Film What to do with a Summicron?

Congratulations on finding a nice Bessa at a nice price. If you're still looking for a digital camera to use that lens on, I'd suggest a Sony NEX with a Leica-mount adaptor. Either a new C3 or 5N with Sony's great 16mp sensor or you can save money and pick up a used NEX 3 or NEX 5. A lot of people are using classic glass on NEXs, all of which have APS-C sensors, which would give your Summicron a 53mm angle of view. I think there are a few samples with your lens at these links:

Nex-5c + Leica Summicron 35mm f2.0 ASPH

Sony NEX5 + Leica Summicron 35mm/f2

Of course, it's all manual focus with classic glass, but with focus peaking mode, it's not hard on the Sony NEXs.
 
Thanks Biro.
The difficulty with the Sony cameras for me is that when I look at them, I simply never have an urge to pick one up and take photographs with it ... this'll probably be my last significant photographic purchase for some time, but if I play the "money isn't a major problem" game, I suppose the GXR M-mount or perhaps the Fuji X-Pro would be more to my taste ... but I suppose we had better not veer too much into digi-land in a film thread :)
 
thanks Barrie.
The edge crops were very interesting to me.
On the E-P2 my Summicron goes a bit at the edges, but not terribly badly; However my CV Ultron (28/1.9) is very soft indeed at the edges at f/2, and still noticeably so at smaller apertures.
The rear element of the Ultron protrudes significantly more than that of the Summicron.
The two things may be connected, but my understanding of lens design and sensors is scant in the extreme.
 
That's what I had assumed, but every time I've tried to think about the geometry my head started to hurt and I had to go and lie down in a darkened room. So I'll just take it as read now that I have confirmation from an engineer
 
Perhaps I should have started a new thread to say "What I've done with my Summicron" ...

My Bessa R2A arrived today. A very handsome thing it is too, slightly chunkier than the E-P2 and definitely heavier; but also very solidly built - it feels good in the hand.
It is also - so far as I can tell - in perfect, almost unused condition, without a mark to tell that it hasn't come straight from the factory.

The vendor, as promised, enclosed some film ... a roll of 36 of each of Ilford FP4+, HP5+ & Delta100, and a roll of T-MAX 100.
As I had warmed to Russ' suggstion of using a C-41 film for the first few shots, I decided to put those in the 'fridge and took a stroll down to Boots ... where I found several rolls of XP2 Super on the clearance shelf at £3.50 each ... so I now have a few of those on ice too ...

Hmm there's nothing like a new toy to get a middle-aged man excited, is there? Next, I think I need a Harley and a 17-year-old girlfriend who "really understands me" ...

This is what it looks like ... (spot the mistake and you get a coconut) ...

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Hmm ... I wonder how you take photographs with it though?
 
This is what it looks like ... (spot the mistake and you get a coconut) ...

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Hmm ... I wonder how you take photographs with it though?

Ok, I'll play. The body cap is on sideways instead of right side up.

As to how you take photographs with it, it's easy:

1. Load it with your favorite film.
2. Set the ISO
3. Set the shutter speed dial to "A."
4. Make sure that your selection of finder lines corresponds to the lens you have mounted on.
5. Point the camera at your subject.
6. Focus by lining up the double image in the rangefinder spot.
7. Choose an appropriate aperture depending on the depth of field desired or need to stop motion. The camera will kindly let you know what SS it has selected.
8. Press the shutter release. Advance the film to be ready for the next shot.

I am sure you were being facetious. So am I. ;). Of course, the fun comes after the shooting (develop, scan or wet print.)

Enjoy the camera! It is a great one.

Cheers,

Antonio
 
Paul,

Quick question for you: Does your R2a have the double hinged or single hinged rewind crank? If it has the double hinged crank, is it spring loaded or loose?

My R2a has the double hinged crank which is not spring loaded and therefore loose. I want to know whether that is a defect or not.

Thanks!

Antonio
 
Well, to be honest Antonio, I'm not sure what a double-hinged crank would look like, but it's certainly not spring loaded on mine; a quick look at Cameraquest.com says that the double-hinged crank was fitted to the r3a and later cameras though ... which must be incorrect if you have a double-hinged R2a ?
 
Oh and no coconut for you, Sir, you already have them in CR ... I'll have to think about a more suitable prize
 
First thoughts ...

First thoughts ... bearing in mind that I haven't even finished the first roll yet! ... I hope all the "old hands" who are proper photographic craftspeople will forgive me my naivety

As context, I started taking photos pretty young, using "instamatic" type 126 cameras, then moved to using a 35mm Werra viewfinder camera, and then in my 30s a Pentax P30T (35mm SLR) with a kit 50mm, a kit zoom that I guess was 28-80?, and a 300mm cat; Dunno what happened to that lot ... then used an Olympus μ[mju]-1 P&S AF 35mm (I've still got that, it's got a roll of film in it and no battery); Didn't really take many photos again 'til I got a Canon IXUS750 (SD550) in 2006. Never used a rangefinder.

BUT ... I never learned the craft of photography; I have always understood very basic optics , of the relationship between film speed, aperture and shutter speed; but always got stuff printed in local labs or by post. Never learned darkroom D&P, despite having an older brother who did his own D&P (and who gave me the Werra); never joined a club, never took a class. I tend to learn things pretty superficially I'm afraid ..

Getting the E-P2 in 2010, I took the idea of "photography" a bit more seriously (rather than simply "taking snaps" ... though I still do mostly that). I use a camera daily, and capture a lot of images.

So handling the Bessa ... it's very strange ... There's nothing to do!

If I leave it in A-mode, there's nothing else to look at (except the object of my interest) or change (apart from the focus) ... when I have my eye to the viewfinder, my thiumb still keeps looking for the E-P2's "focus assist zoom" button ... muscle memory ... it seems hard to keep the RF box centred and bright enough to focus, and I couldn't for the life of me find focus on my favourite pigs ... I expect that those will be practice-makes-perfect issues, as will keeping the framelines in mind ... I had expected my first rolls to be all over the place exposure-wise, but now I suspect a lot of shots will be way off focus ... mind you, with XP2 Super and decent light, perhaps I can get away with leaving the aperture at f/8 and the focus racked open to infinity all the time ...

It does feel odd not being able to see through the lens ... it particularly means that I can't judge the degree of flare I might be getting when shooting towards the light (my Summicron is sensitive to flare), so I need to learn to be more conservative in my picture-taking habits.

What has slightly surprised me is how embedded the "digital mindset" has become ... I've almost found myself thinking of the Bessa and film as digital equipment, just means of exposing media to make images that will be turned into TIFFs that I can then process in LR ... :eek: ... this almost overwhelmed me until I realised the absurdity of it!

So, I think I'll just get my local 24-hour shop to develop & print 6x4s, and do their usual low-res scan to cd at the same time ... a develop & hi-res scan from a specialist lab seems to cost anything from £18-£25 for a roll of 36 ... which seems mad (6 rolls at that rate buys a decent USB scanner) ...
 
So handling the Bessa ... it's very strange ... There's nothing to do! If I leave it in A-mode, there's nothing else to look at (except the object of my interest) or change (apart from the focus) ... when I have my eye to the viewfinder, my thiumb still keeps looking for the E-P2's "focus assist zoom" button ... muscle memory ... it seems hard to keep the RF box centred and bright enough to focus, and I couldn't for the life of me find focus on my favourite pigs ... I expect that those will be practice-makes-perfect issues, as will keeping the gridlines in mind ... I had expected my first rolls to be all over the place exposure-wise, but now I suspect a lot of shots will be way off focus ... mind you, with XP2 Super and decent light, perhaps I can get away with leaving the aperture at f/8 and the focus racked open to infinity all the time ...

It does feel odd not being able to see through the lens ... it particularly means that I can't judge the degree of flare I might be getting when shooting towards the light (my Summicron is sensitive to flare), so I need to learn to be more conservative in my picture-taking habits.

What has slightly surprised me is how embedded the "digital mindset" has become ... I've almost found myself thinking of the Bessa and film as digital equipment, just means of exposing media to make images that will be turned into TIFFs that I can then process in LR ... :eek: ... this almost overwhelmed me until I realised the absurdity of it!

So, I think I'll just get my local 24-hour shop to develop & print 6x4s, and do their usual low-res scan to cd at the same time ... a develop & hi-res scan from a specialist lab seems to cost anything from £18-£25 for a roll of 36 ... which seems mad (6 rolls at that rate buys a decent USB scanner) ...

Paul,

You raise some interesting points. Curiously, some of these are thoughts that I myself have had.

I believe the main issue is the question of why, in this digital era, are you desirous of using a film camera. Only you can answer that, but in my case there are two main reasons: (1) the joy of using a simple and direct picture making machine; and (2) the look of B&W film, even when scanned.

As to the first reason, it ties in directly with your comment that in handling the Bessa "there is nothing to do." That's precisely the point. I have tried to teach my son the basics of photography, which (apart from artistic and compositional considerations) is basically the relationship between film (or sensor) speed, aperture, shutter speed, and focus. When I told him that a camera has three basic controls: focus, shutter speed and aperture, he asked where those were in his digital camera which, of course, had no direct control of any of the three functions.

Shooting with a camera such as the Bessa which requires you to, at a minimum, choose an aperture value, forces you to think about depth of field and subject (or camera) motion. Even if you use it in "A" mode, you should still think about how your choice affects the image. Of course, there is no reason why you should not do this with your digital camera, but the temptation to use "P" and let the camera think for you is significant.

I really enjoy having direct and tactile control of SS, aperture and focus, and that is one of the reasons for shooting with classic film cameras. Additionally, and admittedly this is a much more frivolous reason, there is also something to how the camera feels in the hand. I am sure that moving the aperture and focus rings on that Summicron is a very sensual experience. At the end of the day, it probably makes no difference to the quality of the photographs you take, but is an important part of the experience.

As to my second reason, I have found that properly exposed B&W film, even when scanned into a digital file, has a tonality and look that I cannot easily recreate with my digital cameras. You can see it on screen, and you can definitely see it in the prints I am making with my Epson 3800. I think if you go through my flickr stream, it would not be hard to identify the film shots from the digital shots based on the look alone. Of course, this requires careful scanning, which is not the most straightforward process in the world. I do not have the space for a darkroom, so wet printing is out of the question for me.

However, I do not feel the same way about color. I believe that, in most cases, digital is the way to go for color.

As to focusing the Bessa, give it some time and you will get the hang of it. It's easy and very effective once you get used to it.

I believe that if you are going to pursue film photography seriously, unless you intend to set up a darkroom, you should look into getting a decent scanner and doing your scans yourself. Unless things are different on your side of the pond, you will not get satisfactory scans from a 24 hour shop, and you will only get frustrated trying to fix them in post. In addition, machine prints will not show the potential in your negatives. On Barrie's recommendation, I recently purchased a Plustek 7600i film scanner which I have found to be excellent. Not very expensive, either. Prior to that, I had been using an Epson V500 which is not as good as the Plustek, but decent in its own right.

Keep us posted as you continue on your journey and please start posting some of your shots in the Fun with film cameras thread.

Cheers,

Antonio
 
Congrats on the Bessa, Paul!!! It's a fine camera. I wholeheartedly agree with the recommendations about the Ilford XP2 as well.

I love film as well. It's got such an unique look to it. But it's a pain in the butt to not have instant gratification -- take the film to the shop, then get negatives back, scan, get them in TIFF, and then clean up all the dust marks and scratches (thanks to Walgreens) ... But I love the look!! I have an Epson V500. Decent scanner, but rather slow.

The beautify of not seeing through the lens with the RF is that everything is always on focus. Which really helps for composition purposes. Also helps to see beyond the frame line, so that you can see as things approach the frame. Of course the con is that the frame lines aren't the most accurate when it comes to composition too!

Looking forward to seeing your photos Paul!
 
Paul,

I can only echo what Antonio has said. Sadly I'm Bessa-less at the moment due to this apparent film fogging issue, but the very act of setting aperture and with it depth of field leads, I believe, to much more considered photography. Also black and white is much more about composition and light than colour photography, many colour photographs rely for their impact on the colour alone, take that away and they often fall flat in compositional terms, and therefore in their true impact.

I'm looking at an old Mamiya Press body, 90mm f/3.5 lens and 6x9 roll film back at the moment, it just needs some 120 roll film and a 40.5mm yellow filter and it's a runner, serious yes, compact no :)

I am becoming dissatisfied with digital in terms of producing the tones of a good black and white photograph, colour is another matter as is macro, I would still use digital in those circumstances. The greater involvement that comes from having an old fashioned lens with engraving on the barrel is what sold me on m4/3, in other words the ability to use a legacy lens. I started with a folding roll film Voigtlander 6x9, zone focused, my next camera was a Mamiya Press, then a Leica M3 so for me rangefinder focusing is second nature.

Hang in there and give it a fair trial. The main thing I was getting wrong during the short time I was able to use my Bessa was not to wind on between shots, so digital imprinting has taken its toll with me as well.

Barrie
 
How gratiying to have such thoughtful responses ... thank you Antonio, Armando and Barrie ...

it's always interesting business, finding out motivations for choices ... as I said in the first post on this thread, much of the reason for considering this route was having a beautiful Leica lens which did not give of it's best on m4/3, but of course, like everything, there are other considerations that contributed ... and a very significant one was that "tone" (using that word rather loosely) of film , especially B&W ... the Foveon sensor in my Sigma might come close, but there is something else that goes on, which is I think to do with the fact that film is an analogue medium ... but then it would be hard to understand how the "tone" survives translation to digital, which it clearly does ...

I think it's correct that B&W forces one to consider form more carefully ... although having said that, colour can assist what I often try and do, which is to try and capture "found abstraction" ... and having so little to do can similarly help ... there are a lot of distractions on a digital camera - live view, being able to change so much on the fly - ISO, WB, SS, f/stop, aspect ratio, metering mode, colour rendition - let alone focus assist of various kinds, review, histogram, level gauges etc., etc. ... clearly, one does not have to actually use all (or any) of these things, but finding my thumb looking for a "zoom" button brought it home to me that sometimes I'm looking more for perfect focus than for a perfect composition ...

I don't at all think the consideration of one's tactile response to a camera is remotely frivolous ... I've often said that I bought the E-P2 because when I picked it up, I didn't want to put it down, and that's still true ... and the Bessa is a delight to pick up too ... so I'm certainly not put off by the experience thus far, in fact I know that with my past 3 cameras (the IXUS, the E-P2, and the Sigma) I spent the first month or 6 weeks taking terrible photographs (exposure and focus all hashed up) until I "got" them ... and I too keep forgetting to wind the damn thing on ...

No doubt the lo-res scans of my local processor will have terrible shortcomings, but they are 100 yards from my door, and I can always get the negs scanned again in the future, but I do want to be able to see what I'm producing and post them online ... I have had a look at scanners, and they are a bit out of reach at the moment, although a PlusTek 7200i SE can be had relatively inexpensively on eBay ...

The thing I have really found myself missing, though, is the 90° tip-up VF-2 ... a week only being able to use an eye-level vf underlines just how often I shoot looking down into the vf at chest-level ... I like a lower angle point of view ...

A last consideration for reverting to film is archival ... I worked for many years in IT, and I saw technology change and change and change ... there are still mechanical 35mm cameras nearly 90 years old able to capture images on film ... I'd be interested to know how many current digital cameras are still functional in 90 years time ... or even if they could work, whether there are batteries and chargers still extant .... or if equipment still exists to read SD cards, CDs or DVDs ... or if software still exists that can read and display a jpeg or even a DNG ... yet there are photographs on paper in my possession that are 100 years old ... of course one does not have to use film to create a print, but the important thing is to print ...
 
On focus and framing with the Bessa, or any other RF camera- it takes practice, patience, experimentation, and a little luck.

Bessa R2, Canon 50/1.5 at F2.



One-handed operation, because my other hand was holding up Nikki's foot as she went across the money bars. Preset the focus, moved the camera until the eyes were in focus in the RF patch. Have fun with it, "feedback loop" of analyzing each roll and planning for the next helps. With the RF, some care is needed to focus on the point of interest, then reposition the camera for framing. Shooting at F5.6 helps while getting used to the different (ancient) focus mechanism.

And the Summicron 5cm F2, at F4- on the Leica M3.



Again-prefocus, just waited for the image to come together. Just think of yourself as an O-scope that triggers on the image coming together.
 
thanks for that, Brian.

Well, just got back from the local minilab shop clutching a set of processed & scanned negatives (from XP2) in my hot little hand ... rather low-res but good enough to see what's going on and post a few here ... https://www.photographerslounge.org/f93/fun-film-cameras-image-thread-62/index20.html#post68536

First thing was a certain amount of surprise at how much grain was present in some shots; for whatever reason I was expecting less grain, but equally I expecting it to be consistent over the whole roll ...

I loaded them into LR3 (LR4 is a sore point at the moment) . As small jpegs, they won't take much processing, and I didn't really want to do much to them anyway ... but the second thing to notice was almost every usable in-focus shot needed to have exposure backed off by around a whole stop to bring highlight detail back; most of them also benefited from reducing contrast and a bit of fill light.

Because I don't know enough about scanning film, or about using XP2, I wondered whether this was going to be as a result of the film itself (in which case I might try underexposing a bit on the next roll) or whether it was a small mistake in the scanning process.

The third thing was that I'd managed to get some stuff sharp even when I wasn't using hyperfocal/zone focusing :)
 
thanks for that, Brian.

Well, just got back from the local minilab shop clutching a set of processed & scanned negatives (from XP2) in my hot little hand ... rather low-res but good enough to see what's going on and post a few here ... https://www.photographerslounge.org/f93/fun-film-cameras-image-thread-62/index20.html#post68536

First thing was a certain amount of surprise at how much grain was present in some shots; for whatever reason I was expecting less grain, but equally I expecting it to be consistent over the whole roll ...

I loaded them into LR3 (LR4 is a sore point at the moment) . As small jpegs, they won't take much processing, and I didn't really want to do much to them anyway ... but the second thing to notice was almost every usable in-focus shot needed to have exposure backed off by around a whole stop to bring highlight detail back; most of them also benefited from reducing contrast and a bit of fill light.

Because I don't know enough about scanning film, or about using XP2, I wondered whether this was going to be as a result of the film itself (in which case I might try underexposing a bit on the next roll) or whether it was a small mistake in the scanning process.

The third thing was that I'd managed to get some stuff sharp even when I wasn't using hyperfocal/zone focusing :)

Paul,

Grain is dependent on exposure. Underexposure brings it out. While the shots posted in the Fun with film cameras thread look quite good, to my eye they look a bit oversharpened (which would emphasize grain) and a bit contrasty. I assure you that this is due to the scans and that the negatives have a lot of potential in them. I would not suggest underexposure as it will only bring out more grain.

Cheers,

Antonio
 
Ah that's good to hear ... it shows how long it is since I used film ... I certainly didn't apply any sharpening in post (or rather, I did - and very quickly undid it!) ...

One more thing I noticed after spending a bit more time looking at the images was (surprise surprise) just how superb the Summicron really is ... the quality of the lens stands out on the E-P2, but even on these lo-res scans, the sharpness across the whole frame is quite remarkable ... the only other equipment I own which is as good in this respect is the Sigma DP2s ...
 
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