My Ermanox Journey

This is a problem that I've found with several of my older cameras, all those without a nice, focused, SLR or rangefinder viewfinder, like the larger 4x5 Auto Graflex.

How do you focus in an indoor shoot, or even outside if the subject is close enough? The focal plane is tiny, wide open at f2 or f1.8 (when focus and bokeh is more "interesting"), and without a rangefinder you only have the ground glass. Distance guessing does not work on such confined situations. But even fully open the ground glass look dim withouth a bright light in the composition, and the worst problem is with our 40+ years or more eyes! I can't see a focused image WITH MY GLASSES at less than 30-40 cm away, so the image on the ground glass is small and dark, impossible to see if it's really focused. Only help would be a loupe, but small enough to be used with the already small Ermanox ground glass...
 
carbo73 said:
This is a problem that I've found with several of my older cameras, all those without a nice, focused, SLR or rangefinder viewfinder, like the larger 4x5 Auto Graflex.

How do you focus in an indoor shoot, or even outside if the subject is close enough? The focal plane is tiny, wide open at f2 or f1.8 (when focus and bokeh is more "interesting"), and without a rangefinder you only have the ground glass. Distance guessing does not work on such confined situations. But even fully open the ground glass look dim withouth a bright light in the composition, and the worst problem is with our 40+ years or more eyes! I can't see a focused image WITH MY GLASSES at less than 30-40 cm away, so the image on the ground glass is small and dark, impossible to see if it's really focused. Only help would be a loupe, but small enough to be used with the already small Ermanox ground glass...
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, we older folks have to work with what we've got. For me, the single most helpful aid is a dark cloth. It's amazing how bright the dimmest ground glass looks once you've blocked out any extraneous light. Beyond that, a pair of very powerful reading glasses (5 or 6 diopter), on a cord around my neck for quick access, works better than a loupe for me. All this assumes a camera on a tripod, of course, but I feel that once I've decided to use a view or press camera, I've decided also to work within the limitations of that technology. Don't give up; keep experimenting to find what works best for you!
 
carbo73 said:
This is a problem that I've found with several of my older cameras, all those without a nice, focused, SLR or rangefinder viewfinder, like the larger 4x5 Auto Graflex.

How do you focus in an indoor shoot, or even outside if the subject is close enough? The focal plane is tiny, wide open at f2 or f1.8 (when focus and bokeh is more "interesting"), and without a rangefinder you only have the ground glass. Distance guessing does not work on such confined situations. But even fully open the ground glass look dim withouth a bright light in the composition, and the worst problem is with our 40+ years or more eyes! I can't see a focused image WITH MY GLASSES at less than 30-40 cm away, so the image on the ground glass is small and dark, impossible to see if it's really focused. Only help would be a loupe, but small enough to be used with the already small Ermanox ground glass...
Click to expand...

Sometimes - based on the situation- ‘guesstimating’ the distance might be all you have at your disposal, and in that case you just have to get good at knowing what a given distance (like 1 meter) looks like, and try to position yourself that far away from your subjects. One thing that I’ve been using outdoors is a digital hunting rangefinder and it works very well (only thing is that they all close-focus only to 5 meters/5 yards, so anything closer I’m on my own). I rarely use the ground glass to focus unless it’s something like a posed portrait situation (like the one image of Joe a few posts ago), and I have a small focusing loupe but it mostly resides in the bottom of my camera bag. I think I’ve gotten better at determining what’s 12 feet away, 3 meters etc, and indoors I have another distance rangefinder that I can use if need be. It takes a lot of practice, to be sure, and in general shooting with a camera like the Ermanox isn’t the most practical of endeavours. And as I’ve come to find out, it’s an expensive commitment.
 
Thanks for the answers, both of you. I could try that idea of the reading glasses, as these can be bought on the chemist. I use a dark cloth and a loupe on my large format cameras (5x7 usually). But these obviously are always with their tripod (I've just bought a very heavy Majestic tripod), so it's easy to do that with both hands free. The problem of the Ermanox should be to focus with the ground glass without tripod, as it should be.
 
Another version of 'Reading Riley' that I shot late last year -- this glass plate was 'scanned' using my Nikon Z7 and the 60/2.8 Micro G lens. The file is a bit smaller than one from the Hasselblad 907x, (and the sensor is smaller), but it ends up making a 93mb TIFF file and the results are pretty much the same. I think I may switch over to this method for now.

With a J. Lane glass 'speed' plate, about 1 second at f/2.


Reading Riley Ermanox4 by Vince Lupo, on Flickr
 
I’m not sure if it could work on your camera...to brighten up your ground glass image~~~~~ I had that issue with an Ansco Automatic Reflex, and things got soooo much brighter and even across the GG when I installed a Hartley Field Lens under the Ansco ground glass. Amazing difference with no visible alteration of the camera. The Hartley Field Lens is a very fine fresnel in lucite, about 1/16 thick. It’s easily shape /size cut with simple hand tools. I mounted mine under the GG in its normal position, with the fresnel surface in direct contact with the GG surface, so focus is unchanged https://www.ebay.com/itm/30355448180...QAAOSwIOheqbx~
 
I think I found another nice paper that will work with these photos -- Epson Legacy Textured. 100% cotton paper, really heavy stock. I was a bit concerned that the texture would be too textured, but it seems to be just right for these kinds of images. It does take a tiny 'edge' off the sharpness, but overall I think it's okay.


Legacy Textured1 by Vince Lupo, on Flickr


Legacy Textured2 by Vince Lupo, on Flickr
 
Ambro51 said:
I’m not sure if it could work on your camera...to brighten up your ground glass image~~~~~ I had that issue with an Ansco Automatic Reflex, and things got soooo much brighter and even across the GG when I installed a Hartley Field Lens under the Ansco ground glass. Amazing difference with no visible alteration of the camera. The Hartley Field Lens is a very fine fresnel in lucite, about 1/16 thick. It’s easily shape /size cut with simple hand tools. I mounted mine under the GG in its normal position, with the fresnel surface in direct contact with the GG surface, so focus is unchanged https://www.ebay.com/itm/30355448180...QAAOSwIOheqbx~
Click to expand...

Well, my main problem is not the amount of light in the ground glass (a brighter image would help, for sure), but being able to see if the image is focused or not. WITH my glasses I theoretically can see things focused about 20-30 cms away, but then they are so small that I can't properly see if the image is focused or not, in the ground glass. And that with my glasses, without them it's much worse. That has happened these last 5-7 years, damn 🙁:bang: That's why I will try the reading glasses, because a loupe should be better, but I can't hold the Ermanox with one hand and use the loupe with the other without problems or damaging the hood arround the gg.
 
Nokton48 said:
Hey Vince,

You prolly are already aware that Shanghai is selling their GP3 now in 127. A bit faster than Pan F

Shanghai GP3 100 Black and White Negative Film 127 | JIANCHENG FILM – SHANGHAI JIANCHENG FILM (shjcfilm.com)

I'm using their 220 version and I like it. Just ordered ten more rolls
Click to expand...

Yes I was aware -- $14.00 for the Shanghai vs $8.86 for the Pan F though. Actually I think the Pan F is perfect for the Ermanox, though admittedly it's a bit of a chore to trim 120 down to 127. The one thing about 100 speed film is I have to watch for fogging, as the light-tightedness of the Ermanox is not like modern film cameras (the shutter design causes light to leak around the curtains). Even with the Pan F I have to remember to replace the dark slide after every shot, thankfully that method has all but eliminated any fogging of the Pan F.
 
Vince Lupo said:
Yes I was aware -- $14.00 for the Shanghai vs $8.86 for the Pan F though. Actually I think the Pan F is perfect for the Ermanox, though admittedly it's a bit of a chore to trim 120 down to 127. The one thing about 100 speed film is I have to watch for fogging, as the light-tightedness of the Ermanox is not like modern film cameras (the shutter design causes light to leak around the curtains). Even with the Pan F I have to remember to replace the dark slide after every shot, thankfully that method has all but eliminated any fogging of the Pan F.
Click to expand...

Hey Vince,

That PanF is certainly a perfect match and WOW is it working for you. Amazing stuff. Obviously you are enjoying the process. Thanks for your insights. I think I should shoot PanF+ in my Makina II That will be fun Anyway keep going with this
 
Nokton48 said:
Hey Vince,

That PanF is certainly a perfect match and WOW is it working for you. Amazing stuff. Obviously you are enjoying the process. Thanks for your insights. I think I should shoot PanF+ in my Makina II That will be fun Anyway keep going with this
Click to expand...

Many thanks for the words of encouragement -- I do appreciate it!

I seem to be having overall good luck with the Pan F -- at times I've read that people have issues with Pan F, that it's tricky to work with/process etc but I've never had a problem.

Trying some available light with Pan F - I managed to get something marginal at 1/20th of a second at f/1.8, hand-held. Gives me a vague sense of the technical challenges that Salomon faced!


Cooking Riley by Vince Lupo, on Flickr
 
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