Kiev 88 with digital back

Kievmarc said:

I think anyone who buys a 907x is essentially buying a Hasselblad with a digital back and a medium format sensor to use the new lens lineup, and that can be paired with the old 500 C/M or 203 that's gathering dust in the attic. I think few people would buy the CFV system and still spend $7,000 to get their old lenses.

I don't think there are any shops in Italy that rent that camera; in any case, I'd also have to rent (or borrow) an analog Hasselblad to test it out. Too risky. I might just like it.

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If the "risk" is that you might just like it, get a 907 and a 500CM, sell a kidney and your grandmother.Life is really too short to spend time on meddling with stuff, unless you love the tinkering more than actually using the camera.

Ask yourself: If you'd own the 907l, would you ever think "If I had only bought a Kiev?".

When I wrote "barrel lenses" I meant vintage brass lenses that do not have a shutter mechanism or a focusing helicoid, but do have an aperture control mechanism.

1. The native Kiev lenses are also barrel lenses except that they have a focusing mechanism. If you want faster shutter speeds, you might be able to mount a Copal, Compur or Prontor 3, Shanel 5A or the larger Acme and Ilex shutters in front of the lens. You will of course have to ensure that there is no vignetting. The digital back is connected to this shutter.

It may be possible to mount lenses from other SLR cameras, as long as they can focus at infinity (or at portrait distances, if that is your priority).

2. Barrel lenses as used with large format cameras pose the additional challenge of focusing.

This can be done by mounting the lens in a helicoid like the Pentax 67 Helicoid Extension Tube. This will naturally add some extension, so you would be limited to using lenses longer than 105mm or so.

Again, if you can live with the 1/30 sync speed there's no need to do anything else. For faster speeds a front mounted shutter may be possible.

3. Using regular large format lenses mounted in shutters is straightforward. Mount the lens in a body cap, which in turn mounts in a focusing helicoid (like the Pentax) and connect its shutter to the digital back. Again, you are limited to 105mm and longer lenses.

In all these cases, you would keep the shutter on the camera body open at 1 second, B or T and trigger the back with the connection on the external shutter.

Shutters like the Sinar Copal and Packard would minimize vignetting, but they are very large.

Using Sinarbacks is certainly not as convenient as using a modern CFV100 back, but is certainly far, far cheaper. Sometimes cost is an insurmountable problem... There are still many commercial photographers still using them and making money.

Kumar

RezaLoghme said:

If the "risk" is that you might just like it, get a 907 and a 500CM, sell a kidney and your grandmother.Life is really too short to spend time on meddling with stuff, unless you love the tinkering more than actually using the camera.

Ask yourself: If you'd own the 907l, would you ever think "If I had only bought a Kiev?".

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Unfortunatly I run out of grandmothers, last one sold for when I bought my used car

Probably no, except for the idea of the analogic object.

I dont want to spoil the fun of your project but this looks as if they offer a V body + digital back to rent.


I found 2 other vendors based in Italy, offering Hasselblads to rent, on first page of Google results.

Kievmarc said:

However, it's also true that these defects are due more to a lack of final quality control and maintenance than to design (they copied the Hasselblad 1000F after all).

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The Hasselblad 1000F wasn't a reliable camera as well. They abandoned the focal plane shutter and decided using a reliable leaf shutter was a better choice, and thus the 500C was born and the rest is history.

The soviet cameras (Salyut, Kiev 80/88) are inheriting the reliability problems of the 1000F.

That being said, there are people who report very good reliability with them. But they're not the norm.

B.S.Kumar said:

The back's light tightness (or lack of it) could be due to the camera body or the back

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Light fog problems in the back are almost always caused by a worn seal between the dark slide and the back. Something easy to repair.

Kievmarc said:

Maybe also the experties of @flavio81 can help with this thread

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Thanks for the quote, however i'm not sure how to help.

What I see here is that you are trying to fit a digital back on a Kiev 88 or similar body.

This would mean that you would use a smaller sensor than 6x6 on a 6x6 camera.

Anyways, if you're doing that, the only advantage I see is to use the wide array of (VERY CHEAP) soviet lenses available for that mount.

But on the other hand I read here that you are planinng to mount large format camera lenses with leaf shutters. In that case, using a Kiev 88 doesn't make sense at all, just adapt a digital back to a large format camera and call it a day.

Finally, I never liked the idea of old medium format lenses on digital backs. The sensor size of what the industry has the nerve to call "MEDIUM FORMAT DIGITAL" is tiny compared to true medium forma. I think the biggest sensor available nearly reaches 645 format. That is a joke.

If you want to digitally get closer to medium format results i would recommend Pentax 6x7 lenses on a Fuji GFX "medium" format digital using a Kipon focal reducer. In that way the laughably tiny sensor size of the Fuji is optically compensated for.

Still, i'm a film shooter first and foremost.

RezaLoghme said:

I dont want to spoil the fun of your project but this looks as if they offer a V body + digital back to rent.

Exit Rental - Cameras Hasselblad

CAMERAS HASSELBLAD HASSELBLAD H5X + IQ2 50MP HASSELBLAD H5X + IQ3 80MP HASSELBLAD H5X + IQ3 100MP HASSELBLAD H5D 60MP HASSELBLAD X1D 50C HASSELBLAD 503/553 + IQ 50MP

exitrental.eu

I found 2 other vendors based in Italy, offering Hasselblads to rent, on first page of Google results.

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@Kievmarc did you have a chance to speak to the vendors about renting the digi back + body?

F4U said:

genuine Hasselblad is bad enough. They are prone to jam, need service, and are not particularly convenient to use.

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...you shoot 8x10 and you think a Hasselblad is inconvenient to use?

mshchem said:

I remember when Shutterbug magazine reviewed these cameras. Right off one jammed and wouldn't wind.. The author smacked the camera against a counter and it then worked fine. Reminds me of the 65 Chevy I drove in high-school

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Camera is fine, comrade.

If the thrill is the marriage of digital and film medium format in one body, the Mamiya AFD series cameras allow use of both digital and film backs, and if it's particularly old Russian lenses you want to use then adapters are/were available (eg Hartblei) so you can use Kiev88/Pentacon6 lenses on these bodies. The digital backs that will work go up to the Phase One P45+

I have to register and give some advice:

1. When buy camera and lenses, please think about buy-in price vs sell-out price. You may use Leica or Hasselblad with "profit" if you can "time the market." (ie: buy low / sell high).

2. Kiev88 + digital back is for fun, when you already have the Hasselblad V system, not the only option. Because the biggest problem is not the synch, but the reliability of the shutter. In digital era, it is easy to press shutter 10,000 times. The shutter WILL have problem, especially at 1/30 etc due to second curtain escapement. Here is the video for Kiev 88 shutter CLA:
3. I have the Hartblei + Phase P25+. The Phase back can't be directly mounted - you would have to file the film gate etc on the body. Even then, the connectivity may not be secured - please use tape as insurance.

4. Sinar back may not work due to its wake up method. I bought a Sinar Emotion 75 and tried, it didn't work. I didn't do much further test / workaround and just sold it.

5. The Hartblei can synch under 1/30 with CFV back; For Phase, you can use a shutter button - after all, it is a switch button. So don't need to think too much about synch method. Think about evenness of shutter travel and reliability - this is its Achilles heel.

6. For the "button" switch, you can buy Canon rs60-e3, or use the Phase synch cable that have a small wake-up button built in the wake up cable. Of course, there are 1 shot vs 2 shots (latency) settings on Phase. But once we know it is all about switch "contact" for 1 time or 2 times, we will figure something out according to the situation. Leaf shutter or X synch method is just convenience, not necessity.

7. I contacted Arax about the "digital back modification" many years ago. They could not convert X to FP synch, but the technician was able to add a contact point on the mirror - so when you do the mirror lockup, the back will be waked up, then you can press the shutter to capture the image. As long as the mirror is up (and touching the mirror contact point), the back is always active. It will go back to sleep only after you advance the film knob and lower the mirror (the total back's active time may be 3-5 seconds). So you can ask Arax to cheaply add this contact point on the mirror - tell him that Yongfei's Hartblei got this modification about 10 years ago, maybe he will remember

Here are some photos. The Hartblei is mine (you can see the tiny button on the synch cable). I use this Hasselblad 2000 found online to show how the Canon switch works - it will wake up the Phase back upon pressing the button, no need for shutter or X synch. I took the Hartblei and Schneider 60mm F3.5 on a trip, and it can take beautiful photos. But sometimes the shutter travel was uneven and unreliable.

Kievmarc said:

I think anyone who buys a 907x is essentially buying a Hasselblad with a digital back and a medium format sensor to use the new lens lineup, and that can be paired with the old 500 C/M or 202 that's gathering dust in the attic. I think few people would buy the CFV system and still spend $7,000 to get their old lenses.

I don't think there are any shops in Italy that rent that camera; in any case, I'd also have to rent (or borrow) an analog Hasselblad to test it out. Too risky. I might just like it.

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The 907x can also use all the HC/HCD digital lenses with the appropriate adapter. Those can be found at good prices today and are quite sharp since you are just using the center. And the orange square/red dot ones retain AF on the 907x.

This Vello remote switch worked fine, when I tested it many years ago with CFV.

F4U said:

I learned a hard and bitter lesson owning ONE old Soviet camera. I shall never own another, much less spend money on an expensive digital retrofit back. I can think of no surer way of throwing good money after bad. On old genuine Hasselblad is bad enough. They are prone to jam, need service, and are not particularly convenient to use. If you want to pursue your idea the right way, get a genuine Hasselblad, have it professionally serviced, THEN continue with your digital back idea.

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I am probably the one who has followed your advice. Since the late '90s, I have owned two heavily modified Kiev-88 cameras as Hartblei Studio Masters with both K88 and P6 mount. A couple of years ago, I purchased a Hasselblad 201F and let a new focal plane shutter curtains installed. I only used the Hasselblad occasionally. Now, this camera is a paperweight with a broken shutter, whereas both of my Kiev-88s are still working.

Eyelike M22 (22Mp medium format sensor) on Kiev-88 (I purchased it for 300 Euro at EBay). An iMac or MacBook Pro with Snow Leopard is need to operate the digital back.