which modern 4x5 field camera to buy

[Wayne_6692]

If moisture is a concern I would think the Walker Titan would be hard to beat. It's made of stainless steel and ABS, the bellows are a synthetic material also. It weighs 6 pounds - but you could beat to death any metal or wood camera with it, and I doubt that you'd even scratch it.

[Carlos Co]

Yes Bob, metal is good. But I happen to be and still convinced by Ron Wisner's sales pitch which may indeed sound like nonsense to many people.

http://www.wisner.com/Page3.html

WHY WOODEN CAMERAS? Because wood is beautiful, durable, light, strong, and withstands the abuses, the grit and grime of the outdoor environment as no metal could. Like the old wooden sail boat which has been in our family for sixty-five years, our cameras are made of many of the same materials and varnished with the same varnish which we use on our boat. The boat has sat in the sun and rain and salt spray summer after summer for all these years and performs as well today as it did in 1935 when it was built. What metal camera could stand the elements like that?

[Bob Salomon]

What an artful imagination!

" WHY WOODEN CAMERAS? Because wood is beautiful, durable, light, strong, and withstands the abuses, the grit and grime of the outdoor environment as no metal could. Like the old wooden sail boat which has been in our family for sixty-five years, our cameras are made of many of the same materials and varnished with the same varnish which we use on our boat. The boat has sat in the sun and rain and salt spray summer after summer for all these years and performs as well today as it did in 1935 when it was built. What metal camera could stand the elements like that? "

Ever see a wood boat that without refinishing regularly and constant upkeep would do what the above claims?

The answer is prpably much easier to determin then quian prose.

Go look at a Technika III or IV, up to 54 years old. Used by outdoor photographers and compare the finish after 40 or 50+ years of professional use oputdoors to a 40 or 50 year old top end wood camera- no way the wood stands up better.

But Ron does have pretty prose. Fiction is alsways easier to writ