I might be able to acquire a older Hasselblad system. I've got some ?'s.

Where is a good place to find out about these system?

I am not sure what model it is, but If I got a Kodak digital back, where would be a good place to get one used? All the forums I have seen are garbage.

In general where is a good place to find used gear besides ebay?

For those of you who have dabbled in MF, is it worth it? If so, is it worth it to with a digital back? Film seems like it will be really expensive to learn on one of these bodies.

Let me know, some things that I should know.

thanks for those who have answers to the questions

If you don't like ebay, try KEH I've never used them but I have heard only good things about them. You can also look in the for sale section at the LL forums.

It will be somewhat difficult to find a used digital back...most pros leased the things, rather than outright purchase! Is 20-39 MPixel better than 8-12 MPixel? Yes, size matters and it wins for pixel size and for pixel count and for overall image dimensions.

Is it expensive? Think this way...you pay for film and processing one roll at a time. You pay for ALL of your 'rolls and processing' with a dSLR all up front, all at the same time!

If you can get a 500C/M and some CF Lenses its all really good stuff. The glass is amazing especailly the 50, the 120 and the 180. Hasselblad also makes a square digital back. I wish that I would have kept one of my 500 C/Ms.
I second KEH...

I checked out keh, thanks guys.

So what are you saying, stay with the film back then? I live in Wyoming, and I think it is going to be a huge hassle to get this type of film processed. Am I wrong? Also, since it is an advanced system, at least in my mind, what are my keeper rates going to be like when it I just get started? Is it suitable to take outside, or just for studio work?

thanks

I've got a 500 c/m with three lenses, the 50 f/4 CT* Distagon, the 80 f/2.8 CT* Planar, and the 150 f/4 CT* Sonnar, as well as some other accessories.

I haven't even thought about a digital back. The prices and equipment are so volatile that I'm content to shoot film. The camera has a little bit of a learning curve, but you'll quickly find what a brilliant system is. It's truly one of the greatest ever camera systems ever made, in terms of quality, ergonomics, and performance.

If I were you I'd get a total of 2 or 3 A12 film backs. I have three, and it allows me to instantly change from B&W to slide to negative film in the field. Getting film processed may mean mailing it to the nearest full service lab if there isn't one nearby. I'd be surprised if there isn't a single one in Cheyenne, but I'd imagine there are some in Denver and elsewhere in Colorado. B&W you should just process at home. It's practically free, it's easy, it's safe, and you don't need a darkroom -- just a changing bag, a small light-tight tank, and a sink. Color you'll need to send out ordinarily, though you can do it at home. If you get a Jobo CPE-2 you can do your own home processing of slide film and print film. The machine generally goes for $400 on E-bay, and the somewhat better CPP-2 goes for $700 to $1000.

If you send it out, then generally you're going to want to scan color films. You can get professional scans with expensive, high end scanners, and I do that at times, but generally a $350 scanner like a Microtek i800 or Epson 4990 will get you great results. I have printed up to 16x20 with home scanned negatives, and they're beautifully sharp and detailed -- and the professionally scanned ones are even better.

I hike and travel with mine all the time -- it's my preferred travel and hiking camera. I've even been sea kayaking with it. The Hassy system is so great because it's a modular system that is small and portable. It's not quite as flexible as say a Mamiya RB67, but it's much more portable. It's not quite as portable as say a Mamiya 7 rangefinder, but it's much more flexible.

As for your rate of keepers, it will have almost nothing to do with how advanced a system it is. Just remember that 1/60 (or 1/30 with short lenses) is about the slowest you can handhold it unless you use mirror lockup (which is easy to use handheld). In fact you may have more keepers once you realize how easy it is to compose through a MF viewfinder. Take a look at your typical collection of DSLR shots and count the number of keepers. You'll realize (or I did, at least), that 95% of your shots are things that wouldn't be worth shooting if you were using film -- and you'll end up being very selective from the beginning. At this point it actually takes me a long time to go through a full roll of 12 exposures. Of course I'm more of a large format guy, and I'm content to go out and take only 2 shots.

You'll find much more info about Hasselblads on http://www.apug.org and http://www.photo.net

Finally, you don't need CF lenses. Definitely get ones with T* coating, but a lot of experts I've corresponded with say that the difference between CT* and CF T* is basically indistinguishable. The CT* lenses are a lot less expensive. I wouldn't get the plain C lenses, because they're not coated.

Wow thanks Doc for the great response with very helpful information. It is still up in the air if I will even be getting this system. I cant see myself buying other lenses, unless the ones he has are no good anymore, but if they are good, I might try to save up for a digital back.

You are right, with a digital camera, you can just snap snap snap, and not worry about wasting film. Does the range finder type camera teach you to be a better photographer?

thanks again

There is one digital back for sale on ebay for under 6g's

Do you have to load the film in the back in a dark place or can you swap it out quickly like a 35mm camera?

Glad to help. Generally I don't take special precautions loading and unloading film, though if I have a choice I do it in dim lighting.

I only routinely use one very fast film, which is Ilford Delta 3200. That one I do load in dim lighting.

But this isn't like loading large format sheet film, which I need to do in pitch blackness.

Hasselblads aren't rangefinders (other than the Hasselblad SWC, a fixed lens camera with the truly legendary superwide 38mm Zeiss Biogon). They are SLRs, just like any 35mm SLR. You can use a prism finder, which means the reflex mirror reflects the light up to an eyepiece that you look through. Or you can use a waist level finder, which means the mirror reflects the light up to a ground glass that has shades around it, and you look down from above onto it.

I think what helps you be a better photographer with this type of camera is the amount of control you get over composition. The viewfinder is truly huge and bright, and generally you know if you've got the shot. Previewing depth of field is extremely easy. And the discipline of having only 12 shots per roll really helps you recognize which shots are worth shooting (or not).

As I said my main interest is large format. I started with a 4x5, which I still own and use, but I use an 8x10 more commonly now, and I'm working on building an ultralarge format camera (probably 12x20). With these you have even more control, and I swear the viewfinder (strictly speaking the ground glass) on an 8x10 camera is like watching TV -- it's amazing. So LF is an even better way to concentrate on composition and technique and selectivity. The problem with LF is that it's slow and usually not portable, so it can be limiting depending on the kind of photography you want to do.

Of course, if I lived in Wyoming, I'd want to capture that scenery with the largest negative the world had ever seen. I'd gladly lug 50 pounds of large format gear up a trail in Yellowstone.

Scenery, and especially wide angle scenery, just screams for resolution. The size of any given feature on film is so much smaller than real life, that you need a big capture area to resolve a lot of small details. Medium format is certainly better than small format for this, and there are lots of high res films out there -- with slide films like Velvia, Provia, and E100VS being great options.

One thing to consider about digital backs and older Hassleblads is the need for a very expensive dual cable release to fire the camera and and the back at the same time. I know this is true for the Kodak backs, not really sure about the Leaf and others. And Dr. Pablo, SWC is a scale focus camera not a rangefinder. Rangefinder cameras use two images in the viewfinder which when aligned indicate proper focus, SWC has a simple viewfinder which indicates framing but not focus.

SnowManZ wrote in post #3981866
I checked out keh, thanks guys.

So what are you saying, stay with the film back then? I live in Wyoming, and I think it is going to be a huge hassle to get this type of film processed. Am I wrong? Also, since it is an advanced system, at least in my mind, what are my keeper rates going to be like when it I just get started? Is it suitable to take outside, or just for studio work?

thanks

I was trying to merely set realistic expectations for you, about the availability of digital backs on the used market...if they were mostly LEASED, the companies that leased them to the photographers owned them. And if the back was $25k new, can you afford even 50% of that for a used back?

And in case you didn't realize this...medium format SLRs are mostly NOT having automatic return reflex mirrors! The viewfinder goes dark at the time of the shot and stays dark until you wind the camera.

Processing...mail order processors! In shooting weddings on film, even before digital was prevalent, I sent my film and printing job out to a commercial processor 800 miles from me!

Keeper rates...that is dependent upon you. If you spray and pray, the keeper rates are low. If you think methodically and carefully compose your shots, you can improve your keeper rate considerable. In the days of film, many 35mm photographers liked medium format because it simply slowed them down...and that was in the days when film motor winders were a relatively slow 2-3 fps, compared to today's Gatling gun cameras!

A Leaf Aptus uses a sync cable hooked up to the lenses sync contact. Works fine on a Hasselblad 503.

There are a lot of used < 22 mpx databacks out there now. Check besides KEH, but also Adorama and B&H have used equipment sections. In shutterbug mag, there is a regular advertiser in there that sales these a lot used, forgot the name but they usually have a full or 2 page advert. Many are well under 10K and produce just wonderfully deep images.

Aside from the fact that it's out of my budget, my main problem with a $10,000 digital back is that I'd never feel comfortable hiking or kayaking with it. That rugged Hasselblad would all of a sudden become a big liability.

Also, the largest digital backs right now are around 37x49mm. That means you suffer a large crop factor, and it virtually ends the possibility of digital MF wide angle photography.

Finally, scanned film is digital photography. It just happens to use a film intermediate. And there are such amazing films out there, especially on MF and above, that it would be a shame not to get to know them.

I just thumbed through Ansel Adams "The Camera" book today and he discusses MF and LF cameras. Wow, very impressive. Granted, Ansel did a lot of dodging and burning in the darkroom, his photos are still impressive.

Buying a MF camera is intriguing. Something to ponder.

In another thread, I posted about doing my own B&W film negative processing. It appears to be a fairly simple process that I can do in my dinky one-bedroom apartment bathroom.