Silvestri Flexicam experience?

[tom_l]

Tom,

How is the screen on the Silvestri sliding back? Their screens have typically been fairly dark. If you are working tethered it may not matter that much.
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It looks ok to me, I had a look outdoors, everything fine of course, indoors at the table too. I did test the 35mm Digitar (without filter)indoors without additional lights...it was hmmm ok to me, better than the Sinar/P1-Flexadapter ever was, but I can imagine these wide-angle  lenses can be quite tricky with a normal screen.


@ jing q: good question, my back is a V-Mount, so i just rotate it, justlike on the 503cw. hmmm. How can you do this with a H or contax back. I suppose (well i hope) they have inserts like on a P1 flexadapter sliding back. A good question for Silvestri.



tom

[jing q]

I can focus with a 35mm hr in low light (hotel dim lighting). I find that it's helpful to have a black and white board on hand (just about letter size) to put at the point of focus to make focusing easier

that's with the silvestri sliding back on a bicam..I think the screen is the same

[jonstewart]

Newbie (viewcam) question, if you don't mind.

Trying to decide between the Flexicam and Bicam (interior for PC, and product), or perhaps a Cambo. Are there any practical disadvantages with only rise and fall on the 'back standard' and shift on the front, as opposed to being able to do both rise/fall and shift, all on the back standard?

I'm also assuming that tilting the film plane (eg forward) is to tilt the whole camera, and then tilt the front standard back, and that there's no practical difference there between do that and tilting the back standard the direction you want and leaving the front standard with no tilt.

(I've not used a view camera before, but think I just about understand how the principles apply)

I'm also interested in the answer to the question about eh mounting of the back; I have P45 in an AFD mount. Am I stuck to mounting it on these cameras in 'landscape' orientation, as opposed to being able to rotate the mounting plate, and have the back in the portrait orientation. I'm thinking here about using shift on a 35xl to produce a stitched shot of 2-3 individual shots, to use the full image circle and leave a lot of come and go for cropping of the final image.

Listen, thanks to any who help answering; I'm keen to get the right product that suits my needs - I didn't win the lottery last week :-( !
Jon

[jing q]

Newbie (viewcam) question, if you don't mind.

Trying to decide between the Flexicam and Bicam (interior for PC, and product), or perhaps a Cambo. Are there any practical disadvantages with only rise and fall on the 'back standard' and shift on the front, as opposed to being able to do both rise/fall and shift, all on the back standard?

I'm also assuming that tilting the film plane (eg forward) is to tilt the whole camera, and then tilt the front standard back, and that there's no practical difference there between do that and tilting the back standard the direction you want and leaving the front standard with no tilt.

(I've not used a view camera before, but think I just about understand how the principles apply)

I'm also interested in the answer to the question about eh mounting of the back; I have P45 in an AFD mount. Am I stuck to mounting it on these cameras in 'landscape' orientation, as opposed to being able to rotate the mounting plate, and have the back in the portrait orientation. I'm thinking here about using shift on a 35xl to produce a stitched shot of 2-3 individual shots, to use the full image circle and leave a lot of come and go for cropping of the final image.

Listen, thanks to any who help answering; I'm keen to get the right product that suits my needs - I didn't win the lottery last week :-( !
Jon
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I think that having the shift on the back standard rather than front would have been a good idea (for stitching purposes)

the sliding back on my bicam can be taken out and put back on the camera in a portrait position.

Numerous people have pointed out that tilts and swings are unnecessary with such a small sensor (apparently) but I find it more pleasurable to use than adjust in photoshop later.

Not many cameras with a small minimum extension while enabling tilts and swings so the silvestri cameras are good in that aspect.
Not sure what the flange focal distance of the 35mm XL is but I can stitch with my 35mmHR
I've attached an image below, it's about 10mm shifted up and 10mm shifted down with the sensor in landscape position (please forgive the vignetting on the right side...was just testing the quality and maximum image circle of the lens)

[jonstewart]

I've attached an image below, it's about 10mm shifted up and 10mm shifted down with the sensor in landscape position (please forgive the vignetting on the right side...was just testing the quality and maximum image circle of the lens)
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Thanks for the reply, and I assume you weren't using a centre filter for that photo either?

It's interesting being able to remount the sliding back. might have to displace the whole camera from the tripod / stand to make sure the two don't meet.
J

[mshea]

Thanks so much for all your input, folks. You've given me a lot to think about!

Merrill

[jonstewart]

As far as I know, there isn't a stitching back per se for either digital back or Nikon/Canon EOS body. But... you could combine the +/- 23mm vertical shift and the sliding back's horizontal movement to serve in this function IF you can live with reduced shift convenience, imprecise horizontal positioning in the stitching. Can you live with this? There is a measurement scale on the vertical shift movement, but none on the sliding back, so you would either have to do some testing and mark the different positions yourself, or make a hard card or wooden or plastic ruler that would help you understand how much you have shifted the sliding back left or right.

shutay
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If anyone's interested, there IS a stitching back coming for the Bicam in the next month or two, and my dealer is going to ring Mr Silvestri next week and find out the sp on a stitching back for the flexicam.

In the end I started thinking Bicam, but the Schneider 35xl doesn't focus on it but does on the flexicam.


Jon

[tom_l]

#up#

Don't want to open a new topic for this:
Last week I got the Schneider 35mm XL for the Flexicam; I quickly did  a test in the studio (3-4 pictures, really out of focus, moiré, I didn't keep them:-) and was a bit nervous so I took the combo home to do some interior shots at a local gallery yesterday evening. Not very arty, but a good way to get confortable with this combo.
I really will have to get used to focussing I guess. This was a real challenge, 15 sec. exposures, Centerfilter, dark corners, LC correction, bad lightning, shooting to card on P25.
Here two shots, I took 3-4 pictures of every shot. The first one (the one I focussed on) was usually the best. f:11, 15 sec exposure, No sharpening in PS.

- The two standards of the view camera a really REALLY close; shift only on the first photo, shift and lateral tilt on the 2nd. Do see how Tilting can work on a wider lens, there's no place...
- I really need a Flarebuster or Lensshade for the 35mm.
- Focus looks ok to me, but obvisously is a bit trial and error. I really will have to take a notebook on location to check focus. (or hope for a day when we get acceptable screenss  
- This is not a travelling camera, It's not in the same league ass Alpa/Cambo/Sinar Artec. It's a great location view camera, that allows the use of wide-angle lenses too.
- There IS a problem with stitching on the Flexicam, you have to re-focus after shifting the front or rear standard, the barrel of the lens touches/moves the front standard. Unless they bring out an updated sliding back (with stitching capabilty), the Flexicam is not the right tool for stitching.

Tom-

[Zachary Goulko]

Just to stir things up and to add a purty picture to this thread (don't you prefer a book with pictures in it? ).

It's a Silvestri Flexicam with Sliding back and Hasselblad H-mount, with digiBellows mounted over the ground glass. The lens is a Rodenstock Apo-Sironar Digital 4.5/45mm lens. Tripod is a Gitzo as you can see for youself...

The shot is a crop taken out of a shot taken using a Kapture Group Truewide using my Ixpress V96C and a Zeiss ZF 50mm f/1.4 lens. As far as I could tell, the Zeiss lens image circle covered the entire 6x6 ground glass focusing screen.

Interesting,
Recently I've been looking into a Silvestri solution myself. Considering their pricing, and the amount of accessories they offer, this seems to be the best solution for a portable technical camera.

After speaking with the Silvestri USA rep, I was told that the Flexicam could not take a Sliding/Stitching back, due to weight restrictions. Is this not the case?

Ps, Does anyone rent Silvestri equipment in the NYC area?

[jonstewart]

Interesting,
Recently I've been looking into a Silvestri solution myself. Considering their pricing, and the amount of accessories they offer, this seems to be the best solution for a portable technical camera.

After speaking with the Silvestri USA rep, I was told that the Flexicam could not take a Sliding/Stitching back, due to weight restrictions. Is this not the case?

Ps, Does anyone rent Silvestri equipment in the NYC area?

Yes, they will not put / develop a stitching back on the Flexicam, because then it loses the size advantage. Forget the Flexicam, go with a Bicam. Much better piece of kit.