New RF 645

P

Paulo

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I've had a Mamiya 7 for about a year now and and am very happy with the results , I originally wanted n RF645 but couldnt find one in New Zealand, While looking online for a second lens for the mamiya I came across A bronica Rf645 with 65mm and 45mm lens's and well as the viewfinder and double hotshoe adaptor. all for $1300 NZD about $800 us. so I jumped at it , it arrives tommorrow and I cant wait. I will probably be looking for the Rf20 speedlight as well so if anyones got on for sale let me know.

This is a fantastic site, It's refreshing to see a continuing interest in quality film cameras in an increasingly digital age. Don't get me wrong I have nothing against digital photography. ( In fact I work as an effects artist at weta digital for LOTR and now KING KONG and deal with pushing Pixels around all day).
My colleagues cant believe I still shoot film for stills and think my passion for strange large odd looking cameras is kind of eccentric but when I've shown them 6x7 chromes on a light box or zoom in on a drum scan from a 6x7 chrome they are just blown away. well I ramble now thanks for all the info and posts in the Bronica rf forum it has been great reading and has made me even more excited about the arrival of my new camera.

If I decide I can Part with the mamiya 7 I will advertise it on this site first 🙂

paulo
 
RObert Budding said:
Welcome, Paulo. Does the site where you found your RF645 have any more in stock?

Robert
Click to expand...

Welcome. Now that's a good question. I second it. We need to know these things.

Do you mind sharing why you choose to ditch the Mamiya for the Bronica? After all, one's 6x7 and the other is 6x4.5. Is the Mamiya that much bigger or is it something else? The price of some of those lenses would surely deter me though 😱.
 
Hi so many replies in such a short time thanks for the welcome , Firstly the site I found the Bronica on was a local NZ one and it was a complete fluke. I never see these cameras for sale in N.Z and i was just Lucky. If I do however I will post a link of course.
I'm not sure if I will sell the mamiya or not but can explain my interest in the Bronica Firstly I like to shoot wides and The mamiya only has the 80mm lens which is not really that useful for my style of shooting (beautiful lens though with amazing results) It was only when I started looking into other Mamiya lens's did I realize what I had let myself in for in terms of $$$$ the 43mm mamiya lens in NZ is around $2900 NZD. Yikes !! So I found myself not using the camera as much as I should because having just the 80mm.
Another really important thing for me is build quality, I'm pretty rough on cameras, probably got spoilt by always using nikkoramat ftns and even the F3 I use now is a solid lump of metal. I travel a lot and spent 3 months in china last year having my bags dropped and thrown all over the show, (i shot 35mm on this trip) The feeling I have about the Mamiya is that if I wanted to travel with it I would be constantly worrying about it getting damaged, I'm not saying the Mamiya 7 its' badly built but rather that I know myself (two left feet) and that I am not always the most careful person, also I want to be able to backpack, scrabble over rocks explore caves squeeze into overcrowded busses etc etc. After looking at the Rf 645 in Jacobs camera shop in london last november I was really impressed by the size and the apparent build quality.

6x7 vs 6x4.5 well yeah i'll have to live with smaller images but for me I think the trade off with 16 shots per roll compared to 10 will make up for this especially as I will be using the Bronica as a travel camera, it's a pain to have to stop and change rolls when you're standing in a dusty dirty market place after just 10 shots.

So those are my reasons for being excited about getting my hands on the Bronica Rf 645 guess it's a personal choice weighing up different factors, Things that bother me may cause no problems for other (more careful, wealthy 😉 ) people and visa versa.

cheers for the questions.

and I'll let you know what I think once the camera actually arrives ( and i start using it)s, till then it's all academic 🙂

Paulo
 
Welcome to RFF, Paulo, and to the ranks of RF645 owners! Several of us, in this forum. I've had mine for several years, and something infectious about RFF led me to acquire a second body this summer. 🙂 I have been very pleased with the Bronica, but do wish the viewfinder showed framelines for the 45mm lens. Great camera... Robert, you clearly need to find one soon! 😀

Here's a bit of fire with the 65mm
 
Yes, Peter, I bought a lens for which I have no body. IT sounds crazy, but I had read enough posts here to know that both the 100mm and 135mm lenses are hard to come by. So I jumped when I saw a classified posting on pnet.

I'll have a body soon, though. The Robert White kit is an excellent deal. And I've now sold a complete Contaflex system, a Minolta Autocord CDS !!!, and a Zeiss Jena 85/2.0 to fund my purchase (too many cameras anyway).

Now if someone would just buy my post-war Zeiss 35/2.8 Biogon . .

Robert
 
Welcome Paulo. Looking forward to seeing some results from the Bronnie. I've been pondering an RF645 for a while to complement my ageing ETRS for shots when I'm out and about. Following a rather big bill on my car I'll have to wait a bit longer now.

Our sponsor Robert White has the last stock in the UK and I believe they will ship world wide not problem. Could be a last chance to get a new one. Good luck.
 
Paulo, Welcome to the Bronica 645RF club. I think we have enough members now to officially be a cult.
Try the 45mm. It's truly an amazing lens.
 
peter_n said:
Pardon my ignorance, but what is the top shutter speed of the RF645? And does it have AE and if so aperture or shutter priority?
Click to expand...
Hi Peter-- Here's a snip below of the exposure chart for the Bronica RF645. It has fully manual control, Aperture Priority, or Program AE... As you can see, the shutter's highest speed is 1/500th until f/16, then from there to f/22 transitions to a max of 1/750th, but this is only available in Program mode. Here's Bronica's spec text on the shutter:

"Bronica No.00 type electronically controlled lens shutter in each lens,shutter speeds;B,1 to 1/500 sec.(on manual without intermediate speeds),8 to 1/500 sec.(on aperture-priority AE mode,1/12-stop increment control) 8 to 1/750 sec.(on programmed AE mode, 1/12-stop increment control.) Electronically timed self-timer with 10 sec.delay time."
 
Last edited:
received my new Rf 645 today , first impressions are "WOW" seems so much smaller than my Mamiya 7 and much easier to hold , ergonomics are great. The build seems very good, Both lenses and the camera are in mint condition arrived all boxed and with all body front and rear caps hoods filters etc etc. now all I need is some time to get out there and start shooting.

cheers

Paulo
 
Nick - I'm still looking at the Robert White package, which is about $1,200 delivered to my doorstep, and includes both the 45mm and 65mm lenses. I'll watch the auction site, but I probably wouldn't go abouve $550 for a used body.

Now, if I can just find someone to buy my post-war coated Zeiss 35/2.8 Biogon . . .

Robert
 
Robert- I bought my RF 645 with 40 and 65 mm kit from Robert White in mid July. They sold it for 532 lbs at that time. They ship the goods worldwide but the shipping cost is quite high, 80lbs. Anyway, RW is an reliable company.

BTW, I want to find a 100 mm lense too 🙂

FY
 
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