A question for those of you who use more than one camera of different makes... for example a Speed Graphic and a Toyo or Wista or whatever.
Do you use the same lenses with both (all) cameras changing the lens plates as you move from camera to camera? Or do you have specific lenses set up for each camera and just use them?
Changing lens plates isn't a big deal but I am finding that I fall into the latter category. Just lazy I guess. How about you?
Ed
Adapters help. My 450mm is on a Sinar board because it only works with my 8x10. Most of the rest are on Wista compatible boards that I can use on the 8x10 or MPP using an adapter, or directly on the Wista.
The real problem with having just one set of lenses is moving them between bags, unless you cart everything along 8-) The one lens I have that seems to cross-kit a lot is the 270mm G-Claron.
Originally Posted by Ed Vatza
I do both, mix and match. For my Chamonix (modern field camera) lately I've been using modern lenses in Copal shutter. Last year I was mainly using vintage lenses 1905-1930 mounted on technika boards. I also have a 1905 Century Camera No. 41. For that I only use lenses of that vintage, mostly to keep the physical period look and experience. With my 1925 Gundlach Korona (5x7 with 4x5 back) I use large heavy lenses vintage 1847 to 1865, and also have an adapted lens board so I can used any other lens I own, including the modern Copal ones. Most of the time I'm using the light & easy to use Chamonix, and for that I'll use just about any lens I own except for the 5 pound monsters that would crush it. I value the flexibility.
Kent in SD
In contento ed allegria
Notte e di vogliam passar!
It would make sense to standardize on a board that works across multiple cameras. As others have mentioned you can get adapter boards that make this quite do-able.
Most of my lenses are mounted on Linhof Technika lensboards.
I have an adapter to mount those boards on my Sinar F2 and the various Tachihara field cameras.
Works fine.
- Leigh
If you believe you can, or you believe you can't... you're right.
+ 1 to the adapter.
I started with 2x3 Pacemaker Graphics, was later given a 2x3 Cambo SC. I sacrificed a 2x3 Pacemaker front standard, a 2x3 Cambo board and some money paid to SKGrimes to have an adapter made for mounting my lenses on 2x3 Pacemaker boards on the Cambo. Medium format not to be mentioned here, but the principle is the same.
One advantage of doing this is that 2x3 Pacemaker Graphics are much less expensive than 2x3 Cambo boards, also much easier to find.
Beyond the popular small Linhof style lens board, the other popular lens board appears to be Sinar, some reason why. Smaller lens boards can be made to fit a larger lens board with an adapter board, using large lenses on smaller lens boards is often very difficult to not possible at all.
Being lens centric with a need to use a very wide variety of lenses, the Sinar does really well with this due to the Sinar shutter, Sinar lens board size. on the Sinar P front standard-can support signifiant lens weight > 5 pounds with little difficulty, no real limits on bellows draw, bag bellows allows near contacting of the front to rear standards- If a recessed lens board is used with a bag bellows the distance between ground glass to rear of the lens is a few mm. These perks are traded off for weight and lesser portability.
All this makes using virtually any lens from microscope objective to Gigantic Military lenses possible. As for mixing lens types and brands, been this for decades.
This is why deciding on what the lens set needs to be and what images are to be made is first choice with the camera fitting the needs of the image maker and lenses required for the image maker's work.
This is opposite of many roll film cameras where once the user is into a brand, it can be difficult to use lenses that are Alien to the choose camera brand.
Essentially the view camera is a light tight box with flexi in the center with the front and back of the box movable.
Bernice
Lensboard adapters are where it's at... in 23 years of futzing with large format cameras I've accumulated a whole zoo of them. If you use cameras with both small and large lensboard sizes, it does make sense to standardize on one small and one large size (for example, Technika for small boards and Sinar for large), add a small-board-to-large-board adapter, and shop for cameras accordingly and lensboards accordingly.
However, adapters can be tricky or even entirely impractical if the size difference between the boards is small. This issue arises most commonly for people seeking to adapt one small board type to another but can occasionally come up with large-to-large adaptations too. In particular, since you mentioned Speed Graphic, while adapting 4x5 Pacemaker Graphic boards to large monorail camera boards (Sinar, Toyo view, etc.) is not difficult, adapters that allow swapping between 4x5 Graphics and other small-board 4x5 cameras (Technika/Wista, Toyo) may be a problem.
Most of the adapters in my user-collection are small-board-to-large-board, but FWIW, in the small-to-small category I have Horseman-field-to-Technika and Technika-to-Toyo-field adapters. The former works without restriction, the latter accepts Technika boards with no problem but won't fit into the front standard of some cameras that are specified to accept Toyo field boards because the retaining hardware for the smaller board gets in the way.
Although I doubt it's what you have in mind, for completeness I should add that all of the above refers to adapting flat boards to flat boards. The adaptability of recessed boards is far more restricted, because of issues with host lensboard size and/or front standard clearances.
I thank you all for your responses. From what you've said adapters look like the solution where practical. However Oren hit the nail on the head in my case. I have a Speed Graphic and a Wista 45DX both of which have small but different boards. Not sure an adapter is the answer in a case like this. But also not sure what is.
Ed
My bias is that I'm uncomfortable about constantly unmounting and remounting lenses that weren't designed for such use. I'll do it once in a while if I have a special need, but in general I'd just as soon avoid the wear-and-tear or risk of greater damage to the mounting threads, losing shims (if any), misalignment etc.
So the "solutions" are to not have cameras with different lensboards, or to have lenses dedicated to the cameras. If you're just talking about the most common focal lengths, the latter isn't that expensive these days. The lenses that come with Graphics tend to be pretty cheap, but modern lenses in the 90 / 135 / 150 / 210 focal lengths just aren't that expensive either. But I don't mean to be in any way dismissive if you are on a very tight budget - in that case, you'll have to decide what's most important to you.
FWIW, for my purposes a Graphic is a press camera and the point of having one is to use the rangefinder*, which means having a single lens dedicated to the camera, which is in turn calibrated for it. (Yes, you could assemble a set of lenses with matching cams for one of the late-model top-RF Graphics.) Otherwise I use cameras with reversing backs, a greater range of view camera controls and readily interchangeable boards. So I do have a 4x5 Pacemaker Crown Graphic with a dedicated lens, but turn to other cameras for general-purpose 4x5 work.
* Well, the other point of having a Speed Graphic in particular is to have a convenient way of using barrel-mount lenses. And for that, a lensboard with iris clamp is ideal.
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