I would like to know if its that big of a deal to have the standards tilt "on ax is", as opposed to base tilts. I understand why on axis is better, but when shop ping for a field camera, I've found it hard to find one that is on axis. Some ha ve on axis front standards and base rear standards. Thanks, Raven
There is less refocusing and recomposing involved in setting up a shot when deal ing with on-axis tilts. However, I would say that it is not that big of a deal. ..it's just a matter of getting used to whichever you have. I use a Wista SP wh ich has on-axis front and base rear standards and have found each to be equally "easy" to use...I just need to remember to recompose slightly after adjusting fo cus with the base rear standard. In choosing a field camera I would recommend looking at other features which may be equally or more important to you than the type of tilts offered. Have you s een Stroebel's "View Camera Techniques" which compares a number of LF cameras an d their features?
Of those field camera which do offer axis tilts, many suffer from a basic design problem. Namely, the lock for the axis tilt also locks the rise/fall. The res ult is that when you want to raise or drop the lens, it's easy to add a small am ount of tilt accidentally. I use a Zone VI camera, whch has this problem. Not only do I not use the axis tilt, but I wish the camera didn't have it at all, fo r this reason.
The Wista SP which I use does have separate locks for axis tilt and rise/fall so the problem Rob mentioned doesn't exist with this particular field camera.
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