Mounting Enlarging Lenses on EOS Cameras -- Quick Update

Airmail package from Hong Kong came today. It contained an adapter that allows me to convert an M39-type lens (like those typically found on enlargers) to an EOS camera mount. Got mine off of eBay for $10 including shipping. It's a relatively thin brass ring -- does exactly what it the ad said. However, this particular one I bought is thin and a bit tough to get off the camera, not much to grasp on to when I try to twist it to remove -- other than that 'tis straightforward to use.

Here's a word of warning (learned from observation, not by making this mistake): Many of the enlarging lenses that I own have a bit of metal / element that protrudes back behind the screw mount. If placed on the adapter and mounted directly on the camera, this element would protrude back into the body of your camera -- something that typical lenses don't do. The quite real danger here is that the lens could actually protrude back far enough to get in the way of the mirror as it flips up -- the lens would probably be ok, but the mirror and camera would really suffer after the mirror slams against the lens. This is the same warning that Canon gives folks with their EF-S mounts -- there can be mirror collision if one of these EF-S lenses is mounted on full frame EOS cameras. Some of the enlarging lenses I have sit really far back, probably enough to damage all types of cameras, not just full frame ones.

The only solution I readily see is to use these protruding lenses on some sort of extension tube or bellows to get them off the body of the camera and away from the mirror. Didn't check out all my lenses, but I did find one lens (the Taylor Tayon 75mm) that didn't protrude.

I started playing with various combos of lenses and extension tubes, but it's a bit late and dark and I'm not up for doing a whole lot of testing tonight. In general, this line looks promising, and I'm getting good macro effect. The tubes are pretty static for focusing, so I still think some bellows will help fine tune focus.

Will report back with some photos later this week.

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Macro Tilt-Shift experiments

So, I was rolling around the previous post in my head a bit, thinking about how to get a tilt-shift off the body of the camera. Had some extension tubes and a lensbaby lens so decided to go macro that way.

Lots of variables to play around with here. This Peace Lily (yeah, I know, most common houseplant in the US) was shot with the middle-sized Kenko extension tube, the 20mm one, to simulate a short set of bellows. Then added a lensbaby lens to give some of the feel that some tilt-shift bellows would bring to the table. (I still don't know how to use these lensbabies properly - lots of trial and error).

Shot in early morning light, but as a twist I used tungsten white balance to push the lily back to it's more natural whiteness than the gold given by the sun -- could have done that in Lightroom, but in my mind lately I'm trying to pretend I'm using film... Tungsten probably not a really good idea here -- this looks better on black or grey background...

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Cheap Tilt/Shift Lens Possibilities

So, if you follow my Twitter, you know a little bit about my recent windfall of a boatload of darkroom "junk" (according to some spouses) or "treasure" (according to me).

As part of the acquisition, I now have no less than 10 different enlarging lenses. I was goofing around with them, and I'm thinking that I could piece together a pretty nifty tilt-shift setup. I think all I need are some old-style bellows (example, Canon had rails and bellows for their old FD mount), and a couple of Leica-Canon and Canon FD to Canon EF adapters, and I should be good to go. Maybe even throw some extention tubes into the mix as well.

Would be good for some good macro work, but maybe even possible to use in product or food shots.

Couple of inspirations are this shot by jobe0902 or this shot by NEW_KANGSGEM on Flickr. They both mounted a Taylor Tayon 75mm enlarging lens directly on their cameras (with adapter) and snapped both macro and infinity focus shots.

This Taylor Tayon lens is one of the many that I acquired. Kind of cool to have 10 new lenses out of the blue to work with.

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Holga in studio -- rough cut

So, I took a setup like the one below, and put into the studio (actually, I replaced the ST-E2 Canon trigger / Canon flash with a PocketWizard and controlled a strobe in a large softbox -- same idea, different bling).

After a bunch of experimentation both indoors and out, I finally figured out that the particular Holga I have is approximately aperture of f/9, and shutter speed of 1/125.

Based on that info was able to zero in on different light levels in the studio. Best exposure of the lot was the photo taken at manual strobe settings of approx just shy of f/9. I was taking photos at same time with the Canon 1DsIII to confirm and compare the light levels.

Was also trying to test focal lengths at same time. I had a focal length on the Canon of approx 50mm (was trying to compensate for the Holga's 60mm, but really underestimated how big a difference focal lengths were between medium format and 35mm -- much wider angle on the Holga film than I expected).

Anyway, here are the representative photos. First one is Holga 120N, manual strobe set to a bit over f/8, Kodak TriX 320 film, scanned in negative.


Canon 1DsIII, 24-70 lens set to about 50mm, manual strobe set to a bit over f/8, ISO set to 320 (notice the meter in the photo ready 4.5 2, this is the ISO *100* reading of the light).


All in all, this was a pretty cool technical exercise to combine Holga with controlled studio flash, and also good exercise to help calibrate exactly what I'm working with in the Holga. However, after looking at the Holga shot, I've got some thinking to do about exactly how I could work this really wide angle (it's a lot more than I expected) and "Holga-look" in a studio. Any ideas? (I have a few I'm sketching out...)

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Holga Overkill (or, How GM Lost It's Way)

I tried to add as much bling to the Holga as possible.

Bogen Tripod, Markins Q-Ball Ballhead Mount, spare Markins mounting plate, Holga 120N camera, Canon ST-E2 hotshoe trigger, Canon 580EXII flash (not shown). About $1100 worth of gear, only 2.5% of it towards the camera.

I took some photos with this setup. Will need to wait until I finish and develop the roll to see what effect the bling has.

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Welcome, new (and old) readers

Brief note to say hi to the folks that have recently signed up for the email version of the blog and those that hit the site directly or read in an RSS reader.

I've noticed a big jump in subscriptions and readership over the last couple months -- I must be providing *something* of value. Drop me a note if there is anything in particular you want me poke into or write about. Thanks for reading! -- Brad

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Black and White Development Times

I'm no expert, but seems like the The Massive Dev Chart (MDC) is a great resource for figuring out development times for the basic combination of film type, developer type, and development temperature. For example, I shot Ilford HP5+ film, and developed with Kodak D-76 developer. The MDC instantly told me that I should develop my ISO 400 film for 7.5 minutes at 20-degree C. Others on the www suggest using the MDC as a really good starting point, and then adjust based on experience.

Better yet, I downloaded the MDC iPhone app, which has built in look-up of the MDC charts, plus phase timers, adjustments for development temperatures, and C/F conversions all built into the interface. I was able to put in info like 74.4 F room temp and the MDC iPhone app adjusted the 7.5 min dev time to 5 min 21 seconds, and then adjusted all the timers accordingly. Really handy app.

Results? Here is example from the 2nd roll I just developed.



By the way, here's the "Holga-Look" from the same roll -- light leaks, some weird plastic object rolling around, double exposure, softness all over.... I was actually sort of amazed that the above ph0to came from same camera...

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Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Holga

A tremor in the Force. I have successfully developed and processed my first roll of film. It's also the first roll of medium format film I have ever taken, and my first foray into the world of the Holga camera.

Digital is much easier, but this film stuff is sooo much fun: the second guessing of the light and exposure, the crappy controls of the Holga, the smell of photo chemicals, and the waiting, waiting, waiting.... All of these factors make this photo of Lord Vader very special to me.

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HDR in the wild

I've talked a little bit about HDR -- High Dynamic Range -- imaging before. HDR allows one to combine the different levels of light that are beyond the ability of the typical camera to capture in single exposure -- you do so by taking multiple exposures of an image at different exposure levels (e.g., underexposed, correct exposure, overexposed) and then use special software to take these various images and combine into a single image that can show more details at all levels -- from the shadows to the highlights.

In Blue Ridge, I tried some various HDR shots during the weekend. The first photo below is a 7-exposure shot -- completely planned for and taken with the intent of making an HDR image. I shot at -3 EV, -2EV, -1EV, 0EV, +1EV, +2EV, and +3EV. I simply imported the 7 photos into Photomatix and combined and tone mapped them to a single image. Lots of detail in the shadows (you can see in the port and window if you zoom in enough), and the railings in the sunrise are not blown out. Great example of how HDR can help create an image.



The next shot is a haphazard HDR, I was shooting various exposures without considering HDR. In post-processing this week, I found 3 shots of various exposures, roughly -2/3 EV, 0 and +1EV and combined them into single shot. HDR helped me pick up a lot more detail in the trees and shadows.



This next shot is a pseudo-HDR -- made from a single exposure. We were in woods, I had no reflector or flash and Ansley's face turned out to be completely dark in the original shot. I tried to salvage the photo by taking the single shot and "underexposing" and "overexposing" it in Lightroom so I wound up with 3 shots. I then combined those in Photomatix the best I could. I was able to tease out some details in the shadows, but it was at the expense of making this look really artificial and has some of the cartoony HDR look that I absolutely hate. Also, these pseudo HDRs look really over-sharpened to me, not sure why, but probably because the overexposure version really blew out the details.


Sort of obvious, but better HDR shots come from those you seriously plan for, and those that have more exposure range in the base photos. I'm going to try printing some of these HDR shots and see how much more detail on can really see in the prints. Will report on that later...

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Momentum

Amazed at how much photography momentum I have at the moment. I stopped looking at Flickr, photo.net, and trying to blog -- forced myself to shoot a bunch instead. Shooting stuff outside the studio setting and getting outdoors too. The PhotoChallenge.org folks helped me get my butt away from the computer. Their little exercise sort of kick-started my photo metabolism...

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Lake Blue Ridge

A rather strange looking intake tower at the Lake Blue Ridge Dam. Right before sunrise, the last minutes of twilight. The mist saying goodbye...

Here's what it looks like from the sky...



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Walking / Foyer

Couple of opportunistic shots in last 18 hours: Kids and dog on the river trail at sunset last night, and the foyer this AM as I was getting ready for work.

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