Portable camera with movements!

[David Klepacki]

For quite a while, I was struggling to find a small and portable solution to have camera movements, and if possible to use the lenses I am most familiar (Hasselblad V).  So, I decided to re-engineer the Hasselblad Flexbody, as it was "almost there" in terms of my needs.  I have finally achieved my goal.  The key piece was to expand the image circle of the Hassy lenses to accommodate more shift, at least with the wide and normal lenses.  This can be accomplished with the Hasselblad PC-Mutar, which does exactly that, and to integrate it into the Flexbody.  For that, the front standard had to be redesigned.  Also, I wanted more movements than the original Flexbody, so I also add swing and horizontal shift to the front standard as well.  Here are the resulting specs:

Total Weight: 3 lbs. (2lbs. without PC-Mutar)
Size: 6.75in x 6in x 4.5in (H x W x D)
Lens and Back mount: Hasselblad V
Tripod mount: Arca-Swiss

Lenses: 30CFi - 350CFE (all Hasselblad V lenses with leaf shutter)
With PC-Mutar: enlarges image circles to 113mm for 30,40,50,60, 80 lenses, and to 96mm for 100 lens)

Rear rise/fall: +/- 14mm
Rear tilt: +/- 28 degrees
Front rise/fall: +/- 16mm
Front shift: +7mm / -3mm (+23mm / -19mm with PC-Mutar rotated)
Front swing: +/- 15 degrees
Bellows Extension: -2mm / +24mm

All movements are geared and lock down rock solid.

[tom_l]

Wow!
This is a great piece of equipment. Well done. Find a way to add a sliding back, and you have a near perfect camera.
Would love to see some more pictures, maybe from other angles.
With the Flexbody, Hasselblad was very close to developp a great cam. A pity they stopped. Silvestri (Flexicam) and Linhof (Techno) were quite inspired by the Flexbody when they developped their new cameras.  Maybe the manufacturers should listen a bit more to the professionels, about theirs needs etc, when they developp a camera. (this has been done with the new Sinar)  Your great camera shows that photographers often have a very good idea about the camera they need.


Tom

[David Klepacki]

Wow!
This is a great piece of equipment. Well done. Find a way to add a sliding back, and you have a near perfect camera.
Would love to see some more pictures, maybe from other angles.
With the Flexbody, Hasselblad was very close to developp a great cam. A pity they stopped. Silvestri (Flexicam) and Linhof (Techno) were quite inspired by the Flexbody when they developped their new cameras.  Maybe the manufacturers should listen a bit more to the professionels, about theirs needs etc, when they developp a camera. (this has been done with the new Sinar)  Your great camera shows that photographers often have a very good idea about the camera they need.


Tom

Thanks Tom.  I know a lot of people like sliding backs, but in my case, I wanted as small and lightweight a footprint as possible.  Also, I primarily use this kit for product and indoor work, where I can shoot tethered to a laptop with live view.  For focus and composition accuracy, not to mention seeing the product shot on screen immediately, is more beneficial to me as I never have a need to remove (or slide) the back from the camera during the shoot.  

Per your request, I have attached another image, which shows the PC-Mutar rotated when extra shift is needed in the horizontal direction (sometimes useful if you want to stitch for more resolution).

[tom_l]

David, Thank you for the 2 additional photos,
you were just editing your 1. post, and I only saw your second picture after I posted...
I had the Flexbody for years, but I sold it for the Flexicam.(not that I regret, but i loved to work with the Flexbody too, long live the Flexbody  ).
I didn't, and i still don't have Live View yet, but it's really something I look forward to use on the Flexicam later too. Sliding back is nice to have in the meantime.

Tom-

[David Klepacki]

Tom, I actually first tried the Silvestri, which seems fine for the lighter weight lenses, but it did not have the rigidity that I needed for the Hasselblad lenses.  I found that the Hasselblad Flexbody provided me with much better stability, at least for the lenses that I wanted to use with it (like the 40IF with PC-Mutar).  I find this Flexbody setup to be as rigid (and precise) as the much larger Linhof 679cs or even the Rollei Xact2 cameras.

[ynp]

David,
Congratulations! Fantastic! You should start to take orders.  

I have been playing with the idea to build something light and rigid to use on my Sinar-m with the Reflex module and to have at least limited movements with a longer lens. Do you think that a Flexbody will be a good platform for a modification?  The Sinar-p3 is too heavy for location work.
Thank you,
Yevgeny

[David Klepacki]

David,
Congratulations! Fantastic! You should start to take orders.  

I have been playing with the idea to build something light and rigid to use on my Sinar-m with the Reflex module and to have at least limited movements with a longer lens. Do you think that a Flexbody will be a good platform for a modification?  The Sinar-p3 is too heavy for location work.
Thank you,
Yevgeny

Hi Yevgeny, thank you for your comments.  This was indeed a major undertaking for me, so am glad some people like you can appreciate the work.  I have no intention of selling these, but I am willing to make one for you if you are sincerely interested (they are hand-made and labor intensive, so may take awhile).  You will need to come up with some of the parts though.  Please PM me for anything further in this regard.

As you know, I am huge Sinar-m fan as well.  I also looked into building something to give me movements, but as long as the reflex module is in place, a large amount of focusing distance is lost.  It can be done without the reflex module in place, but that turned out to be more costly than my Flexbody project, so I stick with the Flexbody.

The Flexbody is extremely built well.  Everything is geared; the bellows extension and rise/fall on the camera both use worm screw gears, so there is no slippage and you have very fine control of these movements.   As you can see, it is extremely compact and lightweight, yet rigid enough for copy and product work.

[tom_l]

Tom, I actually first tried the Silvestri, which seems fine for the lighter weight lenses, but it did not have the rigidity that I needed for the Hasselblad lenses.  I found that the Hasselblad Flexbody provided me with much better stability, at least for the lenses that I wanted to use with it (like the 40IF with PC-Mutar).  I find this Flexbody setup to be as rigid (and precise) as the much larger Linhof 679cs or even the Rollei Xact2 cameras.

that's true, I tried the cfe 120mm successfully, but no way that I would put a 150 or 180mm or heavier on the Silvestri. The front standard isn't as stable as a Flexbody standard. (But the rest is).The Flexbody is really well build and very rigid.
As rigid as the new Linhof Techno that I played with for a few minutes, It had the perfection and quality of a 679cs, but at twice(I guess) the weight of your Flexbody. And the Techno is a heavy body, bigger than Flexbody and Flexicam. It will be interesting to see if a manufacturer tries to build a complete 6x6 view camera with all possible movements on both standards with the possibility to use wide angle lenses.


Tom-

[ynp]

David,
I am interested!!! Thank you for your generous proposal. I will PM you tomorrow
Yevgeny

[thsinar]

Wonderful, David!

I am tempted to order one as well!

 

Congratulations for your work and best regards,
Thierry

For quite a while, I was struggling to find a small and portable solution to have camera movements, and if possible to use the lenses I am most familiar (Hasselblad V).  So, I decided to re-engineer the Hasselblad Flexbody, as it was "almost there" in terms of my needs.  I have finally achieved my goal.  The key piece was to expand the image circle of the Hassy lenses to accommodate more shift, at least with the wide and normal lenses.  This can be accomplished with the Hasselblad PC-Mutar, which does exactly that, and to integrate it into the Flexbody.  For that, the front standard had to be redesigned.  Also, I wanted more movements than the original Flexbody, so I also add swing and horizontal shift to the front standard as well.  Here are the resulting specs:

Total Weight: 3 lbs. (2lbs. without PC-Mutar)
Size: 6.75in x 6in x 4.5in (H x W x D)
Lens and Back mount: Hasselblad V
Tripod mount: Arca-Swiss

Lenses: 30CFi - 350CFE (all Hasselblad V lenses with leaf shutter)
With PC-Mutar: enlarges image circles to 113mm for 30,40,50,60, 80 lenses, and to 96mm for 100 lens)

Rear rise/fall: +/- 14mm
Rear tilt: +/- 28 degrees
Front rise/fall: +/- 16mm
Front shift: +7mm / -3mm (+23mm / -19mm with PC-Mutar rotated)
Front swing: +/- 15 degrees
Bellows Extension: -2mm / +24mm

All movements are geared and lock down rock solid.

[David Klepacki]

Wonderful, David!

I am tempted to order one as well!

 

Congratulations for your work and best regards,
Thierry

Thanks Thierry!

This Flexbody really complements my Sinar m (and eMotion Live View!) perfectly.  The Sinar m camera is nice and portable already, and of course shares the same Hasselblad V lenses as this Flexbody.  The small, portable and lightweight kit with these cameras gives me all the flexibility that I need for location shooting with high demands on image quality.   So, the Sinar system actually provided a lot of motivation for this project.

[arc-technika]

This has got to be the most awesome thing since my introduction into ALPA! If I may ask, how did you do the modifications?

[Dustbak]

I like this version of the Flexbody, well done!

I used to own a Flexbody and still regard it as one of the most nicely built machines. Very sturdy, yet light and good portability. Somehow I wished Hasselblad would have introduced a Flexbody that would take HC lenses and H3/CF backs instead of the HTS (naturally with the software corrections as well ).

This looks a lot like the other initiative to rebuilt the Flexbody into something really cool, the Bendyblad.

http://www.owenphotographicrepairs.com/bendybladg.htm

[paulmoorestudio]

Thanks Tom.  I know a lot of people like sliding backs, but in my case, I wanted as small and lightweight a footprint as possible.  Also, I primarily use this kit for product and indoor work, where I can shoot tethered to a laptop with live view.  For focus and composition accuracy, not to mention seeing the product shot on screen immediately, is more beneficial to me as I never have a need to remove (or slide) the back from the camera during the shoot.  

Per your request, I have attached another image, which shows the PC-Mutar rotated when extra shift is needed in the horizontal direction (sometimes useful if you want to stitch for more resolution).

wow, you did fix some of the things which kept me from going to a flexbody.. well done.
very nice indeed..I hope the manufactures notice as this type of thinking/problem solving cam is needed for us tethered dudes... and we are tethered by choice. I would love to see something like this for the hy6 / rollei  system

[ixpressraf]

I had the same contraption made from my flexbody and the shiftconvertor in the nineties( on film in those days). When i moved to digital MF i got myself a rollei variable shutter with a 135mm in a rotatable mount . So i had myself a perfect tiltlens for working in the studio. I now have a Flexframe 4040 with rolleimount again... I am a very happy man again.  Now i am making a similar thing for my H3d.

[paulmoorestudio]

I had the same contraption made from my flexbody and the shiftconvertor in the nineties( on film in those days). When i moved to digital MF i got myself a rollei variable shutter with a 135mm in a rotatable mount . So i had myself a perfect tiltlens for working in the studio. I now have a Flexframe 4040 with rolleimount again... I am a very happy man again.  Now i am making a similar thing for my H3d.

I have been trying to find one of those rollei m39  to do just that .. and figured a 135mm would be perfect..let me know if see one floating around.

[paulmoorestudio]

I had the same contraption made from my flexbody and the shiftconvertor in the nineties( on film in those days). When i moved to digital MF i got myself a rollei variable shutter with a 135mm in a rotatable mount . So i had myself a perfect tiltlens for working in the studio. I now have a Flexframe 4040 with rolleimount again... I am a very happy man again.  Now i am making a similar thing for my H3d.

oops, double post.

[ixpressraf]

it's not that simple. there must be made some extra space inside of the shutter. Maybe you can see this in the images. it was not that simple to have that done.

[EricWHiss]

I have been trying to find one of those rollei m39  to do just that .. and figured a 135mm would be perfect..let me know if see one floating around.

I've got a zork MFS attached to my rollei m39 remote shutter and it works great for modest tilt.  I'm still smarting over waiting too long to make RAF an offer on his piece!    

[EricWHiss]

David,
That's a great piece of engineering work you have done there with the Flexbody.   I was looking at these the other day wondering if something were possible and there you are with the whole job! The mutar was a brilliant stroke too!
Very nice and yeah you could sell those.  

Eric

ps - I don't know him but there's a guy whose selling a well made looking custom hasselblad mount view camera on photo.net.  Did you see it?  Yours is miles better of course but the other may be even lighter still.