Smaller is Bigger

[bwidjaja]

Not really a revelation, but just realized when looking at the medium format cameras I have (big to small in physical size and weight):
Huge: Mamiya 645 (6x4.5)
Large: Rolleiflex (6x6)
Medium: Zeiss Super Ikonta C (6x9)

The smaller the camera, the bigger the negative size!!! How interesting is that.

 

[jeanba3000]

According to what I have on my shelves that use 120 rollfilm :

Huge: complete Arca Swiss set + 12 lenses from 35 to 600 mm (6x9)
Very big: Plaubel Peco Jr (6x6/6x9)
Big: Rollei 6008 + 3 lenses (6x6)
Large: Rolleiflex Tele (6x6)
Medium : Rolleiflex Wide (6x6)
Medium : Rolleiflex 2.8 F (6x6)
Smallest: '50s Mamiya 6 Automatic (6x6)

Well ok I like square format a lot, and Rollei cameras too…

Should I mention my gear from 35mm half frame to 8x10" ? 😀

 

[Steve M.]

Folders, as you pointed out bwidjaja, rule. Try shooting a Nikon F4s sometime, a medium format camera that masquerades as a 35mm camera.

I recently sold a Voigtlander Inos 6x9 folder w/ a Heliar lens that was just tiny. People will telly you that folders have film plane issues, aren't sharp in the corners, can't hold the film taut, have wobbly front standards. Well, maybe THEIR folders are like this, but my folders shoot sharp from corner to corner. The Inos didn't even have a pressure plate in it! The film just ran on the inside of the back. They made it so well that the shots were perfect, nearly eighty years later.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Once I had a 6x9 Cambo monorail. You could moor ships to it.

Another time, in the early 90s I think, I was nearly thrown off the Canon stand after the following exchange:

Canon-wallah (at press conference for monster new 35mm SLR): "What do you think of it?"

Me: "Actually, I prefer smaller, lighter cameras. That's why I use medium format."

Steve: "sharp from corner to corner" -- for a given value of 'sharp'. There's a Zeiss paper from about 2001 on film flatness that quantifies film location and flatness. Even the flattest are not very flat, and it varies with camera design, when the film was last wound on, and more.A good folder, such as a baby Linhof, can easily rival a rigid body (which is not to say that the film is held especially flat in rigid bodies either). Not all folders are as solid as baby Linhofs.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Steve M.]

Took me 6 months to get back here, but I made it 🙂

Roger, when I say sharp corner to corner, I mean just that. Linhof, Smirhof. Over engineered, over priced, over weight cameras. Good for bulking up your arm muscles I guess.

Just buy a 70 or 80 year old Voigtlander 6x9 folder w/ a Heliar lens, stop it down, and no worries. Here's one from the Olde Folder. Notice the signs on the far left and far right. Sharp, corner to corner. Always, every time. My scanner is an ancient flatbed that can't produce pro results, so this is a bad scan, but on the negative you can take a loupe and count the leaves on the tree in the top left of the shot.

 

[Steve M.]

All you need is one of these little things.

 

[oftheherd]

I'm not familiar with the baby Linhof, but I have several other MF folders. When they work well, they tend to work very well. I expecially like Welta and Zeiss, but there are others that many users have reported favorably on.

Mr. Hicks, I am so glad to see you have found a MF folder you can like. 😛

 

[Roger Hicks]

Roger, when I say sharp corner to corner, I mean just that. Linhof, Smirhof. Over engineered, over priced, over weight cameras. Good for bulking up your arm muscles I guess.

Dear Steve,

I'm not sure you can overengineer a camera, but I'm damn' sure you can under-engineer it. Zeiss agrees. Then, they would, wouldn't they?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Argenticien]

All you need is one of these little things.

I've got one, but I'd have to say (in Dept. of Smaller is Bigger), I wouldn't mind if this were carrying a few more grams of prisms and glass up in the RF unit. I find its little split-image RF unbelievably squinty. If you think about it, that's kind of a trade-off that you accept. A big, bright VF/RF like in a Mamiya 7 or the new Bessa III must add a bit of mass (and even more so volume), although nobody seems to think much about RF mass as compared to lens mass (say, the 750 grams of the 100 mm lens on a Fujica G690).

Brilliantly clean-looking example of the old Bessa RF you've got there Steve, by the way.

--Dave

 

[ljsegil]

Concur with the annoying rangefinder of the original Bessa RF, particularly its split (triple so in mine)nature, such that only a bit of the rangefinder is useful for focus, but somehow, focus it does, and I too find it producing wonderfully sharp images with the 3.5 Heliar (happily rivaling the results I get from the 4.5 Zeiss Tessar on my Super Ikonta C). How can one lose?
Larry

 

[AJShepherd]

I've got an old Franka Rolfix II (6x6 or 6x9 depending on whether you use the masking plate), and folded up it'll fit in my pocket easier than my Olympus Pen E-P1!
it's a lot heavier, mind you, so you need a good belt and strong pockets!