I eventually pulled out the camera and started shooting with it. I was addicted after the first few snaps. Obviously the camera is huge and heavy as you’ll read anywhere. But I found handling it to be surprisingly easy. It took me almost no time to get used to handling it (maybe because it’s so simple?). The hard parts were using the waist-level viewfinder (where the picture is reversed from left-right) and using a dedicated light meter for the first time. I wasn’t really too happy about having to carry this extra device around, but that’s about the only way to get perfect exposures with this setup. (Speaking of perfect exposures or a lack thereof: I learned later that night that the first roll I shot was loaded in the wrong way, and so I’d wasted it completely. Oh well.)
As far as slow, pensive landscape shooting goes, this camera seemed to be well-suited. There was plenty of time to manually meter the scene, setup the camera on the tripod if necessary, adjust the exposure on the camera, compose, focus (which was almost always at infinity anyway) and click. Oh and there was often the added step of using a cable release to prevent mirror slap.
At some point I really want to shoot people with this camera. I’ll have to get a more portrait-friendly lens and I haven’t decided which one to get yet. Maybe by then I will be more proficient in metering/setting up on a tripod/exposing/composing/etc with this thing and portraits won’t have to be too tedious.
more details on the film experience coming soon…
