Innovation Station: Medium Format Macros for the Frugal
Shooters of the 35mm format seem to get all the perks cheaply. For under $20, one can easily pickup any of a wide number of choices for a competent used shooter taking 135 stock that will pretty much do about all that one can expect, including a wide range of shutter speeds and the ability to close focus on even some of the most basic of cameras, allowing for some great shots with wonderful separation of field.
In the world of medium format however, this wide array of choices quickly vanishes. For those of us who love working with the larger negative sizes that 120 film offers, securing a decent 120 camera for anywhere under $100 often seems like something of a challenge. And whether one's 120 camera of choice is ultimately is a TLR, a guess focus folder, or a something more along the lines of the "Texas Leica," the ability to get close can be especially elusive on medium format altogether.
However, with a little bit of ingenuity and some stubborn determination, one can pretty readily be up and about shooting macros in medium format after having spent less than $20 in equipment for camera and accessories, while having a tremendous amount of fun and involvement in the process! This is the hobby of photography at its most enjoyable and affordable.
So let's start with a shot taken on Ilford HP5 with focus around infinity. Pretty decent stuff, though this gate in foreground is completely out of focus. It'd be great to pull the focus a bit closer...
Hey, now we're getting somewhere, though the ornament is still a bit shy of the sweet spot...
Now that's better! Any chance focus can be pulled in even further?...
Now this is closer than one typically sees from medium format cameras. Just how close can we pull in focus?
All the way to the nearest bar in the gate! By now that once crisp backdrop has been wonderfully muted in the distance.
The camera used to produce these images cost me just $15 in a second hand shop, and is readily found in antique stores or online auction sites at around the same price in ready to use condition. So what did I use for these medium format macro photos? This!
A simple Kodak Brownie Number 2 was used to create all of the images above, by means of a pretty simple technique.
A Kodak Brownie Number 2 was indeed used for all of the above images. I achieved this "Brownie Bliss" simply by using a number of close up filters (designed for use typically on SLR cameras) placed before the lens to achieve a closer focus point than the typical hyperfocal distance of a Brownie covering from about 10 feet to infinity. The five images above were taken using (1) no filter, (2) an Ansco Portrait Attachment, (3) a screw in Close Up Filter #1, (4) a screw in Close Up Filter #2, and (5) a screw in Close Up Filter #3.
Using a handful of "Close Up Lenses" I had on hand that I placed over the lens of the Kodak Brownie Number 2, I was able to achieve a nice little bit of Box Camera Magic!
The idea for this admittedly took far longer than I might want to admit. A great book of vintage cameras and the photos they take turned me on to the Mayfair Portrait camera, a British made box camera that featured an accessory lens that could snap on to focus more closely for portrait images. Intrigued as I was at this camera, samples surviving with the accessory lens intact were few and far between, and I soon after forgot about this model. A few months later, I made another pickup of a collapsible box camera (to be featured soon) that came with its original manual, and made mention of the availability of a "Portrait Attachment" to enable this camera to do the same thing. Regrettably, searches online for this specific attachment came up empty handed.
But I came to discover there were a number of other portrait attachments readily available as low as $3, and with little to lose in such an investment, I snapped up an Ansco Portrait attachment designed specifically for a Folding Buster Brown model. Even after its arrival, it took a few days for me to really get a good look at this lens and what it could do, and by this time, the brain child finally hit me to see what I could do by pressing the close up filters (and even discarded elements of broken rangefinder cameras I'd tried to fix without success) to the front of the box camera. With the camera on the time setting, and a piece of frosted negative strip holder taped into the film plane, I was both delighted and astonished to see some amazing images through the lens of the Brownie Number 2.
Deriving optimal focusing distances was accomplished by taping a piece of negative holder along the film plane, opening the shutter, and pointing the camera at a light fixture, while moving fore and aft until achieving focus.
After taking some notes of what the approximate "perfect" distance was from front of camera to subject using each of the lenses and filters, I came away with a decent set of options for a versatile set of filters that I might be able to use in the field for some photographic fun that would put my guesstimating skills to the test, while also requiring me to frame images with little in the way of visual aids from the camera itself. I determined that the "Portrait Attachment" seemed ideal for subjects that were roughly 5-6 feet from the front of the camera, while the "Close Up" lenses numbered 1, 2, and 3, were best at distances of just under 3, 2, and 1 feet respectively. Naturally, the closer one gets to the subject, the less margin for error there is. I also did a quick test of "Close Up #10" filter and found it achieved focus with subjects about 6 inches from the front of the camera.
After the initial "safe" examples (where there was a possibility of desired subject paced at any distance from the camera) that are shown above, it was time to cut the cord and try see what I could do with less ambiguous compositions. After some surprisingly good results with the last three shots from the pilot roll of HP5, I did another trial using a roll of Bergger Panchro 400. While there were some misses on my part on the second roll, the results were still remarkably encouraging, delivering large 6x9 negatives focused closely like nothing else I had ever shot before.
120 film negatives of HP5 and Bergger Panchro 400 showing the possibilities of close focus using this method.
Using the Close Up Filter #1, and guessing a distance of 2 feet and 10 inches from the front of the camera, my first standalone try using this method met with some pleasing success. A hint of softness and a light leak create a very nostalgic look.
Stepping it up with Close Up Filter #2, and a subject sitting 1 foot and 10 inches from the camera, I managed to accomplish this image, which truly does set off the subject from the muted backdrop.
The nail biter was this one, resting the Brownie on the ground, and hoping that my use of Close Up Filter #3 would pull off a decent image of this prominent leaf. While I expected some softness to result from the razor thin sweet spot, I was elated to see this image come forth from my attempt.
My 3 for 3 on the remaining exposures on the HP5 led me to quickly load up another roll of film, a roll of Bergger Panchro 400 that I'd been saving for the right opportunity. With my enthusiasm refusing to be muted by an overcast day, I set out to achieve more Box Camera Magic. However, this attempt using the Close Up Filter #1 missed the mark, as I was apparently a hair too far from the subject.
Even worse was this attempt using the Close Up Filter #3. I just wasn't able to replicate my luck on the leaf shot above
Originally I eyed using the same close up filter as the one above, before ultimately settling on using Close Up Filter #2. The result is a little soft, but nicely nostalgic. I struggled a bit in composing this one, with the subject offset so far from center.
The Portrait lens that inspired this whole experiment was brought back into use for more than just the trial shots above, and in this case, it seemed to work spot-on in delivering just the result that I'd hoped for. Given that the subject distance from the camera was not so great, I was able to compose this image in the small viewfinder of the Brownie without worrying of extreme parallax error.
On further review, it may be that the usefulness of Close Up Filter #3 is especially limited. I was hoping to achieve focus on the fence post 1/4 of the way from the right border, but instead accomplished proper focus on the board at far right. A little review may be in order, as I certainly like the out of focus rendering of these images most of all.
Trying to line up a backdrop in an image without a viewfinder while also guessing close focus in the same image is a huge challenge, and one that I didn't quite accomplish in this case. Though I managed decent focus on the two dark leaves near the center of the frame using Close Up Filter #2, they don't stand out enough to be an effective subject. And my hope of having the church steeple occupy the left side of the frame largely separated from the foreground didn't come to pass.
All told, it seems that Close Up Filter #1 manages to hit the happy medium of enabling a sharp in-focus subject that can be effectively framed on the Brownie, while still muting the backdrop for better isolation.
But that doesn't mean I won't try to use the trickier lenses at times too. This is a result using Close Up Filter #10, focused at a bit less than 6 inches from this bulb. I pre-focused this shot using the method shown above, marked the positioning using two pieces of tape, loaded film, stopped down the diaphragm on the camera, and took this 2 second time exposure, that delivered a truly mind boggling result for a Brownie Box Camera.
If I was the kind of film camera blogger that thrived on creating "Top 5" lists, this experiment would certainly be among the five most interesting and quirky film related things I've done in the year 2017. It involved little in the way of expense, while managing to create a feeling of involvement in the photo taking process that is so often lost or minimized using the "Do Everything" tools that are are so readily available to film photographers in smaller formats.
But I can safely say that this won't simply be something I've done in the year 2017. With frost having killed off some of the best subject matter for macro photography a few months before I had this revelation, I can easily see that this is something I'll be trying more of as warmer weather unfolds in 2018. Meanwhile, if you are looking for something fun and challenging to add a twist to your photographic routine, I would wholeheartedly suggest this as a possibility to create your own Box Camera Magic!
This is the article Innovation Station: Medium Format Macros for the Frugal this time, hopefully can benefit for you all. well, see you in other article post.
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