First Test: 36" Aero Ektar

A couple of decades ago, I traded my 12" f4.5 Ektar I had on my 8x10" Burke & James for a WWII vintage 36" (ca. 1000mm) Aero Ektar. The lens itself weighs - well - alot. It has no shutter. I'm assuming this pointing facing down on a Flying Fortress or something confirming bombing hits over Germany or Japan in the 1940's.

Way back when my dad and uncle built a camera around this lens. The camera consists of a couple of interleaving wood boxes (more or less light tight) with the Aero Ektar in the front, and the back half of a Speed Graphic in the back. The rear-end of the Speed Graphic has a shutter in addition to a ground glass and all the accoutrements required to place a film holder. My dad made a label for the front calling it the "Neardorf" (spoofing the famous large format Deardorff.)

Recently- well actually a couple months ago I convinced my daughter to go to the park to test this out. And recently (really this time) I developed the test sheets.

This test was a first for a number of other reasons besides the "Neardorf". It was also my first test of the Fomapan 200 film and my first attempt with semistand development HC110. I guess all those tests were semi-successful.

The crazy long-fast lens (Almost 1000mm @ f6.3) creates a nice out of focus background as one might have expected. HC110 semistand looked ok, but the Foma neg was pretty grainy.

While working on this post, I thought it might be useful for some that I share a spreadsheet with the shutter speed settings for the Speed Graphic cameras too:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1b5OxQ-HJfaLvBm5rXT3SsUhC39dlhtIIUBE8q1wX8bE/edit?usp=sharing

Comments

Linhof Serial Year List - Salomon Says

Recently I've acquired a few Linhof cameras. I got a 5x7 view camera from Oakland Museum's White Elephant Sale. Later I stumbled upon a Color Kardan 90 Jahre Jubalaeum edition on Craigslist. And more recently, I found a "baby Technika" 2x3 (6x9) at Oakland's East Bay Depot for Creative Re-use. Not knowing much about Linhof large format cameras, I tried getting more info online, and came across a strange thread on the Large Format Photography Forum . Basically on this thread various Linhof owners ask a guy named Bob Salomon what year their Linhof was made. And the thread is over 100 pages long! Sifting through that thread is mindnumbing. Why Bob doesn't just publish the list of serial numbers is beyond me. Maybe it's just nice to feel needed. So I started compiling a spreadsheet of the serial numbers and the answer Bob gives. If you don't feel like spending a couple days reading this thread to get a hint as to the age of your Lin

From the Archive: Obsolete Film Data Sheet Scans - ORWO Information

Here's a sheet I got from writing ORWO Technischer Kundendienst back in the 1980's. It lists development times for all the ORWO Black and White films sold for export at the time (NP15, NP22, NP 27) combined with western developers Microphen, Atomal, Rodinal, Refinal, D-76, & ID-11. A little bit of ORWO history- Germany's big photo film/paper manufacturer up until Germany's losing WWII was AGFA (short for A ktien G esellschaft F ür A nilinfabrikation - or corporation for some sort of plastic manufacture.) Germany was occupied by the winning powers USSR/USA/GB/FR and the rift between the USSR led to some complications for industries. Depending on your view of history the US and western allies were much friendlier to the land they occupied (remember the USSR lost many millions of their citizens to the NAZIs which made them much less tolerant.) In any case, some factories in the east moved to the west with many key employees. Most photo enthusiasts know of the t

Should I ditch my Sony a6500 for a A7r IV?

Recently, I bought a Sony a7r IV. The main reason was for stock photography. The high resolution along with improved focusing and biggish buffer would allow me to make better people (and other) stock photos for my various stock endeavors. The Sony system has treated me well. I own two A7r II's for stock and other work, and two a6500's for event photography. The A7r II's aren't ideal for events for a couple reasons. The focus tracking is pretty good, but maybe not enough for fast paced people on stage. Another reason is that silent shooting is only available on single shot mode. And (admittedly a first world problem,) the files are much bigger than needed. Well, the last problem, too big files isn't an issue with the A7rIV if you use it in APS-c mode. The files are effectively the same size as the a6500: 24 mp. Focus with the IV is even faster and more effective than the very capable a6500. And with those smaller files, the IV has no problem with buffer overflow. So

Lensbusters.com

Search This Blog