Kraken 6x24 3d printed camera

[shawn]

Building off my Kraken 617 version of the original Kraken 612 I just finished a new version.

Kraken 6x24 using a Fujinon SW 105mm f8.

Had to get a little tricky with this lens since it typically is thought to not work with a M65 helicoid since the rear group is wider than the helicoid. It is but can still be mounted in the helicoid, it just limits the helicoid movement to a little over a quarter turn.

I designed this lens cone around that. Had to be creative with the geometry as the rear element is installed after the shutter is mounted. The rear element fits into the cone sideways (the gate is only 55mm wide) and then rotates 90 degrees to be screwed into the shutter.

With the helicoid all the way in the lens is exactly at infinity. Extended out as far as the lens will let it the camera focuses to just under 6' away which is plenty.

Test roll drying now...

This was just shots to look at coverage at f8, f16 and f32. I am going to tweak the position of the rear door window by about 10mm to better center the images between the start and end of the roll. The window is based on 6x6 numbering and you shoot on 4,8,12.

Shawn

 

[sojournerphoto]

Brilliant. I’ve just started shooting (playing) with my new old Fotoman 617. This is really wide - like some of my old stitched digi panos.

How is loading? The film must be near the ‘gate’ when you’ve pulled it across to the receiving spool.

Your negs look darker than mine - wonder if I need to up development. I can see some experimentation coming on here. Seem to see some vignetting in one of them too.

Mike

 

[shawn]

What lens does your 617 have on it?

Loading wasn't bad, I still had some room to turn for a bit before I saw the first number in the window so it had at some room to spare on the leader. I'm going to move the window a little over more but that shouldn't change the loading at all. Just want to have a little more space before the first image and to get the window just over the film gate area, where it is now is sort of at the transition point between the spool and the gate.

These are fairly dark, maybe a little bit too much. This was Fomapan 100, which I really like to stand develop in HC-110 at 100:1 for an hour with 4 inversions at the start and at 30 minutes.

Looking at the test shots the wide open shot is definitely vignetting pretty strongly. Doubt I would use f8 anyway as it is soft on the sides. I don't know what its image circle is rated at wide open but it looks like it is smaller than this camera. The f16 shot is much much better. Still vignettes but it is easily correctable in LR, see attached.

These negatives are so long I need to work on my scanning rig to keep the negative position fixed better. It was 9 frames of my digital to scan one shot, about 300 megapixels (and that was with some auto cropping of the blend) and the panoramic DNG was well over a gb.

Shawn

 

[Mr_Flibble]

Now that is IMPRESSIVE!

 

[BWF]

Awesome! Now that is wide. I’m curious, I assume you had to redesign the cones and body, but you could still use some existing Kraken parts? It must have been quite the undertaking.

 

[neal3k]

I thought my Fuji G617 was big until I saw this. It is quite impressive and so is your ability to get it all to come together. I hope you post some more images.

 

[shawn]

Awesome! Now that is wide. I’m curious, I assume you had to redesign the cones and body, but you could still use some existing Kraken parts? It must have been quite the undertaking.

I reused most of the little pieces with the exception of the shutter boards and film reminder. The original was too complicated and didn't fit well. The body is based on the 612 body that I extended out to 617 and then I made other changes to the body for the 4 point lens mounting, 2 additional strap lugs (for vertical hang) the integrated ARCA plate and then fixing a couple of bugs in the original design. To go to 624 I basically extended out the 617 body again. I designed a new rear door for the 612 as the original rattled too much and was too complicated and used that design for the 617 and 624. Lens cones for the 617 and 624 are totally new designs as are the viewfinders. Need to keep working on the 624 viewfinder, what I have will work for longer focal lengths but with the 105mm it is too wide to work well. I'm going to go back to using a mask on a wide viewfinder for this camera.

Going from 612 to 617 took a long time for me to design as I had to learn a bunch of new tools and I had multiple prints before it all came together. Moving the 617 to 624 was easier and much quicker. Amazingly it all worked with the first print of the new parts.

Shawn

 

[shawn]

I thought my Fuji G617 was big until I saw this. It is quite impressive and so is your ability to get it all to come together. I hope you post some more images.

Thanks, it is big. I was just barely able to fit the body on my printer.

But it is manageable and much lighter than the G617, it weighs just about 3 pounds about 1330 grams.

Will add more images as I get them.

Shawn

 

[shawn]

Finally got a chance to get out and use this. Only out for about 15 minutes as it was extremely cold but it was nice to get something. Brought a few rolls but my hands were so numb after 1 roll I didn't even try to reload.

All at f22, Fomapan 100, HC110 100:1 60 minutes.

The new window position got the film spaced out more evenly start to end of the roll. Going to change the viewfinder a bit and create a mask for a Sigma VF51. The glassless finder works but you have to move your eye around side to side to see the edges since this is so wide.


Shawn

 

[shawn]

Sigma VF-51 is an extremely nice finder. More magnifications, more space outside of the 21mm frame and much longer eyepoint than the Fuji VF-X21 or Ricoh GV-1. It can basically cover edge to edge for the Kraken 624. Modeled a viewfinder mask for the VF-51 and added a fork to fit around foot of the viewfinder so the mask can't spin.

Shawn