this cannot be used for street and certainly not handheld!

[stevew]

I had one and it's a very capable camera, it was very nice for closeups on flowers. On the vibration issue: alot of the vibration is from the shutter, handholding can dampen the vibration better than a light tripod. You can watch the camera jump on a light tripod. Sometimes you can place a hand on top of the prism to weight the camera/tripod down to dampen the thunk.

 

[Doug]

I reckon I was sort of lucky. I bought a beautiful set up with two lenses, a metered prism and non metered prism and a shiny and new looking 6x7 MLU off a RFF member and two days later picked up a body with rangefinder split image screen off CL for $140!

I think you lucked out... and the two transactions meshed nicely, giving you prisms for both bodies. Hope these will work well and give you some pleasing pics!

The eBay deal I mentioned with the above B&W shots meshed well for me, as it added a second body with meter prism and lenses both shorter and longer than any I had at the time.

 

[andredossantos]

I only had one for a short time but I only used it handheld. It's an amazing camera.

 

[charjohncarter]

I'm not sure why ever body says they can't hand hold a Pentax 6x7. After all, it is about the same weight as a Canon Mark III-ds-sex. I do the hand hold all the time.

 

[charjohncarter]

first frame from the new (to me) pentax 6x7 and 55mm.

handheld, neopan 400 souped in d-76, at 250th /f11

lets see some pentax 6x7 magic folks!

Just you wait, some day you will run a roll of Fuji Velvia or Ektachrome thru it. If you are below the age of 58 you will have an............................well you know.

 

[charjohncarter]

It also work wonders on a Tripod, this is with the meter prisim:

And I have made 4 lens cap lenses for my Pentax 6x7, this one is my Brownie Hawkeye Flash reverse lens, both handheld:

and

 

[gavinlg]

Once again all at around 1/30th or possibly lower on portra 800.

 

[andredossantos]

Fdigital: lovely shots, all of them.

 

[Doug]

Indoors and hand-held; P67II, 75/2.8, NPZ800
Hostess of a wine-tasting party snaps guests...

 

[mike.TTL]

If it's common knowledge that you can't use this camera hand-held, then someone forgot to give my 6x7 the memo! It works just fine for my purposes down to 1/60. Though to be safe, I do prefer to keep it at 1/125 or faster.

 

[grainy_shadows]

dj fiesta is a massive fan of the 67, had a pleasure of using one for a while. beautiful lens, and the camera is really easy to use, just like 35mm slr.

 

[grainy_shadows]

refering to the 105/2.4

 

[Jamie123]

The thread title is a bit ridiculous. Why would anyone say that the pentax 67 can't be used handheld? I suspect that many people might say it is "best used" on a tripod. That's not the same as saying it can't be used handheld.

It's obviously a camera that was produced primarily for handheld use as it's pretty much built like a big 35mm SLR.

 

[gavinlg]

 

[ChrisN]

The thread title is a bit ridiculous. Why would anyone say that the pentax 67 can't be used handheld? I suspect that many people might say it is "best used" on a tripod. That's not the same as saying it can't be used handheld.

It's obviously a camera that was produced primarily for handheld use as it's pretty much built like a big 35mm SLR.

Jamie - refer to post #20.


Great shots all - thanks for showing us. Now pardon me while I hug my Hasselblad and repeat 10 times "I do not need a Pentax 67".

 

[Jamie123]

Jamie - refer to post #20.

I know the title is meant to be ironic but the irony implies that there are actually people saying that the Pentax is not handholdable, which I don't think is the case. If there's one 6x6 or 6x7 SLR that's meant to be handheld it's the Pentax 67(II). Other cameras like, e.g. the Mamiya RB/RZ or even the Hasselblads are certainly shaped less ergonomically.

If you want to post your Pentax 67 shots, just do it. Don't invent a stereotype and then triumphantly post ''counterexamples''.

end of rant.

 

[ChrisN]

There are people who think the Pentax 67 is not suitable for hand-held use, especially with longer lenses. Michael Reichmann had a bit to say about this:

"In Hand — Not

The Pentax 67 has been a popular upgrade for 35mm photographers for decades because it looks like it should handle just like a 35mm SLR — but a big one. It's big and it's heavy but it handles well. Potential purchasers should note that though it looks like it should be mostly hand-holdable like a 35mm camera, it isn't. Yes, you can hand-hold it, but only with normal to short lenses, and only in very good light or with fast film.

Let me put this in perspective. With a 100mm lens (roughly normal focal length for 6X7cm), most user can hand-hold at 1/250 sec — as much as two stops slower than would be possible with a 35mm SLR. This is for critical work, not snapshots, but then this isn't a snapshot camera. Basically, this, like almost all medium format cameras, is a tripod camera — a heavy tripod in this case.

Here's another example. With a 300mm lens and 1.4X extender, a shutter speed of 1/10th of a second, and with the camera mounted on a light weight Gitzo 1228 carbon fiber hiking tripod with an Acratech ball head, there is so much shutter-induced vibration that the shot is blurred. This is shown in the frame below and its accompanying enlargement. Please note that this photograph was taken with the mirror locked up and with the use of a cable release! The sharpness destroying vibration is from the large focal plane shutter. A light weight tripod just doesn't cut it with this camera.

By way of explanation, what's happened here is that the shutter has bounced, as all shutters do. So, there have effectively been two exposures. One during the opening of the shutter and the second during the closing, at which point the camera had essentially rung like a bell thus causing the second image."

It's worth reading the full article here and looking at the sample photo he has shown to illustrate his point.

As he says, fine with normal to short lenses, and of course YMMV.

 

[emraphoto]

The thread title is a bit ridiculous. Why would anyone say that the pentax 67 can't be used handheld? I suspect that many people might say it is "best used" on a tripod. That's not the same as saying it can't be used handheld.

It's obviously a camera that was produced primarily for handheld use as it's pretty much built like a big 35mm SLR.

head over to pnut and you'll get the sarcas... sorry, jist of the title.

 

[emraphoto]

"I know the title is meant to be ironic but the irony implies that there are actually people saying that the Pentax is not handholdable, which I don't think is the case. If there's one 6x6 or 6x7 SLR that's meant to be handheld it's the Pentax 67(II). Other cameras like, e.g. the Mamiya RB/RZ or even the Hasselblads are certainly shaped less ergonomically.

If you want to post your Pentax 67 shots, just do it. Don't invent a stereotype and then triumphantly post ''counterexamples''.

end of rant."


http://www.pandemonia.com/pandemonia/reviews/pentax-67.html

http://www.pentaconsix.com/p6px67.htm

http://forum.shutterbug.com/forum/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=1470&an=0&page=0

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php/www.pbase.com/t10440.html

http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/00SSdK

http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/00Rj5N

i could go on and on and on.

feel free to send over one of your copies of the "rules" so i can brush up

 

[Jamie123]

"I know the title is meant to be ironic but the irony implies that there are actually people saying that the Pentax is not handholdable, which I don't think is the case. If there's one 6x6 or 6x7 SLR that's meant to be handheld it's the Pentax 67(II). Other cameras like, e.g. the Mamiya RB/RZ or even the Hasselblads are certainly shaped less ergonomically.

If you want to post your Pentax 67 shots, just do it. Don't invent a stereotype and then triumphantly post ''counterexamples''.

end of rant."


http://www.pandemonia.com/pandemonia/reviews/pentax-67.html

http://www.pentaconsix.com/p6px67.htm

http://forum.shutterbug.com/forum/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=1470&an=0&page=0

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php/www.pbase.com/t10440.html

http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/00SSdK

http://photo.net/medium-format-photography-forum/00Rj5N

i could go on and on and on.

feel free to send over one of your copies of the "rules" so i can brush up

I'm fully aware of the discussions concerning the Pentax 67's mirrorslap, all of which are saying that it has a negative impact on sharpness. None of the photos posted in this thread have proved the opposite.

Anyways, don't get me wrong, I like the pictures posted. I just don't think they need to prove anything.