Rob MacKillop
Edinburgh Correspondent
Got a new medium-format camera, as I had previously sold most of my equipment to buy the Leicas, but have been missing medium format. So, I got a good deal on a Pentax 6x7 with no less than four lenses: 75mm, 105mm, 200mm and 300mm.
It was such a low price, the camera body was in a bit of a mess, but more or less functional, and the lenses showed a little fog. I had enough money left over to put the body and 105mm lens in for a CLA at Cameratiks, a fine old photography shop in Edinburgh.
When I picked them up, their value seemed to be much higher than when they went in. I'll put the other lenses in in a month or so.
The three containers in that last shot went straight in the bin - absolutely disgusting! I don't have enough lens caps, but should be able to remedy that via eBay.
The 105mm f/2.4 lens is regularly praised as one of the best portrait lenses for medium-format cameras, but I haven't done any portrait work with it yet. Here's the first shot I've had time to scan. Oh, yes, this is my first medium-format home development, HP5, and getting it into a developing reel was a bit tricky, to say the least. I'll get the hang of it eventually.
Not as sharp or as in focus as I'd like, but this was from before lens and body got cleaned, lubed and adjusted. I hope for better from the next roll. It actually (probably) might have been my fault, in trying to hand hold this absolute tank of a camera at about a 60th of a second. It really is a heavy beast! I shouldn't really hand-hold it below 125, but had to test it.
This is the first large MF camera I've had that loads film like a regular 35mm camera. And I appreciate that the image is not in reverse orientation, as with a waist-level finder. It feels like a regular, though much embiggened (!) 35mm film camera.
By the way, it gives me great satisfaction to present images I have developed myself. I feel grown up!
It was such a low price, the camera body was in a bit of a mess, but more or less functional, and the lenses showed a little fog. I had enough money left over to put the body and 105mm lens in for a CLA at Cameratiks, a fine old photography shop in Edinburgh.
When I picked them up, their value seemed to be much higher than when they went in. I'll put the other lenses in in a month or so.
The three containers in that last shot went straight in the bin - absolutely disgusting! I don't have enough lens caps, but should be able to remedy that via eBay.
The 105mm f/2.4 lens is regularly praised as one of the best portrait lenses for medium-format cameras, but I haven't done any portrait work with it yet. Here's the first shot I've had time to scan. Oh, yes, this is my first medium-format home development, HP5, and getting it into a developing reel was a bit tricky, to say the least. I'll get the hang of it eventually.
Not as sharp or as in focus as I'd like, but this was from before lens and body got cleaned, lubed and adjusted. I hope for better from the next roll. It actually (probably) might have been my fault, in trying to hand hold this absolute tank of a camera at about a 60th of a second. It really is a heavy beast! I shouldn't really hand-hold it below 125, but had to test it.
This is the first large MF camera I've had that loads film like a regular 35mm camera. And I appreciate that the image is not in reverse orientation, as with a waist-level finder. It feels like a regular, though much embiggened (!) 35mm film camera.
By the way, it gives me great satisfaction to present images I have developed myself. I feel grown up!
