Who hasn't always wanted a Hasselblad?

http://www.hasselblad.com/us/x1d

Well, back before digital I had a couple of Hasselblads. Still have one of them.

But I doubt if I will ever be able to afford this digital one!

The main problem with this, and any non view camera, is distortion. I wish Hasselblad or somebody else would make an affordable small view camera with an affordable digital back.

Affordable? For something that doesn't interest 99.99% of the people who are willing to spend quite a lot on photography equipment, I think it will never happen. There are almost zero economies of scale, only a handful would ever be made, which isn't the formula for "affordable". Small? That would mean a small sensor, which would detract from the image quality obtained from large sensors which can handle diffraction much better. And tilt and swivel bellows/boards will never be small (depending on your idea of small of course) so it would at best be an engineering idea that never happens.

But you can buy a mass produced camera (with a 50 MP or 36MP sensor) and put swivel and tilt bellows and a lens board on it:

http://www.sinar.ch/en/categor...ducts/cameras/p-slr/

The one made by Sinar for the Leica S is an interesting compromise if you've got the budget, probably a result of Leica buying Sinar. Or you can use one of Sinar's adaptors for a large format digital sensor back. But these things will never be affordable, unless 30K+ USD is affordable to you.

Lastly, those old great lenses, whether Leica or Zeiss, that worked so well on film, give barely acceptable results on high MP digital sensors. The fact is, digital sensors require a different lens design and are much more demanding in terms of the light path; they out-resolve film in a significant way and the new lenses are designed around those specific characteristics. Don't believe me, look it up.

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Originally posted by Wink:

Lastly, those old great lenses, whether Leica or Zeiss, that worked so well on film, give barely acceptable results on high MP digital sensors. The fact is, digital sensors require a different lens design and are much more demanding in terms of the light path; they out-resolve film in a significant way and the new lenses are designed around those specific characteristics. Don't believe me, look it up.

Will it work with my D2x and a lens like 28mm F1.4 or 17-35mm F2.8? Always wanted a view camera to fool with.

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they out-resolve film in a significant way

You have to be Naki or Ed's soul brother.

quote:

Originally posted by Wink:
Who hasn't always wanted a Hasselblad?

http://www.hasselblad.com/us/x1d

I had a complete system and used 6x6 slides a lot for 15 or so years. Then I converted to a digital projector and never looked back. D2x is adequate for presentations.

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Originally posted by DOPPELGANGSTER:

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they out-resolve film in a significant way

You have to be Naki or Ed's soul brother.

Just some more info for the popcorn eaters:

https://petapixel.com/2015/05/...s-and-disadvantages/

Little boxes, no matter how small do not a picture make- so I tinker with the digital camera to get the exposure exactly right, then I take a real picture with the Hasselblad 500 and my hoard of 120 film.

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Originally posted by Ray B:
Little boxes, no matter how small do not a picture make- so I tinker with the digital camera to get the exposure exactly right, then I take a real picture with the Hasselblad 500 and my hoard of 120 film.

Meaning that you use a digital camera as an exposure meter? I'm betting that works just fine if you're shooting negatives in your Hasselblad and the dynamic range of the DSLR is similar to that of the film you are using. But if you're shooting positive film you might notice slight differences:

https://petapixel.com/2016/12/...ained-plain-english/

I still shoot film occasionally, metering for the shadows with negatives, metering for the highlights with transparencies. The good thing about DSLRs is that most have two or three metering modes, including spot metering.

It's weird I get some of my nicest pictures from a Nikon 35-70 F2.8 lens.

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Originally posted by richj:
It's weird I get some of my nicest pictures from a Nikon 35-70 F2.8 lens.

I bought the same lens a few months ago (used of course) giving me a great three zoom lens set: 16-35mm f/4, 35-70mm f/2.8 and 70-200mm f/4.

If the 14-24mm, 24-70mm and the 70-200mm f/2.8s are the Holy Trinity, then mine make up the Mini Trinity. All mine are sharp, vibration reduction on the both the low end and the high end and no breaks or overlap in a relatively compact set going from 16mm to 200mm. The 35-70 f/2.8 is a little bit of a sleeper with little renown. Old fashioned rugged construction, fast aperture (but a push-pull zoom where the front element rotates with focus which isn't always a good thing and the autofocus isn't as zippy as the AF-S lenses), sits on my D700. What's not to like? Good for me, I got it cheap.



Above is my mini trinity in a LowePro Flipside 300 backpack. It's a good travel kit for just about everything but wildlife photography. Would a pro use this combination? No way. He'd replace the mid-range zoom with a smaller, lighter, fast prime like a 50mm f/1.4 for low-light situations.