hi i am wondering how many people feel a field camera should have this feature? it is standard for most monorail cameras but not so standard for wood field cameras. thank y
hi i am wondering how many people feel a field camera should have this feature? it is standard for most monorail cameras but not so standard for wood field cameras. thank y
If the camera does not have direct shift of the front or rear, it should provide swing for both front and rear. The shift can then be applied indirectly. There are simple techniques to apply shift in this way. It is a little slower but shift is not so often used on a field camera anyway. If neither of these methods is provided in the camera, I would find it limiting. (a press camera)
None of my field cameras has rear swing. So when using front swing, shift becomes valuable - especially for lenses with smaller image circles.
Lateral shift movements are a must have for me. I have owned five wooden field cameras, from various manufacturers, over the past twenty- two years. All of them had either front, and/or rear shift capability. Presently, I am using a Toyo 45AII metal field camera, and it only has front shift. I miss the rear shift movement, because it sometimes becomes necessary to adjust the image side to side, without the need to move the tripod head, or re-focus the image. Rear shift an optional feature, and front shift is standard on the Wista wooden field cameras. The Shen Hao, on the other hand, has plenty of rear shift capability, but it doesn't have front shift. I think rear shift is more important to have, if you need to choose one, or the other.
I have rear and front shift on my camera. Using shift is very handy for fine tuning a composition, especially with a wide angle lens. As you rotate the camera side to side(pan)you will see the image "stretch" and "compress" in it's shape so using shift along with rotating the camera it is possible to control the final shape of an image. This can work with most lenses but is most prominent with wide lenses. Rear shift is especially handy since shifting the lens can alter perspective while rear shift only moves the film in relation to the final position of the lens which will not affect relative positioning of the near and far objects in the scene.
Front shift is crucial. If you do not have it you will always be making your photographs from the middle of the subject. To see what a front shift really does set up your camera in front of a row of books and straight on to them so that the bookshelf is parallel to the bottom edge of the ground glass. Note that the book that has the pages coming straight out at you is in the center. Now stand to the side and focus on the same books, but do not look obliquely at them. Still keep the bookshelf parallel to the bottom of the ground glass. Shift the front (or back) so that the book that was in the middle before is still in the middle of your picture. But you will see that now the book that has the pages coming straight out at you is off to the side--directly in front of where the camera is placed, even though the same book is in the center that was in the center before. Edward Weston used the front shift to this end when he made his lettuce field photograph. It can be used creatively in other ways, too. Using a front shift has much more implications for creative camera vision that is usually suspected and using it like this is surprisingly little practiced. Using it just to "fine tune the composition" is selling it way short.
I have had several field cameras, most have had rear shift. One (an ancient Korona) had front shift. In my experience, while they have the exact same effect, I have found that front shift is 'better' since the bellows are less lik ely to cut into the image. Having 6 inches of rear shift is useless if the bellows star ts showing after an inch.
Jason,
I did not quite understand your posting here - if the bellows is only supported by the front and rear standard then what is the difference in shifting the front standard one way or the rear standard the other way? (except for changing the lens position of course)
I'm suprised by how picky people are on how shift is supplied by their cameras. I would suggest you just pick a camera and use it for a while to decide what is important for you. You can still use shift in a camera with no direct shift. What is important is that the camera allows you to position the lens-and-film plane in the proper relation. Yes, you may have to move the tripod for front vs. rear shift, but these things usually only become a pain for table-top distances. (where a field camera will really start to show it's movement limitations in other ways)
If you have front and rear swing, even with no direct shift, you have shift. If you have direct shift of either/both front and/or rear, it's still good to have both front and rear swing for when you run out of direct shift. If I had to give up one movement it would be the direct shift first before loosing swing on either the front or the rear. (I want swing on both) Example: I have a super graphic with front shift but no back movements. My Tachihara has only front and rear swings, but is capable of much more 'shift' than the Super Graphic.
...Like I said, just get a camera and start using it to decide what is important. You may want to get a monorail first that does everything. Then after using it a while decide what you can live without in a field camera.
My apologies for a rather convoluted statement... What I meant to say was that, at least in the cameras I haveused, the front of the bellows, due to its taper, is more flexible, and thus less prone to cause vignetting than the rear. Now however, I am completely confused, and am thinking that (per Eugene) that front and rear shifts are quite different.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks