[DeathToWindows]

Ok, now that I'm off at Uni with access to a good darkroom, I decided to start doing some medium format work... so I went to KEH.com and picked up a Pentax 645 and a 75mm f2.8 lens! The beast (it weighs in at nearly 5lbs) handles like an overgrown 35mm - and I love it.

for those unfamilier with medium format, 645 means a negative that is 6cm x 4.5cm



And it was cheap - $300 (they go for 450+ on ebay)

[ManOfSteal]

[badidea]

Yeah, nice!
I used to have a Kiev 88 because I couldn't afford the original Hasselblad but the quality was by far not as good as I hoped it would be - sold it after a while playing with it!

[wdlove]

Congratulations and enjoy.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by badidea:
Yeah, nice!
I used to have a Kiev 88 because I couldn't afford the original Hasselblad but the quality was by far not as good as I hoped it would be - sold it after a while playing with it!

I still have my Hasselblad from when I did commercial photography although I haven't used it in a while. Medium format does have an edge over 35mm, but with modern film it is much less than it used to be. If you do big enlargements or a lot of black and white you will see the difference, but otherwise you might not. Quite often I found myself using the Hasselblad just because my clients expected to see a big professional camera.

Of course, there are other reasons to use one. The leaf shutter is useful, and the ability to take a polaroid back can be indispensible. Unfortunately, the Pentax 645 has neither. But it does handle faster than a 'Blad.

BTW, if you are ever interested in getting a medium format camera again, the prices on the used market have been coming down. A lot of professional photographers are going digital and offloading their conventional cameras.

[i_rooster]

Originally posted by wdlove:
Congratulations and enjoy.

Do you ever get more original than this?

[brapper]

Originally posted by i_rooster:
Do you ever get more original than this?

buddy, don't be a prick.
wdlove is a good person, get over it.

[DeathToWindows]

Originally posted by badidea:
Yeah, nice!
I used to have a Kiev 88 because I couldn't afford the original Hasselblad but the quality was by far not as good as I hoped it would be - sold it after a while playing with it!

Yeah, I looked at the Kievs - even the rebuilt ones from KievUSA seemed to have a lot of build problems - but you can get a KIEV88 to pentax 645 adapter for lenses... so I'm thinking at some point of dropping $25 on the adaptor and $180 on the Arsat 30mm... or another one of the Arsenal Factory (kiev) lenses...

[macroy]

Originally posted by SimeyTheLimey:
...Medium format does have an edge over 35mm...

I'll say... I recently purchased a scanner to scan my wedding photos (medium format). While I was at it, I did the same with a bunch of 35mm film. Man... the 35mm looks like crap compared to the wedding photos. I'm sure the equipment and the operator also made a difference, but still...

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by macroy:
I'll say... I recently purchased a scanner to scan my wedding photos (medium format). While I was at it, I did the same with a bunch of 35mm film. Man... the 35mm looks like crap compared to the wedding photos. I'm sure the equipment and the operator also made a difference, but still...

Bear in mind when I say based on my experience there is only an edge to medium format over 35mm I am comparing top end equipment with top end equipment. Specifically, I use a Hasselblad with its Zeiss lenses and also a Leica Rangefinder with Leica lenses. That a pretty fair like with like comparison.

I think if you compared a Hasselblad's images with a more run of the mill 35mm camera's negatives you would see a bigger difference. Even with another professional 35mm camera if (as they usually do) it used a zoom lens. Even the top end zooms don't have quite the performance of a top end prime lens.

However, both formats are more than capable of excellent results and I was finding that for a lot of uses -- for example, portraits with enlargements up to about 11x14 -- medium format wasn't really better enough to justify the extra bulk and weight.

[DeathToWindows]

I shoot 35mm with a nikon F4 and Nikon and Sigma glass... the reason I wanted 645 was the fact that I scan all of my negs and more data is always good (i'm doing 13x19's)

[badidea]

If you guys are interested to see the difference between a professional camera like this Linhoff with a Schneider Kreuznach lens (from a friend of mine) and my old Kiev88 you can look at those portrait pictures of myself:

Linhoff (huge because the quality was good enough)
Kiev (small because of crappy quality BUT I do have some better pictures somewhere)

(they have been scanned with an old and cheap Microtek scanner)

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by badidea:
If you guys are interested to see the difference between a professional camera like this Linhoff with a Schneider Kreuznach lens (from a friend of mine) and my old Kiev88 you can look at those portrait pictures of myself:

Linhoff (huge because the quality was good enough)
Kiev (small because of crappy quality BUT I do have some better pictures somewhere)

(they have been scanned with an old and cheap Microtek scanner)

A 4x5 like the Linhof will obviously always beat the smaller formats. That's a big negative. 8x10 would be even better.

BTW, I used to work a block from Schneider's factory. I tried to get a tour but I couldn't arrange it.

[DeathToWindows]

A little dust? But your point is an exceedingly valid one - never settle for small negs!