Scheimpflug process with a 2D

[C. D. Keth]

I enjoy landscapes. That usually means I think of a little front tilt as the same kind of necessity as film and a darkcloth. As I am getting a kodak 2D ready to use, a question about using it popped up in my mind.

I know a lot of you shoot with older cameras that aren't equipped with a front tilt mechanism. I'm curious to hear your methods of adding front tilt.

Now I know the mechanics: I know it's a combination of tilting the whole camera down, front rise, and rear tilt to level the film back out.

What I guess I'm after is a method of doing these things that is a bit more controlled than winging it. A lot of fine photographers in the past must have had this problem and conquered it.

Does anyone have a controlled process for adding front tilt when your camera lacks that movement?

[BarryS]

Sounds like a lot of trouble to avoid using rear tilt--any reason? I'd say the majority of landscape shooters I meet prefer rear tilt, given the choice. I tend to prefer front tilt, but if I'm using my 2D, then I'm ok only using rear tilt. One thing I've found is I don't like fighting a camera. If it doesn't do what I need, I'd just as soon get rid of it.

[Brian Ellis]

Scheimpflug strictly applied often isn't feasible for landscape work even when a camera has front tilt. Too often the point at which the planes meet is several feet underground and so you're really making almost a wild guess as to where the common meeting point is. But you can use back tilt with your 2D to alter the plane of focus in the same way front tilt is used with cameras that have it. The only two differences between front and back tilt are that back tilt will distort the shape of objects near the camera (not usually a problem with landscapes since nobody will usually know what their exact shape was anyhow) and your lenses don't require as large an image circle for back tilt as they do when using front tilt.

[ic-racer]

Rear (back) tilt!

Just printed a fantastic 8x10 image last night from a 210mm. Rocks in the foreground (not far from the tripod legs) appear as if I am looking straight down on them, yet the horizon is also included in the upper frame. The horizon and the close rocks are all razor sharp (and the ground in between also). I could not have done that prior to modifying my Century's rear standard to get more tilt.

Even if I have front tilt available, I like to use rear tilt for landscapes, as I like the effect. I recall Fred Picker describing the foreground as "Looming" when doing this.

Having a short lens helps also. You can just see that as the standards are closer, the amount of rear tilt needed for the two standards to converge on the ground is reduced.

[C. D. Keth]

There seems to be a pretty general consensus there. I never tried doing it by rear tilt because of the distortion issue. I'm a little embarrassed to say that I never even tried to see if the distortion was acceptable or even pleasing.

For argument's sake, say the subject would look much better undistorted. Is there a structured way to do it, given that you have to do 3 different things to end up with the net effect of simple front tilt?

[Paul Fitzgerald]

"Is there a structured way to do it, given that you have to do 3 different things to end up with the net effect of simple front tilt?"

You could use front rise first, recompose and use rear tilt for focus. Try it at 1" fall, 0, 1" rise, 2" rise and max rise to see which you like the look of best.

"to end up with the net effect of simple front tilt?"

not if you include the sky in the picture, something about the inverse square rule.

[Brian Ellis]

There seems to be a pretty general consensus there. I never tried doing it by rear tilt because of the distortion issue. I'm a little embarrassed to say that I never even tried to see if the distortion was acceptable or even pleasing.

For argument's sake, say the subject would look much better undistorted. Is there a structured way to do it, given that you have to do 3 different things to end up with the net effect of simple front tilt?

Maybe someone else knows a way but there's no way I can think of offhand, structured or unstructured. You can aim the camera towards the ground and then tilt the rear standard back to obtain the effect of front forward tilt. But tilting the rear standard will produce some distortion of foreground objects. In my experience that's almost never a problem with landscape work but you're now assuming that you don't want any distortion. If the camera had front swing you conceivably could turn it on its side and convert swing to tilt but it would be difficult to turn an 8x10 camera on its side and use it on a tripod unless the camera was designed with that in mind.

[ic-racer]

"distortion" with rear tilt may not be the best word. If you take a picture looking down railroad tracks and compare front tilt to rear tilt, the tracks splay out more as they come toward you with the rear tilt. But in both cases they still look like normal parallel railroad tracks that converge in the distance.

[C. D. Keth]

I'll have to try it when my camera is up and functional. I never thought this was going to be such a strange question to everyone. It sounds like I'll probably like the effect of rear tilt.

[Peter De Smidt]

Practice a regular tilt with the ground in focus with the camera at a comfortable height. That would generally be the most tilt that you would use in a landscape situation. You can then use your judgment based on what is in the image. I use back tilt regularly unless I want to avoid key stoning with vertical elements. Note: Richard Ritter can make an adapter lens board which adds some front tilt capability to a D2. I have one. It's fine for most uses.