The Beast is back, part 2 -- W I D E

[Gordon Coale]

I have three bodies for my Mamiya Press kit. A chrome Universal, a black Universal, and a Super 23. The Super 23 had a bad rangefinder so I flat topped it. It makes a great platform for the wide angles. I picked up a 50mm/f6.3 (21mm eq with a 6x9 back)) at a reasonable price with a non-working shutter. It came back from the shop today. It's a biogon design. I'm pretty excited to see what it will do. The 50 also fits on the Universals and is rangefinder coupled with them. Landscapes here I come!

 

[ChrisN]

Gordon - that's totally outrageous!

I love it!

 

[Al Kaplan]

Now you need a fish-eye lens equipped 120 camera! Make those big circular images on 6x6cm frames!

Way back in the sixties Pentax introduced a full frame fish-eye. Nikon's fish-eye made a circular image. Back then you could still easily find used "baby" Speed Graphics at many camera stores and they had a focal plane shutter.

A former Miami Herald photographer, Murray Spitzer, had an idea. He bought one and took it to his repair guy. The camera body was leather covered mahogany so it was easy to make major "modifications" like sawing off the body just in front of the shutter mechanism and replacing the drop-bed with a flat piece of thin plywood, mount a Pentax thread flange, and shim the the thing to get correct flange to film distance. The Takumar fish-eye lens could make a circular image about 50mm in diameter, double what you could get with a Nikkor fish-eye on 35mm film.

You can still find "Baby" Speed Graphics and they have no great collector value. Full frame fish-eye lenses today are faster and sharper than what you could buy nearly half a century ago. The films are faster and sharper too.

 

[Gordon Coale]

Al -- Funny you should mention that. I just happen to have a Pentax Super-Multi-Coated Fish-Eye-Takumar 17mm/f4 and an Agfa Isolette II with a trashed bellows. See what this guy did with that lens a similar Franka 6x6 folder: Fisheye66 Camera Project: 180 Degree Circular Fisheye on 120 Film. A future camera project.

 

[zuikologist]

What a great outfit. let's see some output from this thing soon, and thank you for keeping the old RFF frankencamera spirit alive!

 

[kuzano]

I finally stepped up for the 50mm Mamiya Sekor

I finally stepped up for the 50mm Mamiya Sekor

Four of the 50mm lenses came on eBay last month and sold for $457 to over $800. I was the winning bid on the 457$ auction. The lens is near mint. both caps, viewfinder and hood.

I was shocked to see all three remaining lenses go up increasingly to the over 800$ amount. There are two on currently.

I have been using the Fuji G690 for some time and have had no complaints. However, I always felt that if I could rationalize the Mamiya Press 50mm lens for 6X12, I would flat-top another Universal and shoot really wide 6X9, and build a 6X12 back, as it's possible to hog out the Universal body to 6X12.

So, here we go again. Owned a bunch of Mamiya Universal stuff before the Fuji rangefinders. The lenses I want to use are the 50, 75 (which will also cover 6X12 and close to 4X5), and the 100. I've used the 75 on a 4X5 and without movements, do get a little vignetting. The 50 should almost do the same.

Good luck on the Polaroid experiment.