Topic: Polaroid+Kodak Lens+Sugru=Sugruroid

[ludoo]

I just finished a quick conversion, assembling bits of Polaroid cameras I had lying around, and an Angenieux 100/4.5 off a broken Kodak 620 Special 6x9.

I still have to find a way to calibrate the rangefinder, which is ok at infinity but hopelessly off at near focusing, but the camera works, and contrary to popular belief the tiny Angenieux lens covers packfilm wide open comfortably, with some vignetting only.

As the camera looked ugly and I used some Sugru to fix the front cell at its sweet spot (~4m, focusing is done in the usual Polaroid way), I kept at it and covered the ugly front with blue stuff. Then my daughter had a go with some stickers. I hope a couple digital pics are ok to show you the camera.



marking infinity focus on the extension lever prior to dremeling it, flange distance for the 100mm is very little

[moominsean]

looks like it works well! yeah the lack of ability to use the rangefinder has kept me from ever finishing one of these projects. i start it then tear it apart...

[Francois]

Thing is all rangefinders use a cam to calculate focus. This changes with every lens.

As for the digi pics, they're considered OK for illustrative purposes.

[ludoo]

Francois I know rangefinders are calibrated for a single lens, what I'd like to have is the infinity stop correct, and the rangefinder working at 1.5-3m for portraits. If I get there I'll be happy.

BTW I did not mention the idea of using a Kodak lens came from you in my other thread about my Zeiss 6x9 plate camera.

[Chalky]

looks great, well done.

I've done one similar myself. to get infinity to work I used ground glass, extended the front back and forth until I found focus and marked it, then re-drilled the 'sliding arm' so now the camera doesn't extend as far.

my rangefinder is reasonably accurate (more luck than judgement I am sure) and obviously if you shoot f8 and up you have more chance of good focus.

lots of fun to build and use. hope you get yours as you want it. 

[ludoo]

I've done one similar myself. to get infinity to work I used ground glass, extended the front back and forth until I found focus and marked it, then re-drilled the 'sliding arm' so now the camera doesn't extend as far.

I did the same, except for using an SLR with its lens to infinity instead of a ground glass. I've used the same method in the past with good results, this time though I made a mess of it, and drilled the sliding arm in the wrong place with focus going way past infinity.

Redid it now with a ground glass, still a bit off but in the other direction, which is better as I will mainly use the camera for portraits. Marking the exact position on the sliding arm is almost impossible.

Next weekend I'll try to work on the rangefinder.

[Chalky]

yes I found that when I drilled the arm I didn't get the hole exactly where I wanted it... but that was probably my bad craftmanship...

good luck with the rangefinder. look forward to seeing some results.