Hasselblad C/M or Leica M-240 for landscape

[250swb]

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If you really want to get into landscape photography, a 4x5 is well worth considering, but at that point you really will be tempted to have drum scans done, and you need to take that expense into account. Every large format photographer that I know in New York is going the drum scan route for work they want to show.

 

You don't need drum scans, especially if the idea is to sidestep the pointless pixel war and find some satisfaction from using film and grain and exploiting the characteristics of film artistically. Drum scans and ultra large prints are simply about using film until the death knell can be heard and the increasing quality of digital takes over entirely.

 

This whole conversation is threaded through with the trendy 'how big can you print' debate like a pissing contest. It's only relatively recently that ultra large inkjet prints were routinely and cheaply possible, and in the days of film ultra large pictures would have been a specialist and expensive job. But a 16x 20 'conventional' sized landscape print can be made with an Epson V700 and if skilfully done nobody will know its not be made with a drum scanner. Indeed just because it is 4x5 film it isn't an automatic pre-requisite that the film should even be the finest grain, grain can be used expressively, just as tone can, like in any other film format. Certainly the people using wet plate techniques nowadays aren't overly concerned by image degradation and peeping at tiny details.

 

So I really think using film should be seen as an alternative form of expression and not a tandem exercise in pixel peeping where you're trying to use similar standards for two different media. What you do with digital doesn't have to be the same as what you do with film, and now is a better time than ever to stop competing and just take each for what it is.

 

Steve

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[chris_tribble]

Julian - many thanks. I noticed a mint Yashica 124G in London with working meter for £250. I was tempted. As others have said, developing tanks are cheap and easily available and I can get access to a darkroom. So maybe keeping the whole thing analogue will be a good way of scratching this particular itch

[pgk]

I've been playing with the idea of getting a Hasselblad and working with film again ..... I have been asking myself whether, apart from the pleasure of the thing (it's a beautiful piece of engineering) and the fun (?) of messing with a chemical dark room again, it would be worth the effort.

Are you sure that you are not viewing the concept through rose-tinted glasses and with some nostalgia for what were undoubtedly superb cameras? I do own one film camera (an M4), but having tried shooting film on occasion I have, somewhat reluctantly, come to the conclusion that for me the reality of shooting film no longer lives up to the expectations of doing so (I'll keep the M4 for very occasional use though - for when I want to convince myself that film is no longer for me!).

 

My own feeling is that part of the problem is the relative ease of digital shooting. The immediacy of review means that the careful consideration which film entailed, because it took time to see what the image was like, has to some extent at least, gone and this sometimes has, I suspect, a tendency to make me not value the point of taking the image in the same way as I used to.

 

Having owned and used Hasselblads in the past I fully understand the desire to use one (again) but I know that for myself the reality of doing so would sadly not live up to expectation.

[mustafasoleiman]

Could one use a 500C/M Hasselblad body with a digital back? Are they very expensive?

I used to have a SWC/M and I loved it, so I would love to play with a regular Hasselblad, but I see the problem of using film.

[wattsy]

Could one use a 500C/M Hasselblad body with a digital back? Are they very expensive?

 

I think yes is the short answer.

[Julian H]

Julian - many thanks. I noticed a mint Yashica 124G in London with working meter for £250. I was tempted. As others have said, developing tanks are cheap and easily available and I can get access to a darkroom. So maybe keeping the whole thing analogue will be a good way of scratching this particular itch

 

Chris

 

£250 is way too much. Have some fun on ebay, remember this is only an experiment at this stage!

 

Julian

[honcho]

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..... Are they very expensive?

.......

 

Compared to what?

 

Used MFD prices are falling. So is the argument for investing in the hardware now. I would rather use my 503CW with film than a digital back. It does with film what it cannot do with a digital back. I create square images and I can use my lenses at their intended a-o-v. If I want large digital files, thanks to Nikon changing the game, I no longer need to spend silly money for almost MFD comparable digital quality.

 

I could spend around £2k on an old CFV-16 back or £3-3.5k on a used CFV-22 and shoot my 503CW digitally. This would give me either 16 or 22mp, but portrait format is not convenient and I would lose my wide angle lens option. I could also spend around £3200 on a used, low count H3D-31 and have far better file quality in an ergonomically superior package to the 503CW/CFV-16/22. A similar outlay would get a D800E in an arguably more versatile package, and, with care, comparable file quality to the HD3-31.

 

I like using my 503CW just the way it was intended. With film.

[pgk]

Could one use a 500C/M Hasselblad body with a digital back? Are they very expensive?

Yes, and 'it depends'. Older digital backs can be had for the price on an M8 body, or even less, but their interfaces can be older types (even SCSI), they may not be all that many MPixels and support may well be limited from what I've read. I've been tempted when I've seen one going 'cheap' but there's generally a good reason for the price even if they work well.

[AlanJW]

Chris: Your Leica is just fine for landscapes (unless you are going to print truly gigantic; I went (once) as large as 48 x 36 on a landscape with an M8 and the M(240) is better) but I understand the romantic notion of MF film. But for me, it is indeed a romantic notion. Every time I have gone back to any kind of film camera, it lasts month or two and I end up scratching my head and saying, "why did I do that?" I'd see if you could rent or borrow for a while to see how committed you will be to film. I'll be interested to hear how you made out.

[honcho]

.....Older digital backs can be had for the price on an M8 body, or even less.....

 

 

Older backs are often limited to being tethered to a computer, at best connected to an image bank. Add expensive cables that like to fail at the wrong time, low resolution, limited iso, poor dr, mould growing on the sensor, sticking masks on the vf screen....etc, etc.

 

My experience of owning an Imacon V96c when it was 'state of the art' brings back nightmares.

 

The idea is far too expensive to contemplate. At any price.

[algrove]

Could one use a 500C/M Hasselblad body with a digital back? Are they very expensive?

I used to have a SWC/M and I loved it, so I would love to play with a regular Hasselblad, but I see the problem of using film.

 

In Short Yes and definitely yes. I use a V mount Phase One P45+ on an SWC/M and 503CW. Even the new IQ250 Phase One back can be ordered for use with V mount. The 503CW is the one Blad taking interchangeable lenses that many go for these days.

 

Good used P45+ can go for US10k. The new PO digital back goes for $35k!

[Guest redge]

You don't need drum scans, especially if the idea is to sidestep the pointless pixel war and find some satisfaction from using film and grain and exploiting the characteristics of film artistically. Drum scans and ultra large prints are simply about using film until the death knell can be heard and the increasing quality of digital takes over entirely.

 

This whole conversation is threaded through with the trendy 'how big can you print' debate like a pissing contest. It's only relatively recently that ultra large inkjet prints were routinely and cheaply possible, and in the days of film ultra large pictures would have been a specialist and expensive job. But a 16x 20 'conventional' sized landscape print can be made with an Epson V700 and if skilfully done nobody will know its not be made with a drum scanner. Indeed just because it is 4x5 film it isn't an automatic pre-requisite that the film should even be the finest grain, grain can be used expressively, just as tone can, like in any other film format. Certainly the people using wet plate techniques nowadays aren't overly concerned by image degradation and peeping at tiny details.

 

So I really think using film should be seen as an alternative form of expression and not a tandem exercise in pixel peeping where you're trying to use similar standards for two different media. What you do with digital doesn't have to be the same as what you do with film, and now is a better time than ever to stop competing and just take each for what it is.

 

Steve

 

The reason that people have drum scans and high-end flatbed wet scans made is that they want to digitize as much of the information in the negative as possible and also reduce the time spent cleaning up the scan. I have an Epson, but concluded fairly quickly that it is great for proofing, but otherwise has significant shortcomings. Apart from the fact that it extracts less information from the negative, one has to purchase third party film holders just to keep the negatives flat, wet scanning on it is a pain, people wind up using pennies to adjust the height of the holders, and if you want to spend your life dust busting, Epson dry scans are a good way to start. For 35mm and medium format, the discontinued Nikon scanner is a much better choice, but is not inexpensive.

 

I think that the best solution for someone who wants to shoot film larger than 35mm, but who doesn't want to hire an analog or digital printer, is to shoot 8x10 and make contact prints. The cameras and lenses are inexpensive, and contact printing is really cheap and really easy (well, except for the skill part) and can be done just about anywhere (I've done it in my bathroom). I'd also suggest 5x7 if one finds the proportions attractive (I do; incidentally, 5x7 was Paul Strand's preferred format) and the print size adequate, but sourcing 5x7 film has become somewhat problematic. The format, compared to 4x5 and 8x10, has unfortunately become marginalized.

[Printmaker]

Chris,

Every time I see a nice Blad kit at a bargain price, I get the same itch. My 4x5 setup is strictly studio and my M9 covers most everything else. Yet there is something about an old 500CM that brings me back to my early days. The square format, looking down while shooting from the hip, photographing people from a lower and often more interesting perspective, there is a lot this old camera has going for it.

 

However, it is not a great tool for a working pro who has to deliver files in an hour's time day in and day out. But as a weekend or special project tool, well you can sure do a lot of great work with this camera. Nudes, portraits and landscapes are the perfect subject matter.

[BerndReini]

I have many different cameras and formats. As far as resolution, digital probably beats film hands down, but there is a look to film that somehow cannot be replicated. Every time I massage a digital file with tons of post-processing, plugins, digital grain etc. to get the subtle pastel colors and gradation of a medium format negative, I ask myself why I didn't shoot film in the first place.

 

In the end, I'm doing this for myself. This is my hobby and there is nothing wrong with just enjoying that wonderful mechanical piece of art that is a Hasselblad and not trying to quantify the experience. Buy one and shoot some film. If you shoot selectively, it will cost less than the depreciation of your M and whatever digital camera that succeeds it.

[KM-25]

I shoot two 501CM’s and a 500ELX for aerial landscape work, all professionally for hand crafted black and white prints. Even though I use my 4x5 quite a bit, the Hasselblad V system just does it for me, fantastic glass, great components and *cheap* as heck now. 4x5 is certainly wonderful for landscape work, but I find the Hassy V system to be a lot more productive, less dust prone...

 

I have shot some landscape work with my D800 and while it is nice, digital prints just do nothing for me and certainly nothing for my income. But black and white film through my Blads result in simply delicious silver gel prints and they conversely bring in a great income.

 

I just can’t take any digital landscape seriously when one can hand craft incredible prints, but that is just me. Also, I don't care for RF gear for the exacting work of landscapes. I had a Fuji GSW690III and could not stand the detached feeling when homing in on the details that can make a great landscape, my M3 does not get that much landscape work for that matter either.

 

My wife took this photo while I was shooting from 15,000 feet at dawn last week...

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[250swb]

I have an Epson, but concluded fairly quickly that it is great for proofing, but otherwise has significant shortcomings.

 

I'm sure if you have stuck with it and used it within its comfort zone you'd have got better. I'm not saying an Epson V700 competes with a drum scanner (although I have seen some pretty cack handed drum scans), but I am saying film shouldn't compete with digital. As such the necessity to gather every tiny ounce of information isn't always needed if the results can't show it. The collectors preferred size of print is no more than 16x20, and the Epson can easily render the detail and tones from a 4x5 such that a drum scan is pointless at that size. Now of course it requires you tailor a workflow to match the equipment, from film, exposure, developer, development, to software and some skill. But that is a simple darkroom regime, if you've never done it you wouldn't understand.

 

Steve

[wlaidlaw]

I have been very disappointed in the so called “professional” drum scans I have had done recently from 120 film taken with either my 3.5E (Zeiss Planar) Rolleiflex or Graflex Century (80mm f2.8 Zeiss Tessar) and 6 x 9cm Singer roll back. I have tried two local companies who certainly know how to charge for these scans but don’t appear to know how to produce a quality end product. The quality of the scans I received was nowhere near what I can get from Leica lenses and the M240.

 

In spite of my asking for uncompressed TIFF’s, the first company gave me CD’s with highly compressed 3.5 MB JPEG’s on them. When I complained I was told “but they will expand up to the original scan size”. Words were exchanged when I asked them if they thought that, as someone who has used digital photography for over 14 years, I was totally ignorant of the implications of lossy compression and JPEG artefacts. The TIFF scans from the second company appeared to be in focus in parts but not in others, so I suspect the film was not being held properly flat on the scanning drum.

 

Film has become such a tiny part of the business of the few remaining professional processing and printing companies, that I suspect nobody really knows how to operate the equipment properly and has had little practice. For people like me who only bring in a few films a year I also feel that there is a “he’s not a significant customer” attitude accompanied by “oh the scans are not very good but who cares.”

 

Does anyone know of a scanning company in the UK, who does a consistently high quality job? There are people around who do care, for example Paul O’Sullivan at MS Hobbies, the sub-miniature specialists, who has built himself a custom rig, using a Minox enlarger and a Nikon D800 camera body to be able to digitise his customers’ 8 x 11mm negatives with good results. I have not had a digital darkroom with my own Epson V700 flat bed films scanner to do my own scanning for a year now, due to my grandson using it for his bedroom while his mother and father build their new house. I was less than wholly impressed with my own scanning results anyway, getting Newton’s rings issues from the glass film holding plates on the BetterScanning MF scanning frame. I see they now offer Anti Newtons’ rings glass.

 

Wilson

[keithlaban.co.uk]

 

Does anyone know of a scanning company in the UK, who does a consistently high quality job?

 

Drum scanning service, custom drum scans on Heidelberg Primescan/Tango, picture copying & limited edition fine prints - Precision Drum Scanning

 

I used them for years. Highly professional, great service, superb scans.

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[Manolo Laguillo]

I am going to look at this topic from a slightly different point of view. Excuse me for pointing to the obvious right in the beginning, but in a 2nd moment you will understand what I mean...

 

There are 2 routes for making a print from film:

 

1. via an enlarger (chemical path)

2. making a digitalization of it (digital path)

 

If we are forced to take the 2nd path, the digital one, because it would be a mess to arrange a lab, or for whatever reason, then there are again 2 routes for digitizing a film:

 

2a. with a scanner

2b. reproducing it with a digital camera

 

This 2nd method is the one I use for my 6x9, 6x12, 4x5 and 8x10 negatives, both color and B&W, from the past. The savings in time are huge (no need to wait for the scanner doing its job), and the look a digital camera offers is nicer than the one delivered by a scanner.

I use now the MM with a Focotar II and a Viso III for B&W, the M240 with the 100 Apo-Macro-R for color, but the M9 +Viso III & Elmar 65 rendered beautifully as well.

Flatness and parallelism are easily achieved. Retouching is in both cases mandatory, of course.

 

The question now is: why with film when at the end we are going to use the Leica digital M's for digitizing it?

 

Conclusion: I would use film only if I had a darkroom.

 

And despite everything said, I understand you, Chris :-)

 

I bought a beautiful chrome M6ttl, completely new, and used it only for 2 rolls...

Now it's sold, and it's ok.

[mwilliamsphotography]

The tactile experience of working with a precision tool of the mechanical age like a V camera (either a 503CW or 203FE in my case) was, and still is, part of the appeal … and for me was the hardest part of letting all that go a few years ago.

 

I have similar fond memories of working with M film cameras. The very act of winding a M with its smooth mechanical feel and snap back is much missed.

 

Today's digital cameras can't seem to muster up that tactile connection to the photographic process of shooting … it all feels so impersonal and homogenized. An aspect many younger photographers probably do not get, because they never had the chance to form that long term connection to photographic tools that remained unchanged for decades. Today, ever mutating digital cameras have the lifespan of Mayfly.

 

Frankly, I don't miss the whole darkroom gestalt … while it sounds romantic, and the results do stand alone IMO, it does take a certain mind set, and most certainly the patience of a saint, coupled with the serenity of Buddha to enjoy mastering it. Way to many steps between what you saw and what the end result looks like … especially after being spoiled by the immediate need gratification of digital capture.

 

The above is why I don't shoot with film anymore. I shoot 100% digital now because I am lazy and impatient … not because it is better. There, I said what most won't admit.

 

Debates regarding IQ comparisons are so subjective, and there are so many variables and misguided opinions, as to make it simply a personal observation at best.

 

Personally, I've never approached the sheer "presence" of a well crafted B&W neg shot from my V cameras printed on traditional silver print paper. OR even as scanned on my now sold Imacon 949 scanner, and laser printed to silver halide paper. Notably, the frame of reference for my opinions are digital comparisons from cameras such as the Hasselblad H4D/60 and Leica S2 … let alone a M240 or any other 35mm digital camera. I have a number of B&W silver prints from past icons of photography on my walls that are a constant reminder of this. I simply admire them, shrug my shoulders and accept that I'm to lazy and impatient to try and do that anymore.

 

Also, personally, with a few exceptions, I find a huge amount of digital landscape work excruciatingly boring (which has less to do with the tools I'm sure). Landscape imagery is probably one of the most challenging types out there now because so many do it, especially now that digital has proliferated everywhere. There seems to be an obsession with regimented perfection that has superseded emotional presentation in such works … yet I even question this "perfection" business since in all the times I've visited one gallery after another from LA, Chicago and NYC, to London and Paris, I have yet to see any landscape print from any digital camera that approaches the shimmering presence of Ansel Adam's silver prints … and I don't even like his work all that much. They may exist, but I've yet to encounter any.

 

Also of interest is that the professional landscape shooter that replied here, who touts the difference film makes, goes largely unheard. Perhaps testimony that the underlying reason to continue with digital is the same as mine … laziness and impatience … not some deep and driving desire to produce something that matches a unique vision which film may better accommodate?

 

Anyway, all very personal, so YMMV.

 

- Marc