[LargeFormat] Newbie alert - ? on using a strobe

[Les Newcomer]

A couple of things to try....

double check the asa setting on the flash meter.

set the shutter to X.

And while these shutters will sync at any speed, give it the benefit of 
the doubt and set it to 1/50 1/60.

Set the aperture wide open, Remove the ground glass back.  ( Yes remove 
the back. Several people  on this list can certify that I'm certifiable 
including Uncle Dick, just trust me).

Unhook the the sync cord.

with one hand hold on the cable release,   use the other  to adjust the 
dark cloth  over your head and try to focus your eyes on the rear of 
the lens.  Trip the shutter.

Depending on what the ambient light is, you'll see something faint or 
nothing at all.

Now hook up the flash cord and do it again, just be sure the dark cloth 
is keeping out as much light as possible.

You should see something obviously different,  if it isn't then there's 
  synchronizing problem.

If it is  then reassemble the back shoot some film at the metered 
aperture, and one wide open.

And another with the metered aperture, but set the shutter to bulb, 
turn off ambient lights and fire the flash and shutter manually  (open, 
FLASH, close)  Mark this one as it will determine whether the meter is 
off.

See what develops.


On Thursday, May 22, 2003, at 01:06  PM, Delano Mireles wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> a friend of mine has lent me his old B&J 4x5 w/Rodenstock 135mm.  I 
> attempted to take some shots for the first time last night and was not 
> successful at all.  Now, the lens does have something that trips the 
> strobe.  So, using my L-358 I took a corded flash reading of 1/125 @ 
> f22 with my Bee.  I then set the lens according to this reading then 
> proceeded to take a couple of shots.
>
> After developing the negs I turned on the lights to be disappointed by 
> seeing a blank neg.  It looked like there was nothing on the negs at 
> all!  After this happened on 4 frames I went back and took a regular 
> incident reading and shot two more frames 8 sec. @ f22 and had > success.
>
> I'm just assuming that the first run of negs were severely 
> underexposed and that's the reason why the negs came out clear.
>
> There is something I am obviously missing here and I come to you for 
> any ideas or suggestions as to what could be the case here.  The lens 
> does have a "tab" that can either be set to "M" or "X".  I have no 
> idea what these are and how they factor in.  I did try both setting 
> and to no avail...
>
> Thanks for any insight you could offer this newbie!
>
> Delano
>
>
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