Groundglass I.D.

[jhogan]

Could someone help me I.D. this (http://www.johnbrintonhogan.com/groundglass.html) groundglass set, please? (It came with a camera I bought some time ago.)

It is for 4x5, and consists of a plastic fresnel which was mounted under the glass piece. The fresnel side was facing the lens and the setup seems to work well.

It appears to be a Beattie Intensescreen- Am I correct on this?

Thanks- J

[John_4185]

Upload the image to your server and change the URL to be correct so we can see it.

[jhogan]

oops- try it now- Thanks- J

[Juergen Sattler]

I don't think it is a Beattie - I used to have one on my Technika and it said Beattie on the glass - yours does not. Having said that, I have no idea what you have there - could it be a Boss screen - I have never seen one!

[Bill_1856]

It's NOT a Linhof Super Screen; on it the Fresnel is plain and the grid is on the glass overlay.

[Brian C. Miller]

That looks like the Brightscreen (http://www.brightscreen.com/enter.html) I have in my camera.

[ronald moravec]

My Zone IV has the plastic frenel and a plain glass over it. However there are no markings on the glass.

However I am considering moving the marked glass from anther camera. You could always have a mix of two differnt glasses. Or maybe some one marked a plain glass.

[jhogan]

Thanks for the answers so far.

Further research shows it is definitely NOT a "Brightscreen" brand- according to their website:

>>>To date, we are the only known maker of enhanced camera focusing screens who identifies products with a name or identification marking.<<<

There are no visible markings on either the gridded plastic Fresnel nor the clear glass overlay piece.

Any other ideas?

Thanks- J

[Brian C. Miller]

Mine is a 6-L (http://www.brightscreen.com/view.html) and it doens't have any manufacturer's ID on it at all. Maybe you have an early model of the 6-L.

Why don't you write an email to Brightscreen and ask them? If they didn't make it, they might know who did.

[James E Galvin]

It is not a Boss screen, on the Boss two pieces of glass of slightly different size are laminated together with parrafin between.

[Bob Salomon]

Wista fresnels screens also have their name embossed on the fresnel so Beattie is now not the only supplier doing so.

However Beattie screens were originated by a man named Tony Fox. He sold them from TN as Beattie Screens until he sold his company to Fresnel Optics. He called his screens "Beattie Screens" because he made the Beattie long roll school cameras which had probably the darkest ground glass on the planet. So he developed a brighter scrren for them that were about 2 1/2 stops brighter. That's where their slogan came from.

It is very possible and very probable that the Beattie Screens sold by Tony did not have the Beattie name on all of them.

There is a second company in TN who also makes brighter screens named Brightscreen. You could also have one of his.

Of course it might be a bit easier to ID your screen if we knew what camera it came out of.

[jhogan]

Thanks for the all the info so far, everyone. I underestimated how difficult the search for a definitive answer would become.

If it makes a difference, this screen came out of a second-hand TK45s which I purchased from the original owner (summer '04). Unfortunately, upon purchase, he had the dealer immediately replace the factory glass (this was in '99) with the one pictured above, but he couldn't remember the brand his dealer installed.

After using the camera for 6 months the way it was, I decided to go back to the stock Linhof GG with Linhof Fresnel- I've found this combo works best for me.

With Bob's historical overview in mind, and carefully scrutinizing the fresnel gridlines here (http://www.intenscreen.com/products_large-format.htm), one could make the argument that it's a Beattie- The system components are the same, and the gridmarks are almost identical as those currently offered. The only significant difference between the two systems is the presence of clipped corners on the current model. Perhaps it's one of the "Tony Fox" versions...

A call to the nice folks at Brightscreen didn't help to clear things up- They said they DON'T put their name on 4x5 sets... Some have clipped corners, some don't, etc... so it may be theirs- or not.

So- I'm resigned to never knowing for sure.

Thanks again to everyone. -J