Hi, I have a pretty specific (A-S) question relating to my general quest for a precision 8x10 that is light enough to carry around (I do a lot of urban walking and architectural work).
I have used several different brands -- most often Sinar -- and numerous formats, but I'm thinking of selling everything I have and putting the funds into one high-end, lightweight 8x10. I want as full a range of movements as possible in a sturdy, lightweight package, which apparently means Ebony or Arca-Swiss, neither of which brand I've used before. (Feel free to point me to other options, but it seems that most of the usual suspects are either not as precise or as sturdy or as lightweight or as versatile with respect to movements; I'd like all four if possible.)
I've always preferred monorails, which gives the edge to A-S, but in Nathan Congdon's review of the Ebony 810, he said he rejected the A-S 8x10 (I'm thinking F-Line, not M) because it only offered 40mm of front rise, which of course is ridiculously limiting. Somebody else said there's an A-S "extender" that adds 40mm of front rise, and therein lies my question. Has anyone seen or had experience with this extender? Is it the gizmo in the upper right of the 14th pdf page (in A-S's page numbering, page 1.12) of the A-S catalog at http://www.largeformatphotography.info/ARCA.pdf? (How) does it work?
"Official" and "knowledgeable" answers from A-S reps are, I assume, as difficult to come by as they have been since "elusive sales support" was apparently written into the company's charter 40-odd years ago.
I'm open to considering Ebony, and I suppose I could find a way to justify it in terms of income produced, but I can't believe how much a full-featured Ebony costs even over the already-very-pricey A-S. Then again, over the years I've gradually invested quite a bit accumulating camera gear, and I don't want to sell it all in exchange for a camera with a crippling limitation. Thoughts?
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