I use anything that will magnify. Old lens elements, linen tester, anything. I don't see that it makes any difference what it is.
I use anything that will magnify. Old lens elements, linen tester, anything. I don't see that it makes any difference what it is.
I use a 50mm reversed enlarger lens. I cut out the base of a kodak 35mm canister and taped it to the lens so I have a shaded tunnel between the GG and the lens. Works great even without the darkcloth in most situations. I much prefer this to the couple of commercially available loupes I have used.
-Anupam
The 4x Peak loupe works fine for me also.
Has anyone used the Ebony loupe? It looks kind of nice and I was thinking of getting one.
I don't think it makes any difference what the provenance of a loupe is. If it can be focused on the groundglass image, it will work.
I just got one, for that reason. I haven't had a chance to use it yet, but I probably will this weekend. I got a little tired of all the smudges my Toyo loupe was leaving on my groundglass, so I decided to try out the Ebony finally. I'll let you know how it goes afterwards.Originally Posted by gregstidham
Rodenstock 4x slide loupe works reasonably well. Extremely sharp, yet unwieldy and fogged up easily on colder days (stubby), so i never felt confident it would hold up well long term.
Picked up both a Toyo and a Silvestri tilting loupe. Bought the Toyo used (for a song), and for my method of field work i find it's rugged mix of simplicity and precision perfect.
David Crossley/Crossley Photography....
I had a chance to try out the Ebony loupe this weekend... and I was pleasantly surprised. It took some getting used to, since you have to focus it, but by resting my hand on the frame of the camera near the part of the GG I was looking at, I was able to keep it stable. Its field of view is big, so it's easy to see into the corners, and it's also easy to change your angle of view for maximum brightness.
Though I've only tried it for one shot so far, and I'm not quite ready to retire the Toyo loupe yet, so far I'm liking the Ebony.
just bought a 4x peak loupe. tested only on a lightbox and I liked it. let's see how it goes on the GG.
the things I liked: square skirt, additional black skirt, mounting poles for a lanyard
didn't like: plastic skirt may scratch GG, I'll see what I can do about it.
Hi Padu,
The plastic skirt of the focusing loupe should not be able to sctatch a glass GG. If the GG is plastic or it is placed on a Fresnel lens, that is another question.
Rich
In the massive rush to off-load vintage plate camera gear, years ago I found a 4 inch Dallmeyer anastigmat enlarging lens. I've been using the lens as a lupe - works very well off the focussing screen hovering by about 2 centimetres. It cost around £0.50 and offers as flat a magnifying field as a modern day Schneider lupe costing 1600% more.
The beauty of this £0.50 lupe is that the rear element of the Dallmeyer (around 5 coins thick) unscrews and can be used to give higher magnification - around x5 when travelling this is the easiest lupe to carry for size and weight. One advantage of using a skirtless lupe is that the groundglass screen is not scratched by the plastic skirt.
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