LF camera around the lens (Scriptar)

[pointlessphotographer]

Got my hands on an old overhead projector with Scriptar f=340mm lens, that I disassembled. I was thinking about to build up camera (film/wet plate) around the lens... Should I stop dreaming right now or?
If I should go on could anybody point out what I should do next (books, web sites, videos..???)

About the lens, is there anywhere specs for that.. what film size it covers eg. If i build up camera is it going to be 4x5 5x7 8x10...

I'm pretty much newbie LF things ( I have been using only Graflex little bit)

Best Regards and thanks in advance
Tero

[LF_rookie_to_be]

The lens is most likely a triplet and sure to cover 8x10", as overhead projectors can hold up to 11x11" materials.

[Bob Salomon]

The lens is most likely a triplet and sure to cover 8x10", as overhead projectors can hold up to 11x11" materials.

At infinity?

[LF_rookie_to_be]

Correction, it may easily cover 8x10", but not 100% sure.

[Dan Fromm]

Pointless, you are experiencing a bad case of the corrupting influence of found money.

If you want to shoot LF, fine, wonderful. Go shopping for an inexpensive 4x5 camera with lens and a back that takes standard film holders. You'll be out and shooting more quickly if you do this than if you try to engineer a camera around a found lens with no diaphragm and no shutter. More inexpensively, too, unless you make a single shot camera out of cardboard, and you'll get better results.

You asked about books. Posters on this site recommend, among others, Steve Simmons' Understanding the View Camera and Leslie Stroebel's View Camera Technique. The French LF forum recommends Jim Stone's A user's guide to the view camera. Look for them used on, in alphabetical order, abebooks.com, alibris.com, amazon.com, ...

[lfpf]

Got my hands on an old overhead projector with Scriptar f=340mm lens, that I disassembled. I was thinking about to build up camera (film/wet plate) around the lens... Should I stop dreaming right now or?
If I should go on could anybody point out what I should do next (books, web sites, videos..???)

About the lens, is there anywhere specs for that.. what film size it covers eg. If i build up camera is it going to be 4x5 5x7 8x10...

I'm pretty much newbie LF things ( I have been using only Graflex little bit)

Best Regards and thanks in advance
Tero

Tero,

In the DIY area, experimentation works very well. What do you need to answer the lens question: A window, hold or brace lens at window, close the drapes or shades, move white cardboard back-and-forth to focus image, assess image circle. Then find a film holder, maybe a camera back and take a picture as did Nicéphore Niépce for his View from the Window at Le Gras. Result, you know what the lens will do as you begin a work-in-progress.

Yes, many loose ends, unresolved mysteries and unknowns. But the lens and room are available and as you answer a lens question, a reasonable track will present itself. As an aside or distraction, the image on white cardboard can be penciled-in to make a drawing, the original intent and use for a "camera obscura."

Or buy all that you and others think you need and study it to death. All will get you there. Is the sun up?

Steve

[lfpf]

Tero,

In the DIY area, experimentation works very well. What do you need to answer the lens question: A window, hold or brace lens at window, close the drapes or shades, move white cardboard back-and-forth to focus image, assess image circle. Then find a film holder, maybe a camera back and take a picture as did Nicéphore Niépce for his View from the Window at Le Gras. Result, you know what the lens will do as you begin a work-in-progress.

Yes, many loose ends, unresolved mysteries and unknowns. But the lens and room are available and as you answer a lens question, a reasonable track will present itself. As an aside or distraction, the image on white cardboard can be penciled-in to make a drawing, the original intent and use for a "camera obscura."

Or buy all that you and others think you need and study it to death. All will get you there. Is the sun up?

Steve

Tero,

Plenty good ideas here:
http://www.largeformatphotography.in...me-made-camera

Lens (you have),
lens board (many options),
dark box (easy could be: http://www.sonotube.com/products/son...sizechart.aspx),
film or plate holder (perhaps salvaged, perhaps removable)

Just a thought, not knowing the status of your DIY interest.

Infinity was mentioned (sonotube about 340mm) Close-up/Macro work would need a longer sonotube (for example: 2xFL for 1:1 or 680mm).

Shutter, maybe maybe not, 2.0 ND filter, f/32, 10 seconds, on 100 speed film works well (with +1 stop for reciprocity). Advantage: cheap and easy.

Sounds like fun.

Steve

[Fr. Mark]

I think the answer to the OP is "it depends." If you have the skills and materials and tools, certainly an 8x10 camera of some sort can be built around a projector lens.

I took a cooke triplet lens from an opaque projector from the 1950's and built a telescoping box and have made some negatives I like from it. Actually, initially, I used non-destructive modification of the opaque projector to take the first three films. It suffered from some serious problems: would not focus to infinity (couldn't get lens and film close enough) nor do tight head shots (requires a 3 foot lens to film distance). I even used film and printing paper that expired in the 1950's that someone gave me.

The telescoping box camera in question is big, heavy (?30+ pounds?), awkward, hard to use and it turns out that one of my 2 film holders doesn't have the distance to the film plane that I thought!

Other than the lens, I bought nothing for this camera, it was all parts I had previously scrounged/found cast off for the trash and brought home for other purposes. I did make waterhouse stops for this lens out of cardboard, poster paints and an abundance of elmer's glue.

You don't need a film holder if you are willing to only take one picture w/o needing a changing bag or dark room (my initial foray into film developing as a 9 y.o. used paper negs in a cigar box pinhole camera that required a trip to the dark room to reload).

Depending on how picky you, are a lens cap can be a shutter as previously mentioned, LF often operates at small f stops to increase depth of field, you could also use a "V" of two opaque cards and flick it past the lens opening (known on this forum as a "Galli" shutter after its popularizer) or there are large shutters that are air actuated, and again, if you wanted I can almost imagine how to do something from rubber bands and card stock could be made into a shutter like what is found on the early Kodak box cameras. There are also shutters that involve rolling sheets of material like an opaque roller blind with a hole in it that, depending on changing spring tension, can have different times the shutter is open. there's a recent thread on a guillotine shutter too, but I have a hard time seeing how that'd work reliably unless the drop were absolutely vertical and one of the points of a LF camera is movements i.e. tilted lens, so maybe the guillotine shutter could be spring loaded and the spring tension varied somehow.

Admittedly, I'm working up plans to make a much better camera that will include movements, no light leaks, weigh ?1/10th? what the first one did, but I will have to buy some materials to make it.

And, I too, have a 4x5 press camera that was given to me and its old, un coated lens, is scary sharp by comparison to the projector lens even with a small f stop. But, I want to play with making my own emulsions (wet and dry plate) for UV sensitive contact printing and those "films" are a LOT slower than ASA 100, so an f 3.6 18" lens is a really attractive thing even if I never want to go hiking or kayaking with it. My lens weighs between 5 and 10 pounds and its barrel is 5 inches in diameter by 6 or 8" long.

I suspect I'm headed to building a better 8x10 for around the house and out of the car or camel caravans (in other words, I don't carry it far) and eventually getting better lenses for it. And, maybe more lenses for the 4x5 and making enlarged negs (analog or digital) or building a 5x7 for hiking with since for most things 4x5 is too small for contact prints. Actually, I suspect my favorite format may turn out to be 6.5x8.5 as it will fit well in an 8x10 frame and has pleasing proportions. I, personally, don't see having a camera or film holders for that, but rather just cropping down from 8x10 (or enlarging up to it...).

Some of us like to tinker and build stuff and find a lot of satisfaction it in that.

Others just want to take pictures and straight print or others the big deal is prints with lots of burning and dodging and contrast adjustments etc, or of a certain method/printing process or some combination. Some people everything has to be analog, others don't mind combining digital capture with analog printing or the other way around. I'm a clergyman and can be "dogmatic" about some things, but for photography, do what you enjoy and can afford.

I think the idea of playing with a lens and seeing what you can do is great. You might find you really like 8x10 negatives, or you may find you don't. Sure, in music and art it is great to have the best equipment and materials, but sometimes it is wise to explore with less expensive stuff to see if the idea is something you like before investing more in the process.

Some other ways to (possibly) save money if that's the goal: take pictures with printing paper as "film" and contact print them. Use Ortho-litho film or Xray film or house brand film (arista-edu comes to mind, there are others). Film and paper can be developed with Vit. C (no coffee needed---see also caffenol) and sodium carbonate (washing soda) both found in grocery stores. For tray development, glass baking dishes are sometimes available in thrift stores (or the kitchen---I'd be cautious about using them for food if you use toxic developers) or restaurant stores have plastic and glass trays in many sizes, some quite large for you ULF guys, and water can serve as a stop bath leaving you with finding some source of fixer.