Arca focus shift problem...

Over the last week or so I've been photography a damaged cast iron statue of a hindu god(ess) - much of it in close detail.

Having done some in 8x10, I started yesterday with the arca swiss, doing more in 4x5.

I set up, focussed in nice and close, head under the darkcloth, loupe to the GG and got nice sharp focus on on of the eyes. Then stuck the quick-disc in front of the stature to work out the bellows extension factor - went back under to measure the disc diameter and found the focus had shifted. Reset it, came out again to check the light and set the exposure - back under for a quick check and darn... focus has shifted again. Re-set it, took the photograph, double checked the focus and it was okay - phew.

Moved the statue a bit, re-adjusted the camera. composed, focussed, check the quick-disc, re-chack the focus - damn - it's shifted again. Re-set focus, check the light - shifted again - just couldn't figure out what was happening.

After re-focussing once more, came out again to set the shutter and aperture and as I do so, see a little hand moving under the dark-cloth drapped camera.

The tripod was pretty low and my 17 month old's head was just about at tripod head height. He had been stood almost under the camera (whichI knew), but had been faithfully watching what my hands were doing - so each time I came out from under the darkcloth, his little hand would go up to the arca focus knob and twist it back and forth just like daddy was doing.......

A little Tim Atherton in training. :-)

Your child is following me!

Tim,

That is a great story.

Thanks

Tim -

don't pull any dark slides in the presence of this little fellow.

And for pity's sake, buy the kid a loupe, and hold him up near the ground glass.

It's darn near impossible to focus correctly from underneath the camera. If you let him learn bad habits like that, he'll just have to waste time unlearning them later.

Paul,

the four year old already has a number of 8x10's of the garden to his credit....

in fact, when he was somewhat younger and we were in Chapters I was very proud of him when he saw the front of Esquire with Heidi Klum (I think) draped around a Deardorff on the cover and said "look, daddy's camera" - and I had indeed recently got rid of my Deardorff which he had peered into the gg.

Mind you, my wife then added in a stage whisper loud enough for the other customers to hear - "yeah... daddy wishes...!"

The American Physical Society used to sell a T-shirt with the caption: "Toddlers: the shock troops of entropy".

My daughter (4.5 years) somehow got into our bedroom when I had all my LF kit spread across the bed. "Oh I love these!" she exclaimed and pounced on my recently purchased 150 mm Sironar-N. I pathetically confess that the words going through my mind as she ripped off the wrapping, tossed the lens onto the bed and sat down to pop bubbles were "You too?".

They are great! I have four and two year old ones, and guess what: they both prefer Arca to 35 mm stuff, especially if there is some electronic connected to it. Hmmm tell me something. And I even succeded in teaching them, that it's a bad idea to touch glass with their fingers.

Marko