do you use a loupe when focusing?

[Hugh Sakols]

I have read that some large format photographers use a loupe when focusing. How essential is a loupe for focusing. When I focus my mamiya c220 w/ porroflex finder, it is dim, but I just get a feel for what is in focus. Sometimes I will get a portion of forground that is out of focus but this is to be expected when working with the larger format that doesn't have tilt.

[Alan Davenport]

Part of the mystique of large format, IMO, is the ability to record details on the film that might not have been apparent to the naked eye. With or without the tilts and movements, critical focusing is, well, critical. I use either a 4X or 5X loupe to fine-focus my 4x5 camera, without it everything is guesswork. I have a 10X loupe available, but that starts to show the fresnel grooves and the grain in the groundglass, so don't use it much.

[Ling Z]

When critical focusing is needed, I always trust my Schneider 6x loupe. Sometimes I use my bino reflex viewer for convenience and fast operation, but it can never replace my loupe.

[Capocheny]

I usually use a loupe for critical focusing...there are some folks who say that they get most things into focus and then stop down to sharpen up the rest. This technique hasn't worked for me in the past and, therefore, I choose to rely on the loupe to ensure sharpness (especially in those areas I want to be sharp.

I use either a Sylvestri tilting loupe or the Toyo long barrel version...they both work very well.

[Witold Grabiec]

Focusing loupe in LF is similar to using a magnifier on top of a focusing screen of any format. Magnifying power needs to be tuned to focusing screen so as not show screen's texture, yet produce larger image to help the process.

I think you might want to look into the set up on your C220. Porroflex makes the image darker than a waist level finder as it is built of mirrors. Mamiya made a magnifier hood for C line TLRs that some users like (but it's more like an enclosed wasit level. A prism finder would also make an improvement. A new screen however, will make your day. I'd suggest medium format forum on photo.net to research this subject further.

[Dan Fromm]

Yes. Totally obsolete probably not very good Ednalite Magnifinder, contemporary with my little Speed Graphic. I do better with it than with trifocals-assisted vision. Am going to try a set of +3.50 reading glasses when I find one, am not hopeful.

[Steve Hamley]

Hugh,

I also use a 4x loupe for critical focusing. The Mamiya C330 I own also has a flip up...loupe! So Mamiya must have thought it was a good idea too.

Thanks!

Steve

[David A. Goldfarb]

Yes, I like a loupe of about 4X. I usually use a Schneider 4X for 8x10" or 11x14" or if I'm shooting 4x5" with a folding hood instead of a groundglass, I'll use the Toyo 3.6X, because it is a bit longer and clears the hood easily. Too much magnification, and you start magnifying the surface of the groundglass or the fresnel.

If you have a chimney magnifier for your medium format camera, those can make great loupes, since they have square corners, and they are optically no different from loupes. Schneider even makes a base to attach their 3X loupe to a Hasselblad. I used to use the 5x magnifier from my Bronica as a groundglass loupe.

[Christian Olivet]

Ok. I used a 4x loupe to focus my 4x5. When I moved to 8x10 I stopped using loupes all together. I focus wide open. and perform all the movements necesary to get everything in focus and then stop down the lens, some times way down. For contact prints only this method seems to work great. The other day I came across a website. www.wyomingphotographers.com/velveteen.html They have a focusing screen with a very thin fresnel lens sanwiched between 1/16" thick glases and epoxied together. They claim an increase of 2.7 stops of light at the corners. In the website they have pictures of the ground glass focused on something with and without the velveteen screen. The difference is outstanding. I am very tempted to get one. The only thing that scares me a little bit is that design of the focusing screen is made to be looked at from a little distance. If you get closer you defeat the design. How many of you heard or used something like this?

[Jon Shiu]

I don't usually use a loupe to focus. If your eye is sensitive to contrast, you can see the edges of things snap into focus without having to see fine detail. (I'm also pretty near-sighted and can focus 4-5" from the ground glass when I'm not wearing glasses.)

[John Kasaian]

Hugh,

I like using a loupe for "fine" focusing. Some time ago I did a loupe/no loupe comparison with 8x10, and IMHO there is no comparison. BTW I'm near-sighted, but with my big nose getting up close and personal with the gg is anatomically rediculous!------Cheers!

[neil poulsen]

For a long time, I used a cheap magnifier and thought I was doing OK. Then I purchased a good Rodenstock 4x aspheric loop, and it was night and day. Things focus so much better. They almost snap into place, when compared to my cheap magnifier.

Perhaps if one has excellent eyesight, one can get along without a loupe. But my experience is that, when I focus without a loupe, and then check the focus with the loupe, I'm usually way off.

[Andrew O'Neill]

When I focus the image on the gg by eye it always looks nice and sharp....until I move in close with a loupe! A loupe is absolutely necessary if your goal is sharp negatives with clear detail.

[Ole Tjugen]

Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

If I shoot 4x5 or smaller (9x12cm) I nearly always do, on 5x7" I sometimes don't bother if I intend the negative for contact printing. If I intend to shot wide open I do, if I stop down to f:64 I don't see the need for critical focus. If I hand-hold (9x12, sometimes 5x7") I don't, as I will probably add enough shake that it won't matter.

[Andre Noble]

I forget to bring a loupe a good 15% of the time, and always miss it.

[Philippe Gauthier]

Jon Shiu: If you are near sighted and are focusing without your glasses, you are indeed using a loupe. near sightedness allows you to focus your eye much closer to the object than someone with normal vision, which results in an effective higher magnification. I'm very myopic (-10 dioptry) and I often remove my glasses when I want to look to 35 mm slides and I don't have a loupe handy.

On the other hand, I always focus with a loupe on the ground glass, as I feel that the results are more convincing, more precise. As another user said, things seem to snap into focus. I wish I was using a better loupe, however.

[Jan Pietrzak]

Hugh,

Dan, is on the right track. I have lost more loupes than can think of. About 3 years ago a friend was reading a book and had these flip up magnafier lenses on. She does alot of birding and has no time to change glasses. She told me that she got them at a sporting goods store, in the fly fishing section.

Dan this is the best part they clip onto your glasses, flip up and down when needed or not. They come in +1.0 to +4.0 correction and cost only $10.00 bucks. I have several pair of them in places like the darkroom, camera cases, flatfile work table for spotting. These are the best things I ever bought and used. For me they work better than a loupe.

Jan

[lee\c]

with my eyes, it is essential for good focus. I use the Toyo 4x loupe.

leec

[Michael E. Gordon]

I'm young (I'm told) and have perfect eyesight. I use a loupe - always. I cannot imagine NOT using one. We shoot 4x5 or larger because we tend to be perfectionists and sticklers for quality. How can one not loupe the glass to ensure perfect sharpness (where ddesired) before firing the shutter?

Perhaps it is choice of subject matter, but there is now way I can envision not louping my work before exposing.

[Colin Carron]

My eyes are now middle aged and they also suffer from macular degeneration - nothing too serious as yet but it certainly takes the edge off fine vision. I always use a 50mm standard lens off a old Practika as a loupe and would not get very close to a decent focus without it. - Colin

[Richard Urmonas]

Guess I am fussier than most. I use a 30x mini microscope for critical focus. I find that it significantly improves the very fine detail in the negative. Previoulsy I had a 10x Nikon loupe, but find the 30x magnification makes a difference.

[Christopher Condit]

I know most people prefer 4x, but I use a 7x loupe. It weighs nothing, doesn't cost a fortune, and takes up no space, and it lets me be sure that the focus is as good as I can make it, which is reassuring. After all the other fussing and setup to get a shot, I think it is a hasty, false economy not to take ten seconds to loupe it.

Recently I acquired a 4x5 with a metal folding sunshade. I find that I can actually use the loupe inside it, even though it is 3-4" away from my eye. Maybe I'll buy one of those extra long loupes one day.

[Paul Metcalf]

Hey, if you don't use a loop with your large format camera, and the picture is out of focus, maybe you can pass it off as a pinhole picture or maybe even a zone disk picture. Call it art if it's fuzzy. <tongue in cheek>

[Dan Fromm]

Um, Paul I've been reading propaganda about zone disks and such recently. The people selling 'em insist that they have focal lengths and have to be focused. They say that if one is used without focusing the image will be, um, fuzzier.

Cheers,

Dan

[J.L. Kennedy]

I must be out of the loupe (pun intended). What is a "zone disk"?

[jantman]

I shoot 8x10. SO far I only contact print, but that's just because I don't have my 8x10 enlarger working yet. I usually focus by eye wide open (at f/10!) and then check focus and adjust as needed with a cheap 10x loupe.

[Dan Fromm]

JL, by an odd coincidence zone plates are being discussed in the "great leap backwards" thread. Read it, chase the URLs given.

Cheers,

Dan

[Chris Partti]

For a while I got a bit lazy and stopped using a loupe when focusing my 8x10, figuring that it wasn't necessary to be so precise when shooting for contact printing. I started checking myself and found that, when viewed with a loupe, my naked eye focusing could be quite far off. I now think that even for contacts, it's good to use a loupe.

[Christopher Condit]

SOT, I have a zone plate camera, they work just like pinhole cameras, but with exposure times an order of magnitude faster. In both cases the hole or plate must be the correct distance from the film plane, according to its size. In a bellows camera, I guess this would constitute focussing. But most are built into inexpensive wooden box cameras, of fixed 'focus'.