Pentax 67 and the Carl Zeiss Sonnar 180 2.8 - a match made in Heaven (or more specifically Poland)

A few years ago I very foolishly dropped my beloved Pentax 67 - it was such a traumatic experience (for the camera as well as me) that I wrote a blog about it HERE. Ever since then my P67 has not been a happy bunny - frame spacing was out of whack and the film advance mechanism sounded like a bag of spanners…. I did get it repaired but this was just a patch up job and it was never the same after, I would regularly lose a frame or the advance mechanism would jam…. considering that the P67 is my absolute main battle camera (and responsible for 90% of my portfolio work) I am amazed that I managed to limp along with it in this sorry state for so long.

It had gotten to the point where I was avoiding using it and leaving the P67 in the camera bag makes no flipping sense so I decided to bite the bullet and get my beautiful Pentax 67 repaired and serviced. After a bit of research I opted to use ASAHI PHOTO for the repair work and I am very pleased to say that they did a fantastic job - the film advance mechanism was replaced and the camera also had a full CLA and service, they repaired the bottom plate which was cracked and replaced some of the leatherette which had come loose too - it feels so awesome to have my Pentax 67 in full working order!!

While it was away being repaired (it only took a couple of weeks) I made the decision to finally let go of my Soviet built Kiev 60 and lenses - I was really only keeping this camera because it gave me access to the absolutely AMAZING Carl Zeiss Sonnar 180 mm 2.8 lens and I decided that since I was getting the Pentax 67 repaired I might as well do something else that I’d had on my wish list - to have the Sonnar lens adapted from Pentacon 6 to Pentax 67 mount!!!

I’d heard of a place in Poland called Bokeh Factory who could do the conversion - when i contacted them I discovered that they were closing down!! eeek! Not only that but they had no more conversion kits and only a couple of lenses left!! So I decided to go for ANOTHER Sonnar lens and to sell my Pentacon 6 lens (are you still paying attention at the back)??!

Anyway loooooong story short - here we are!! What a combination this is!! The lens pairs beautifully with the Pentax and is a much more pleasing experience than using the big Sonnar lens on my long since sold ARAX CM or soon to be sold Kiev 60.

The conversion process takes a little bit of length out of the barrel which helps, also because of the change to a 6X7 sized frame rather than 6X6 the effective focal length in 35mm terms is about 100mm so it’s a perfect portrait lens!

I decided that I couldn’t wait for a portrait shoot to take this new combo for a spin - I wanted to road test the P67 and the Sonnar together so I took a short walk around the block with a roll of Fomapan 100 and grabbed a few ‘nothing’ shots.

I shot the Fomapan 100 at box speed and developed in what is becoming my favourite developer 510 Pyro if you haven’t tried it out yet then I strongly suggest that you do, it’s lovely stuff, buy it from Zone Imaging HERE - the data sheet recommends rating Foma 100 at 80 but since I shot it at 100 I extended developing time by 90 seconds.

Please excuse the dust marks - I didnt have time to remove them! Anyway, what do you think? I am VERY happy to have my P67 in full working order and to have it matched with one of my favourite lenses the wonderful Car Zeiss Sonnar 180mm 2.8 - what a fantastic piece of glass!

As you can see in the images, the lens is capable of creamy and dreamy Bokeh, SUPER sharp where you want it too - the fall off between these two extremes create a wonderful 3D pop to the images too I cannot wait to bring this combination to my next Portrait shoot!

I tested how the lens handled strong back light with the sun just out of the frame top right - I am very impressed!! There’s a drop in contrast that you’d expect but it’s not unpleasant, in fact i like it!

It felt good just to get out and shoot whatever situations presented themselves to me, I used to do this kind of thing ALL.THE.TIME - note to self: more photowalks please!

Our first Shoot, Develop & Print Workshop

As I write these words it’s been a couple of weeks since our first ever workshop at the Adventures on Film Darkroom and I am STILL buzzing from the experience!

Three people took part in this workshop - all of whom had shot with film in the past but were looking to get back into it, brush up on their skills and learn some new ones too.

The format for the day was a location based portrait shoot with our wonderful model and long time creative collaborator Danni, after which we then went into the Darkroom to develop our film and create some prints.

You’ll have no doubt noticed the preponderance of video in this blog - yes friends I’ve recently rejoined Instagram after a long hiatus - I have been enjoying creating some video reels of our workshop shenanigans! Give us a follow HERE

A lot of work went in to getting the darkroom ready to welcome our first guests and we had a wonderful day together shooting portraits, developing the film and making some prints.

A huge thank you to Gary, Andrew and Damian for taking part and of course to Danni for being such an amazing model and to Jony Hunter for shooting the video and BTS shots of the day!

We’re going to be organising some regular workshops beginning in the new year covering so watch this space for details and if you’re interested in taking part then please see HERE for more details or get in touch via email info@chrischinnockphotography.com

Something Old and Something New: Shooting Portraits with the Speed Graphic, Kodak Aero Ektar & Lomograflok instant film back

It’s fair to say that blogs have become somewhat sporadic over this last 12 months - there are some VERY good reasons for this and I am happy to report that I’ll now be making a concerted effort to post more regularly. I also have some VERY exciting news to share about opening up a darkroom & photo studio where I’ll be running workshops and events as well as using to create my own work too! I will share more details in a dedicated blog about all of that very soon - in the meantime check out the ‘workshops’ page for details HERE

Now let’s get down to business - whatever our passions and inspiration in life there are often things that we associate with that, maybe you’re a musician and you want to learn how to play a particular instrument, or perhaps you’re into football and you really want to erm…. kick a ball (this analogy is wearing thin) anyway I’m a film photographer and ever since I realised this about myself I have flipping well wanted to shoot Large Format - more precisely a Speed Graphic camera with a Kodak Aero Ektar lens and hey ,guess what? Now I have!!

I’m gonna say this now - there are SOOOOO many new elements, processes, fancy bits of kit and just god damned cool toys to play with that I will no doubt be writing further blogs just on this set up alone, consider this blog like a whirlwind run through the whole thing and to share my initial results - I’ll circle back to this theme and delve deeper into certain aspects very soon I am sure!

I first encountered this combination through the work of photographers like David Burnett who is one of my photographic heroes he has used large format cameras to cover major events such as the Olympics and even reporting on the Presidential election campaign trail in the US.

The Speed Graphic is a camera that many of you will know well, even folks not well acquainted with photography will recognise them from old movies - these were the quintessential press cameras of the 1940’s 50’s and into the 60’s.

Just a man in a cape with his camera

They are relatively rare over here in the UK but are readily available in the US where they were manufactured. It is a wonderfully designed and built piece of kit - I picked mine up which is a pacemaker version of the Speed Graphic for less than £150 on evilbay and was expecting to need to get it serviced before being able to shoot but once I had it in hand I realised it was good to go!! I believe that my copy dates from the late 50’s to the early 60’s although I am not 100% on that!

I’ll say more about the operation of the camera in another blog - now let’s also have a look at the business end of this set up - the Kodak Aero Ektar 178mm 2.5 lens.

This lens is a cult classic and for good reason, photographers such as Dave Burnett showcased what was possible with this glass and like me, once you’ve seen the images it can resolve then it becomes something that you just have to try out for yourself.

You might be surprised to learn that the Aero part of the name of this lens relates to the fact that it was originally designed to be mounted on to an American aircraft in WW2 to shoot reconnaissance photos! My particular copy was actually built in 1944! It boggles my mind what this lens may have seen during it’s life time! My copy is actually quite rough - cosmetically there is loads of paint chipping and optically there is a fair amount of fungus and possibly some delimitation of the elements and consequently I got it for a VERY good price. In my experience lenses can resolve great image quality even when suffering issues like this and having taken a punt on this one it seems to have been a good call

Obviously using a lens designed to be fitted into a warplane requires an adapter in order to mount properly - the lens is HUGE compared to what might be considered a ‘normal’ or ‘proper’ lens for the Speed Graphic - once fitted to the adapter the lens required a little bit of gentle persuasion to be mounted on to the camera but now it fits perfectly.

This pic was taken pre-the arrival of my adapter to mount the Aero Ektar - look at how tiny the standard lens would be compared to the beast like Aero!!

So once combined in this way we have what I would hand on heart say is the most exciting camera I have EVER had the opportunity to shoot with! Other things worth mentioning are that I absolutely NEEDED to add the following items to enable me to use this camera:

Tripod - an old Gitzo all metal affair, this is a thing of beauty all on it’s own! A very solid platform to work on and whilst its a bit on the heavy side it gives me confidence when shooting on location that my camera is safe!

Film Holders - at the time of shooting I had two film holders giving me a whole FOUR sheets of film to burn through! Being a trigger happy soul I have since added two more film holders to my set up.

Focussing Loupe - a must have item I reckon, this little device allows you to check critical focus on the HUGE focussing screen

Dark cloth - maybe not essential but when shooting in bright light you need ‘something’ to drape over your head and allow you to see properly, I figured I’d go all in on this and the bonus is you can wear it like a cape! :)

So you’re all set to shoot Large Format Chris! What’s the big hold up? Why am I not now just looking at loads of Large Format photos? Great questions!! Well the main reason is that I also got hold of a thoroughly modern piece of kit to compliment all of the above - the Lomography Lomograflock Instant Film back!! As I said before I will definitely be doing some individual blogs to go into further details about different aspects of this new shooting experience but for now its enough to know that this amazing bit of technology allows you to shoot Instax Wide instant film on the Speed Graphic!! WOW!

And so to the shoot itself - who else other than my long time creative collaborator Danni Shepherd to help me test this monster of a camera out. We met at Kirkstall Abbey in Leeds on a beautifully bright late summers day and shot a few packs of Instax colour film and FOUR sheets Fomapan 100 in 4X5. I have waffled on interminably for long enough - let’s see the results of the shoot.

OMG! Seriously I am just blown away by the results with the Lomograflok - what an amazing piece of kit!! Rest assured that a dedicated blog about this instant film back will be coming soon - but there are so many awesome new things I want to share and this blog is already MAHOOSIVE so let’s just agree that the Lomograflok is ACE and little more needs to be said, to whit: Let’s have a quick look at the 4X5 shots…

Or rather ‘shot’ as in singular - mainly cos at the time of writing I haven’t scanned any of the other three shots, but WOW!!! LOOK!!! AAARGH! This is just everything I dreamed of with this camera and lens combo and more besides - the original scan itself has an ENORMOUS level of detail and resolution, it’s super sharp where you want it to be and soft and dreamy where you need it too, the way that film format, micro contrast and focus fall off give you a proper 3D pop. I am stunned by this shot - especially on my first outing with the camera!

I developed and scanned the film myself, this is something I am now going to be doing more often as I have my own darkroom and workspace too :)

I have to say that shooting with the Speed Graphic is a wonderful experience - the process has a number of steps but once you get into the rhythm it becomes very natural. I’ve read so many other photographers talk about having random members of the public ask them about their old film cameras - I’ve never had that before until now!! Pretty much everyone who walks past wants to know more about it so that’s definitely something to be aware of, you can’t be low key with this kind of camera!

A huge thank you to Danni for being absolutely amazing on this shoot, we always have a lot of fun and always create some stunning photos together too. I think this is really the beginning of a new phase of my work - not just the camera but the darkroom and workshops coming soon too, so much to tell you all about!

Just with this set up and the results of one shoot I think I’ve got at least two or maybe three blogs to write up just to go into some details - and on top of that I need to share what’s been happening with the new Darkroom and workshops and there’s another business that’s going now too…. yikes… Thanks for making it this far if you did!! I’ll see you again real soon!