Taking pictures with view cameras


Left Image:

Omega 45E, Caltar 210mm f-6.8 lens, Fuji Velvia 50, Bogen tripod and pan/tilt head.
Multi-spot metering with Minolta Auto Meter IIIF and 5 degree spot attachment, 1/30 sec at f-22.

First thing you need to do is load your films. You need a few sheet film holders. These hold two sheets of films. Keep the film holders clean from dust as they can show in your pictures. Films must be loaded in total darkness or by using a changing bag. You also need a lens board. Lens boards are available predrilled for most lenses. Attach the lens and set the camera on your tripod. Check the composition on the ground glass. The image is seen upside-down and reversed. It takes some time to get used to composing with a view camera, but this slower process forces you pay more attention to details resulting in much better photographs. It is a good idea to check the scene you want to photograph before setting up your equipment. Look around and find a good spot, choose a lens, and set up your camera. Decide how you want to compose your shot. Rotate the ground glass from horizontal to vertical and check the scene. Focus on your subject by using a loupe and adjust necessary camera movements. This is the area that view cameras have a great advantage over other formats. Rise/fall/shift movements, move the lens' image circle relative to the picture frame and are used to control perspective. Tilt/swing movements control focus and depth-of-field. Swing and tilts are used to create razor sharp images. With a 35mm camera you need to use a very small aperture to bring both the foreground and the background into sharp focus. Very small apertures also reduce overall sharpness due to diffraction. By tilting the front you can make the image sharp without having to stop the lens down to the smallest aperture. By shifting the camera back and the lensboard side to side or up and down, you can position your subject on the ground glass without having to move the camera. This avoids distortion caused by 35mm cameras by pointing the camera up to include the top of a tall object such as trees or buildings.


My good old Omega 45E

Play around with your camera and learn how each different movement effects your pictures. It seems confusing at first, but you'll master all of them in no time. Once you have set up your shot, insert the filmholder; close the lens; take a reading and set the f-stop and the shutter speed on the lens; pull the dark slide; trip the shutter using a cable release. Insert the dark slide back into the holder after taking the picture. Although this is a slow process compared to and medium formats, the final result is much more impressive and sharper. View cameras are also good teachers. They force you to slow down and think how to compose your shots and become better photographers.