You Can't Do That With MF Redux

[Dick Roadnight]

I wouldn't immediately think of a Hasselblad either as the most appropriate tool for street photography.  That being said, on the website of Leaf I read a testimonial of Lois Greenfield who shoots dance with a Hasselblad 500CM and a Leaf Valeo 22 digital back.  If you can shoot dance with a Hasselblad I guess street photography should be feasible as well...

The waist-level finder helps wit candid photography,m and I intend to shoot a lot of dance and gymnastics with an H4D-60 or CFV-50/555ELD, some with a shutter beam and/or Sinar P3.

[fredjeang]

No no John, I would not contemplate this Blad for com works, but maybe for candid and knowing a different experience.

To confess, I've always had a weird unexplained bad feeling with the 500 series, and therefore avoided them. But in my life, I've been learning that things that provoque such feelings can be very surprising and I've been caught many times saying "why didn't I knew this before?". So...

Is focussing really that nightmare with the backs on the 500?

[John R Smith]

So how do you shoot a 500/cfv combo in portrait orientation without a prism? As I understand, the back can't be mounted that way.

This is a problem, admittedly. When you are shooting film in 6x6 format, the image is square and you do not have to rotate the camera. But the CFV back is effectively 645 and the back is fixed, which is fine if you are using a prism, but using the WLF restricts you to landscape format. However, one of the joys of the old 500s is the huge range of V-System accessories which go along with it, and I have most of them (one reason I am not too keen on the H-System). The little gizmo which helps out here is the Sports Finder, which clips onto the accessory shoe on the L/H side of the camera. Various masks for different focal lengths and formats slot into a frame which you squint through at eye level. So for portrait shots -

* You focus using the WLF magnifier.

* Trigger the mirror pre-release.

* Fold down the WLF.

* Pop-up the Sports Finder.

* Rotate the camera, bring it to eye-level, frame and shoot.

When you have all finished falling about laughing, knowing now that Smith is in fact (as you suspected) completely unhinged, I would add that (with practice) this does actually work quite well. And yes, I do have the usual set of prisms, but they add a lot of weight to the camera, so I tend to use them only when I am working from a tripod.

This shot was taken using the sports finder, for example.

John

[Rob C]

?

Rob, I'm probably being particularly thick, but I didn't understand the bone specialist reference.

EDIT

The light just went on...lugging around two systems.

There, I was being particularly thick!

Back problems... I think I got mine from fashion: not so much a matter of weight of equipment, as that damned awkward shooting position that's somewhere between a squat and a sitting-on-a-stool height. My Rowi of the day was usually set at that low position, but I didn't have three useable legs to copy its easy life.

Rob C