I’m a very happy man! But only since today, July 25 2008.
In 2000 I was also a happy man. After years of slowly being able to buy one Hasselblad lens and body after the other, I was the proud owner of a 203FE and a spare 201F body, and five desirable lenses: 50/2.8; 80/2.8; 110/2.0; 150/2.8 and 250/4. For years I spent many happy hours in the darkroom printing my beloved big Delta 100 and Tri X negatives and I thought my MF equipment was a lifetime investment.
That was the pre-digital era.
My 135 format (Nikon F5) was the first to set aside for a digital body, and a new body, and again a new body, (sounds familiar?) But my dear Hassy had to do without digital; film only.
Five years ago I closed my darkroom definitely, and it was also that moment that the batteries were taken out of the Hasselblad bodies. I inquired patiently if something was to be expected for MY F-Hassy, but no, V-only, maybe later, no, maybe another manufacturer, no, and no and no, no digital backs. Letters to Hasselblad Sweden kept unanswered. The “lifetime investment” turned out to be degrading rapidly, day by day.
This is the digital era.
So let’s forget the beauty of Carl Zeiss made in Germany lenses, let’s forget Hasselblad, this is a new time with new digital players and VERY enthusiastic international photographing testers and testing photographers, all talking about the new Full Frame not too expensive Nikon D700.
I ordered at the first of July a Nikon D700, with some new ultra wide glass, and from another little shop a smart accessory.
Not only arrived my D700/MB-D10 today, twenty-four days after ordering and oh boy, what a machine, what a fantastic, well build gear, but also an ugly, cheap looking paper box with a printed name ADAPTER HASSU, LV.SHI and a sticker with the name Nikon arrived. There were some Chinese characters too, so we know where it comes from. The box contains only a piece of metal, a black tube with on one side a Nikon-like lens mounting and on the other side a Hasselblad-like camera mounting. And I must say, it made me more than happy, double or triple happy, because this simple $115.00 device gives me my Hasselblad lenses back, to be used on my D700 body!!! Focal length is the same, so there is no multiplying factor; my Carl Zeiss Distagon 2,8/50 gives the same picture as my AF Nikkor 50/1:1.4D. O.K. it is Manual all over, no autofocus, but metering can easily be done with the aperture pre-closed (it’s open to focus) and the D700 focus assist in the viewfinder works, and please old Hasselblad users be aware, we were used to focus ourselves, we were used to our Minolta incident light meters, it is in fact easier than it ever was. O.K. it is only a 24 x 36 mm 12 MP sensor, but I am happy with 14” x 22” prints, and this is without upressing the picture. And I made already some beautiful, clean 1600 ISO pictures, shining at the unsurpassed LCD, is there a digital back out there with the same sensitivity? And with upcoming bodies, like the D800 (being an undressed version of the D3x) we have the double amount of pixels/dots…
For all with a new Nikon D3 or D700 and “old” Hasselblad lenses, try to spend just over a hundred box and have some real, real fun!
This what I liked to share with you, reading the forum for a long time now, and contributing for the first time.
Hasselbas.