[LargeFormat] Geo's lenses

[Amos Peek]

Geo
I dont want to buck what every body else is recommending, but, one of the 
main reasons for moving up to 5X4 is movement, and quality. in the 30's to 
the 50's newspapers insisted or rather platemakers did that they has 5X4 and 
5X7 plates from which the could work while still wet. This produced an erea 
of press camera's, some even home made, that used, wide angle lanses, that 
only just covered the film. In America it was the 127 in europe the 135. One 
of the favourite methods of focus was to use a piece of string cut to the 
focus length, one end tied to the camera attached to the other end was a 
paper clip that was attached to the vicitims jacket. The photographer backed 
away and fired the shutter just as the string was pulled off. to summerise, 
taking pictures of people with LF cameras is a pig when done under pressure.

As you are finding  there is a massive exodus by commercial studios out of 
wet chemistry photography, resulting in a lot of kit comming up for sale, 
buy yourself a modern lens say a nikon or schneider 150 with loads of 
movement and brighten up your focusing screen by either buying a Beatalight 
screen or making your own buy getting one of those magnifying sheet optians 
and Libraries sell to short sighted people like me, punch out a small circle 
in the middle and lay on top of your ground glass. Save buying the old 
lenses till you fully know what you are doing or you will be like a man with 
two watches never confident of the time.
Regards
Amos
Anybody still using glass plates



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