Ivan J. Eberle
25-Sep-2008, 17:38
Experienced in LF I'm not-- the 45B is my first LF camera in 30 years of outdoor photography. I did hold off buying just any old technical camera while looking for one of these "wide-angle friendly" beasts. Largely waited til I found one due to the presence of the inner focusing rails, 90˚ drop bed, and the articulating back.
Now that I've just gotten a Nikon SW 90mm f/8 (shoehorned it in there on a flat board and it closes up with a generic thin lens cap), I'm quickly finding out about the compromises. Perhaps compromises are inherent with most any field/technical camera, but specific to the Meridian 45B, the 90mm focal length seems to fall right into the gap between the end of one rail and the start of another at infinity focus.
The prospect of back focusing seemed to be one way around this 90mm dilemma and for a few minutes an intriguing one at that. Surely I could make some kind of fixture or jig to zero it out each time, or maybe even devise an internal focusing stage of some sort. Or so I was thinking until I realized that racking out the back takes away from being able to access the rise and tilt knobs as the 90mm would be contained back within the camera body at infinity.
Removed the wire hoop framing slider & assembly to gain rise. Contemplated relocating the bed catch to a corner to buy even more rise, til I noted that the bellows/body obstruction is really the limiting factor, from getting any further rise.
Well, if anyone else has workarounds to share re: using W/A's on the 45B (or, what works great as originally intended!), you've got my rapt attention.
Now that I've just gotten a Nikon SW 90mm f/8 (shoehorned it in there on a flat board and it closes up with a generic thin lens cap), I'm quickly finding out about the compromises. Perhaps compromises are inherent with most any field/technical camera, but specific to the Meridian 45B, the 90mm focal length seems to fall right into the gap between the end of one rail and the start of another at infinity focus.
The prospect of back focusing seemed to be one way around this 90mm dilemma and for a few minutes an intriguing one at that. Surely I could make some kind of fixture or jig to zero it out each time, or maybe even devise an internal focusing stage of some sort. Or so I was thinking until I realized that racking out the back takes away from being able to access the rise and tilt knobs as the 90mm would be contained back within the camera body at infinity.
Removed the wire hoop framing slider & assembly to gain rise. Contemplated relocating the bed catch to a corner to buy even more rise, til I noted that the bellows/body obstruction is really the limiting factor, from getting any further rise.
Well, if anyone else has workarounds to share re: using W/A's on the 45B (or, what works great as originally intended!), you've got my rapt attention.