Focusing / metering bellows

[pierods]

What exactly is this thing? Where do I attach it? How do I use it?

Will I not need any longer a cam, a loupe, and a separate meter?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...g_Bellows.html

[John Hennessy]

That is a gadget to replace the dark cloth. It has two loupes, one 2x permanently attached and another 2x which screws into it for focusing.

The link describes one for a small Linhof and there is another one for 4x5 Linhofs.

It just snaps on the back with a spring-loaded spike and can be swung out of the way. I don't any meter or cam involvement.

It is useful if you don't want to use a dark cloth. But that makes it tricky if the sun is behind or beside you since there's no dark cloth to block the sun.

It is also very over priced and very very cheaply made. Its lining is a crappy foam which immediately begins to self destruct leaving bits of black foam all over both sides of the ground glass and ripping up along its frame blocking your view of the GG.

Nonetheless, I still use one sometimes.

[Capocheny]

What exactly is this thing? Where do I attach it? How do I use it?

Will I not need any longer a cam, a loupe, and a separate meter?

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...g_Bellows.html

It goes at the back of the camera against your ground glass. Essentially, it's like a binocular hood that many other manufacturers have, such as Sinar, Arca Swiss, Ebony, etc. In other words, it replaces your dark cloth for viewing the ground glass.

At one time (I don't know if they're still made or not) Gossen had an attachment device that allowed you to connect their meters to this and, voila, press the meter, read the settings, and away you go.

IIRC, the older versions were made from leather.

Perhaps, someone else will chime in here with the full story?

Cheers

[Peter K]

After twenty years or so rubber foam decays, also with my focusing / metering bellows. Now the problem is solved with other materials.

The groundglass should be equiped with a fresnel lens also. As mentioned before, together with an exposure meter the measuring bellows can be used to measure TTL.

Peter K

[pierods]

Thank everybody very much for the info.

I am not really interested about the focusing part, i was thinking about a cam for that, but the TTL part is really interesting.

Anybody knows of an equivalent/alternative solution for that? Especially something that would not interfere with the film back.

The idea would be, with the film back in place, meter, focus on cam, shoot. Switch film back, meter, focus on cam, shoot and so forth, so not to disturb the composition.

piero

[Peter K]

There was a sliding back aviable for Linhof 4x5 cameras, so one could switch from one back to a second one. With the first back you can focus and in the second a TTL exposure meter like the Gossen "Profiselect TTL" is mounted.

But with a handhold exposure meter you can work faster as with every TTL meter exept at macro work or so.

Peter K

[pierods]

There was a sliding back aviable for Linhof 4x5 cameras, so one could switch from one back to a second one. With the first back you can focus and in the second a TTL exposure meter like the Gossen "Profiselect TTL" is mounted.

But with a handhold exposure meter you can work faster as with every TTL meter exept at macro work or so.

Peter K

Thanks for your answer.

But don't you work faster by not having to calculate compensation for bellows extension?

[Peter K]

As I said, at macro work and very long bellows extensions. Specially when the distance between subject and lens is too short to handle an exposure meter.

[Brian Ellis]

Thanks for your answer.

But don't you work faster by not having to calculate compensation for bellows extension?

Who makes calculations for bellows extension except with an extreme close-up? Just use a factor of 10 - if the subject isn't closer than 10 times the focal length of the lens ignore bellows compensation (some people use 8). Since you know the focal length of your lenses, convert them to feet and round off. Do the math once, if you have trouble with math tape the calculation to the lens or something else. For example, a 200mm lens is about 8 inches, 10x8=80 inches or about 6 1/2 feet rounded up to 7 feet. So unless the object on which you're focusing is closer than 7 feet you don't need to worry about bellows compensation.

You can pretty easily tell when you're getting close to the number just by eyeballing the subject. If you're a more or less typical outdoor type photographer you'll find that you're seldom focusing on things closer than 6 ft. And even you are, you don't need to bother with heavy calculations. If I'm kind of close I open up half a stop, if I'm really close I open up a stop. That's really all you need unless you're doing serious close-ups and are using slide film.

Bellows compensation IMHO is kind of like diffraction with LF photography - most people tend to worry too much about it. When it comes to bellows compensation, a professional photographer using slide film and doing studio close-ups for a magazine ad is one thing, an amateur doing outdoor photography is another (IMHO).

[pierods]

Thanks for the info!