right and locked with the middle screws. Without the tape the mdf sucked itself together making it hard to move. It still gets a bit stuck if it is not moved in a while, but a little jiggleling helps here.


The lighting is done with flash with Yongnuo triggers. For focussing there is a led strip at the bottom inside the device (with on off switch outside). There are three diffusing drawers, with opalwhite plexiglass. HAving the light very diffuse helps with minimising scratches. And making them removable helps whith very dense, underexposed slides, where even maximum flash brightness was not enough. I made the diffusers lalrge enough to be able to scan 4x5 in one shot.


It stands on levelling legs, for easier alignment with the camera. I also use an app called bubble level, which can measure to 1/10th degree. It can be set to zero on either the camera or the copyrig and it's then very easy to adjust the other perfectly.

 

[danitoma]

Because the rig turned out quite large, the pole from the enlarger was not high enough to be able to capture all formats in one shot (don't want to stitch every shot!). Withs some glued together strips of MDF I made a higher platform to mount the pole on.



We already had a honeywell hepa air filter, which does suck a lot of dust from the air. Not everything, but if you turn it on an hour or more, before starting to copy, there is a clear difference (in a relatively small room).


To handle and clean the film I use nitril medical gloves (without the white powder in normal throwaway gloves) and ilford antistaticum rags. Cotton gloves kept losing fibers on the film, so stopeed using those. Normal clothes can also lose fibres and dust I found, so I started wearing a cheap rain jacket, which is no fun if its hot!

The camera is a Nikon d7200 with the older 60mm Micro lens and I use ControlMyNikon from the computer. This controls the camera, you can have the liveview on your monitor, use autofocus at 100% magnification to check focus. It even has a copystand and negative mode, but I don't really use the later. It also allows the use of a powerpoint remote to trigger a lot of functions, I use on from Logitech.
Controlmynikon is well worth the money, but a free alternative is DigiCamControl. For other brands I don't know.

 

[Godfrey]

You're welcome. 🙂

Thanks.
I'm confused by what is mean in step 2; set post approx third of way from 1:2 to 1:3. Perhaps you have markings on your BEOON that I don't.

I would be quite surprised if your BEOON does not have the scale markings on the rear of the threaded post like this:

On the other hand, I've been surprised before...!

Note that these markings are just approximations, in my experience as borne out by testing. For instance: With the Summicron-M 50mm fitted using the M-D body and the A ring, you should nominally be able to achieve 1:3 magnification at the infinity focus mark. A 1:3 magnification will have a vertical AoV of 72mm, which is actually the inside vertical dimension of the BEOON stand's frame.

I set up the 50mm lens on the A ring, focus mount set to infinity and used the magnifier to focus it by adjusting the column height, then swapped on the M-D body and exposed the gate with a mm scale in place. The magnification is indeed 1:3 as the legend notes, but the column was only extended to one thread above the 1:3 marking. So I consider these markings only a rough guide.

One thing that gives me problems with attempting to get the right tube combo and post height -- the ground glass magnifier does not show me the same extent as the camera sensor sees. In other words, I can't tell where the edge of the image will be. Makes the ground glass magnifier good for only checking focus, not much else.

Are you using any of the metal frame masks? My guess is not, but I haven't checked yet.

The magnifier is just that: a focusing magnifier. It's view is quite distorted off-center. This is why a Live View camera is a heck of a lot easier to work with. A 50-60mm macro lens with a focusing mount to 1:2 magnification also makes the correct focus and magnification setup easier to achieve because you have much finer control of the lens's extension and more focusing latitude with any specific tube setup than an RF lens's focusing mount can achieve.

However, the lens is nicely centered in the BEOON gate's frame ... On my example, at 1:3 magnification it is only off by about 0.5 mm in the direction of the column post. So if you look with the magnifier to the edges of the frame, you can judge that the film strip is nicely centered in the film gate pretty easily, even though it's fuzzy and distorted. You can also measure it out and position the film strip right down the center: 120 film strips are pretty accurately 61.3mm wide, the frame from my Hasselblad backs is almost precisely 56x56mm leaving about 2.5mm rebate to the film edge on both sides. So you can set up a channel to measure 61.5mm and position that in the BEOON's 72mm gate with a ruler. That gets the film into the correct position with suitable accuracy. Now it's just a matter of being sure that the post height and focus cover the range properly, so with a 50mm lens fit the A frame, set the focusing mount to 1m, and then adjust focus with the post. Glancing to top and bottom of the frame with the magnifier, you should be able to see the edge is within the channel you made.

I used the mask for 35mm format 1:1 before I came up with my channel-on-lightbox strategy, but 6x6 is not provided by any of the masks. Now that I use this channel strategy to jig the film into position consistently, I mask that (at the level of the lightbox surface so as not to cast shadows) instead of using the BEOON masks.