WARREN CONNECTICUT – I puttered around our Connecticut place working with my tech camera stuff. This was taken with my Alpa Max and a 120 mm Schneider Digitar.
This with my Alpa TC and a 35mm Schneider.
On this day last year: Hippos. These guys are seriously dangerous, “Killed by a hippo” is the most common bad human-wildlife encounter in Kenya.
3 replies on “Friday August 26, 2011”
Thank you for your recommendation. After reading your words of advice, I’ve changed my mind to buy the 120mm lens.
best regards,
ck yoon
hi,
Lately, I’ve been looking at alpa 12 max on internet and while surfing the web, I found your website. After looking through your diverse collections of photos, I was amazed by the passion that you have for photography. As of now, I am planning to purchase alpa 12 max, alpa 12 swa, schneider apo digitar 35xl, schneider apo digitar 47xl and schneider super symmar 80xl. Right now I am using phase one p45+ and I had few questions about alpa if you were willing to answer.
1. How did you check the frame before using the live view function of the phase one IQ180?
2. Could you recommend me the best alpa product that you have used and liked?
3. Which one of the three is the schneider 120mm lens: N, M, or L?
4. As I mentioned before, I am planning to purchase the alpa 12 max and I was wondering what your opinion is on which combination is the best with the camera. As in accessories.
Best Regards,
ck yoon.
Yoon – good hearing from you. As you note I’ve got the Alpa Max which I use on tripod. I also have the Alpa TC which I use handheld. The SWA should provide equivalent handheld functionality. On lenses:
The SK 35 XL is my most used lens but you should know that it it’s at the edge in terms of performance with the IQ 180 back. It will be fine with P45+. (“SK” for readers not up to date on this stuff is “Schneider Kreuznach”.) You really need to shoot at optimum f-stop (f11 or so); it shows significant color casts which Capture One can correct through LCC exposures, but the results are just barely acceptable (the lens performs much better with a center filter but this puts you over edge in terms of hand holding under all conditions other than direct sunlight). The last few mm in the corners show some acutance and contrast fall off. Shifting is out of the question. All this having been said the lens has outstanding character and produces excellent images.
The SK 47 XL is flawless and a very good choice. The good part of the image circle supports 10mm or so of shifts. Some people have the SK 42 XL instead of the 35 and the 47 – it outperforms them both (in the case of the 47 the outperformance is very slight) but that means you don’t have the very wide capacity.
I have the SK 72 xl. I don’t remember why I got it in preference to the 80. The 80 is available in the short mount which means you can do tilts.
My SK 120 is the N model. Highly recommended.
I use finders to approximate framing. I don’t care for the Alpa finder so I use the Alpa attachment that includes a level and hot shoe and use 3rd party finders in the hot shoe. There is also a small extender that raises and moves the hot shoe backwards. I use the Zeiss 21mm for the 35, the Zeiss 25/28 finder for the 47, a Voigtlander 40mm finder for the 72 and Voigtlander 75mm finder for the 120. The later two (and many other finders) are available at Steve Gandy’s website.
The only additional accessories that I use with the Max are the stitching adapter and the small rod that lets you read mm of rise and fall when you’re behind the camera.
Regards,
Woody