Hi all,

I am relatively experienced point and shoot photographer who has been desiring to move into LF for some time. Finally have with the acquisition (at a great price) of a used Toyo 45AX.

So I spend 30 minutes figuring out how to open and set the thing up, attach the Rodenstock Grandagon N 75mm lens it came with, point it out my living room window, and . . .

. . . and except for the street light across the street, which appears as a small bright blur, I can't see a single thing through the ground glass. I figured 'Hey, it's night time and I don't know what I'm doing, I'll try again when it's daylight.'

So I try again during the day, and now I can see larger patches of bright light (extremely blurry), and that's it. So I tried adjustments--moved this here, that there, swung this, that . . . sometimes it gets a little better--but for the most part, I can barely tell what I'm looking at except for the rough shape of the light source. The rest is just the color of the ground glass itself.

What am I doing wrong (besides 'everything')? When I pull the ground glass away from the back of the camera, the other side appears brighter and mildly distorted--is this the side that's supposed to be facing me or the camera? It doesn't even seem like you can swap it the other direction, but that's my only guess.

I've read a lot online but I think I'm the only person other than a few others that has had this problem---and I have yet to find an answer.

Be gentle.

Matt