Charlie Groh wrote:
On Wed, 25 Feb 2009 12:53:49 -0800 (PST), Robatoy
wrote:

On Feb 25, 3:43 pm, "dadiOH" wrote:
Charlie Groh wrote:
I'm getting into architectural
photography and one of the *big* deals is converging lines...how to
*not* get converging lines is a tough...and expensive...nut

Tough, no; expensive, can be but not necessarily.

All you need is a view camera with tilting/sliding/rising/falling
front and back. Biggest problem IMO is that when you correct for
converging lines you get a "flat iron" appearance. My preferance
was/is partial correction - after all, lines *do* appear to
converge when we look at them - to avoid camera induced
accentuation of same.

As far as expense goes, you can easily find a decent used camera
such as Cambo/Calumet, Omega etc. *with* lens for around $500. Toyo
too but probably a bit more. One does not *have* to have a Sinar


A set of rubber tanks, some 4x5 hangers, a big enlarger... *drools*.
I loved that hobby.

The 'correction' of the cabinet posted by the OP I did in Photoshop.
Very sloppily done on the fly with the 'distort transform*

And you are correct. It looks way nicer to do a partial correction.
Btw, Nikon and leica and i believe Contax all made (or still make) a
lens or two with mechanical correction capability. I think the Nikon
had a focal length of 35 mm.
I have also seen mini bellows used on a Contax RTS.

...I've gotten a decent wide angle that will do for now...doubt if
I'll ever go the bellows route, there's some nice software to help
correct, too. You guys sound like you know the biz...I tend to spend
money when I think it'll solve a problem, not at the expense of
knowledge vis-a-vis the goal, but to achieve maximum speed...and
maximum may be minimum in many circumstances...

FWIW, Nikon has three tilt/shift lenses in the current line, from 24-85mm,
and Canon has four, from 17-90mm.

None of them are particularly cheap.

The Ukrainians are making a 35mm 2.8 tilt/shift that can be had fairly
cheaply--there are two up on ebay right now for under 300 bucks, one in
Canon and the other in Nikon mount--search "Arsat shift" and include
descriptions and you'll find them and a lot of others. Not the greatest
lens ever made but decent enough, and the build quality is Soviet military
or better (the factory was producing them for the Soviet government before
the Fall, and from all accounts they've been improving the quality ever
since), which means it looks rough but everything works and it will take a
beating.

With any of these you want an eyepiece magnifier--the ones that Dealextreme
sells are usable and cheap (main problem is that they aren't parfocal--when
you change from low to high power you have to readjust them), the ones from
the camera manufacturers are generally better but not necessarily enough so
to justify the cost differential. The reason you want the magnifier is that
none of the tilt/shift lenses are autofocus, with the lens off-axis any
focusing aids in the viewfinder are iffy, and just forget about the focus
confirmation getting you close enough.