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Contax 645 tilt shift thingy

Daniel, the Hartblei's okay for landscape tilt but not really up to architectural demands for shift range, it's only about 11 or 12mm when what you'll need is something that shifts 35-45% of the long side of your negative, say 20mm of shift. If you're serious about architectural work you'd be better off with a second hand view camera.

I can't see the benefit of auto focus with T&S lenses, you're working at a snail's pace and you need to be very, very precise with depth of field.

It's a shame that a more comprehensive Contax lens line isn't available, I run Leica, Canon, Contax, and Linhof systems and if I want perspective control without weight I go for the Canon with three great T&S optics, however the Contax would be a more logical alternative if the lenses were there.
 
Gary,

Thank you for the answer regarding the limitations of the Hartblei lenses. Like everyone else, I am looking for good image resolution with minimum weight and size; this is why I am not inclined to go with a view camera and stay with the 645 format. I love the image quality of my Contax 645 on film and also with the Kodak DCS Pro Back 645C, the only thing I am missing is T&S.

Have you tried the Canon T&S lenses on the Canon 1Ds? This could be a possible alternative to get reasonable image resolution while using a relatively “small” camera.

I agree with you that the auto focus is absolutely not a necessity and kind of useless with a T&S lens. I was just wondering if someone had made a lens or adapter that would carry all controls from the camera to a T&S lens.
 
Daniel, yes I use the 1Ds with the 24, 45 and 90mm T&S lenses. As far as "small" goes however it's anything but, throw in a spare battery, flash and a few more lenses and it really is getting close to the all up weight of a Linhof 4x5 outfit!

However the 1Ds quality's great up to about A3 or say 11" x 14", maybe more depending on how you're outputting.

What I'd like (we can all daydream!) is for Contax to develop the 645 system and for Canon to shrink the 1Ds, so that I could reduce down to just those two cameras...and maybe a battered Leica for an occasional stroll down memory lane!
 
I have seen the ad from Calument that it offers a mini view camera for the Canon and Nikon dSLR body. It seems to be a very interesting options for product and architectural work in the digital domain.
 
I shoot with a 645 and an Arca Swiss 4x5. I am getting a digital back for my Contax and was going to get an adapter for my 4x5 so I can shoot still life with perspective control. There is one disadvantage however in using the back on a 4x5 and that is image quality. By having the same image size with both the 645 and the 4x5 we no longer have the advantage of the greatly larger image size for enlarging. I use Rodenstock lenses on my 4x5 which are great but not as great as my 645 glass. They are definitely softer. If I use PS for perspective control I end up losing some valuable image size.

I know about the Hartblei tilt shift lens but I don't think it is as good as Zeiss and probably not as good as my Rodenstock lenses. The Kiev solution I also think doesn't live up to Zeiss qualtiy. What about Zork + Pentax? How is the quality of Pentax glass in comparison to Zeiss and Rodenstock?

Does anybody have any solutions to get better image quality using a T/S lens on my 645 than my Rodenstock lenses? The adapter costs over $2,000 so I don't mind paying good money for a solution.

My work is for high end commercial going to offset press. My clients expect really high quality. I don't like the idea of losing much of an 11 meg or 16 meg image size when doing perspective control in PS.

Thanks for your comments.

Guy
 
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