How do you handle seeing things upside down on the ground glass?

trondsi · Jul 20, 2015

When using the ground glass on my Crown Graphic, I have found that I can easily view it the right way simply by tilting my head, and using the metal focusing hood. I also have the viewfinders attached to my camera. I suppose this is not the case for other kinds of LF cameras. Have you simply gotten used to seeing it upside down, or do you have any tricks up your sleeves?

BrianShaw · Jul 20, 2015

No tricks other than getting used to the situation. It really doesn't take long for most people.

Kilgallb · Jul 20, 2015

I honestly believe that over time your brain is capable of turning the image right side up. I look and then look at the real scene and never seem to notice. Left to right seems an issue for me though. Go figure.

BrianShaw · Jul 20, 2015

My brain seems incapable of inverting. But I've gotten used to composing upside down in LF, or inside out in MF.

Ken Nadvornick · Jul 20, 2015

I'm not one, but I've been told that painters habitually invert their canvases as they work in order to see the distribution and weight of the subject forms, without the distracting element of recognizable content.

In that context the inverted image on the ground glass is not an annoying bug. It's a useful feature...

Ken

Sirius Glass · Jul 20, 2015

I have no problem with the upside down image. I do not use any tricks, I use quickly adjust to the orientation.

Alan Gales · Jul 20, 2015

Ken Nadvornick said:
I'm not one, but I've been told that painters habitually invert their canvases as they work in order to see the distribution and weight of the subject forms, without the distracting element of recognizable content.

In that context the inverted image on the ground glass is not an annoying bug. It's a useful feature...

Ken

Boy, you sure hit the nail on the head!

I completely agree and I used to draw and paint a little. We were taught that trick about inverting our work in art school.

trondsi · Jul 20, 2015

Ken Nadvornick said:
I'm not one, but I've been told that painters habitually invert their canvases as they work in order to see the distribution and weight of the subject forms, without the distracting element of recognizable content.

In that context the inverted image on the ground glass is not an annoying bug. It's a useful feature...

Ken

A few painters do this for sure. I rarely do, but I think looking at your painting in a mirror is very useful.

Maris · Jul 21, 2015

I can't say I've ever noticed the GG image is upside down . It's so familiar after thousands of looks that the inversion never even comes to mind. And I don't notice the pictures is colour either if I'm shooting black and white.

Roger Cole · Jul 21, 2015

BrianShaw said:
No tricks other than getting used to the situation. It really doesn't take long for most people.

Yep. This.

Ken Nadvornick said:
I'm not one, but I've been told that painters habitually invert their canvases as they work in order to see the distribution and weight of the subject forms, without the distracting element of recognizable content.

In that context the inverted image on the ground glass is not an annoying bug. It's a useful feature...

Ken

I also sometimes intentionally view my prints upside down. It has a way of abstracting elements and sometimes revealing relationships between parts of the image that weren't apparent when viewed right side up. Of course that won't help THAT shot (unless it reveals something distracting that can be cropped out, maybe) but it helps with future ones, I think. I think I tend to make better compositions on the ground glass of my view camera than with my correct-viewing medium format and 35mm cameras partly for this reason (and also because of being forced to slow down so much, of course.)

jacaquarie · Jul 21, 2015

Upside down has been the feature for me too! Fint that the inversion assists with the composition. Have the artist friend and he taught me the upside down for drawing, and it workd. You stop drawing what is your memory of the object and instead draw the lines of the object. Was under the impression that the inverted image was the extra cost option of large format. Like wise when looking at the photograph (or drawing) of self look at photograph as the reflection in a mirror. That is how you see yourself. Help when you do not think the photograph does not look like what you think you look like. Few people are perfectly symmetrical.

Now that I have explained away what I think I am seeing, what to do about those voices I hear in my head?

Ian Grant · Jul 21, 2015

I got used to working with TLR's 40 years ago where the image is laterally reversed on the focus screen and actually find the screen of an LF camera slightly easier, I compose/frame then image mentally and really pay most importance to the edges of the frame and then focus and need for any movements.

Ian

pdeeh · Jul 21, 2015

jacaquarie said:
what to do about those voices I hear in my head?

It rather depends on what they're saying ...

Ian said:
really pay most importance to the edges of the frame and then focus and need for any movements.

That's valuable information. Reading that, I've just realised I do exactly the same when using 135 & MF, but when using LF I seem to find myself very fixated on the centre of the frame while disregarding the edges to the detriment of the photograph. Hmm. Food for thought next time I'm shooting.

As for upside-down-ness ... I sort of notice, but it has never felt like an obstacle, even when I first started. there's probably some research in the psychology of perception to be done about why and how people experience this differently.

gone · Jul 21, 2015

My trick was to buy a Polaroid MP4 reflex viewer. Very easily to adapt to it. Not something you would want to carry around w/ it mounted on the camera, but mine was just for landscapes and portraits where I had the camera on a tripod. It was held on w/ two small bungee cords, but you can file the little nubs and mount them more permanently. Other times I simply focused w/ the rangefinder.

Been painting 50 years and never inverted a painting. What I normally do if there is any doubt about values is take a B&W photo to eliminate the colour. That way, all you see are the values. I have tried looking at a piece in a mirror to ck compositional balance too, but it never works. Often, balanced or not, the way it's composed on the paper is the right way. After a while you just know whether its right or not, and don't need to ck any other way other than looking at it.

bdial · Jul 21, 2015

What I hate is when the reversed or upside-down image I saw in the GG looks better than the eventual right-side-up print.

Rick A · Jul 21, 2015

I used to work in a letter press print shop, I'm used to upside down or backwards, in this instance, both. Maybe it helps if one is cixelsyd.

BrianShaw · Jul 21, 2015

bdial said:
What I hate is when the reversed or upside-down image I saw in the GG looks better than the eventual right-side-up print.

What I hate is that I see that phenomenon a lot!

darkosaric · Jul 21, 2015

HCB judged good composition (between other things) by turning the print upside down - if it still holds, then it is good .

winger · Jul 21, 2015

I got used to the upside down GG a lot easier than the left-right switch on my Hasselblad. It's just a matter of doing it more, I think. I still have trouble with the Hasselblad and I've had it much longer.

RPippin · Jul 21, 2015

Seeing things upside down and backwards on the ground glass stimulates right brain activity. For me, the more I use it the faster the "switch" turns on and I see composition a bit more. I too have found the image sometimes better than the print, probably for this reason. Keep at it and learn from it. Let it teach you.

DannL. · Jul 21, 2015

I see the image on the focusing screen as an image that has been rotated 180 degrees. Deciphering and working with the image on a focusing screen is akin to learning a new language. Do it often enough and it becomes familiar and easier to understand.

Alan Gales · Jul 21, 2015

trondsi said:
I rarely do, but I think looking at your painting in a mirror is very useful.

When I was in High School my art teacher liked my work and wanted me to bring some of my personal drawings/paintings I had done at home to show him. One of the things I brought was a drawing of a 59 Chevy with a blower, side pipes, wild paint job, big tires, etc. When I showed it to him he told me it had some perspective issues. He told me to take it back home and hold it in front of a mirror and it would all become clear.

That trick really works!

Rick A · Jul 21, 2015

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4ba309H0WI

removed account4 · Jul 21, 2015

i guess i have gotten used to inverted images ..
when i took a painting course in college we painted everything upside down
but that was before i ever used a view camera. i have more trouble with a slr image being rihtnside
up and moving the wrong way when i change position of the camera.
when i spot images with the electronic device i do it as a negative often times because
i used romretouch on an adams retoucihing desk ...
i guess in the end it is what you get used to more than anything else, and the more
you might do something the more 2nd nature it becomes.

JPJackson · Jul 21, 2015

Ian Grant said:
I got used to working with TLR's 40 years ago where the image is laterally reversed on the focus screen and actually find the screen of an LF camera slightly easier, I compose/frame then image mentally and really pay most importance to the edges of the frame and then focus and need for any movements.

Ian

"work the edges" was the motto/mantra back in the day.

How do you handle seeing things upside down on the ground glass?

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