Macro with RB67 and 50mm Sekor C

[ic-racer]

I do my medium format close-up photography with my Horseman system. The film plane meter is pretty cumbersome for most outdoor use, but comes in very handy making closeups. I think small battery voltage errors with the meter are less than measuring and calculating errors. Not to mention the ambiguity of aperture levers with no click-stops.

 

[Donald Qualls]

Yep, metering through the lens is the real solution. I've already got my eye on a metered prism finder, but for macro (especially flowers and such) a chimney might be more practical. Sadly, it looks like my upcoming stimulus is going to go for a new video card (rule seems to be, if you can really afford a computer goodie, it'll be too slow). In fairness, I have been running the same one for three years, but I just don't see how people spend two-three grand on one of those if they aren't making a living editing video or something of the sort.

I should be able to manage a metered prism and a metered chimney over the next year or so, anyway. But then I'll have to spend as much as a couple lenses on a backpack that'll carry it all.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Donald, My understanding is that fast video cards do not affect photo editing much that the normal furnished card can't handle. I think this has something to do with refresh rates required with computer gaming but not required for photo editing. I could be wrong and I'm sure someone will quickly let me know.

 

[Donald Qualls]

Yep, you're right, @Alan Edward Klein . The video card isn't for photo scanning or editing -- I could do that with on-board integral graphics, as long as I give them enough RAM in setup. But every time I watch a video in YouTube, the video lags behind the audio, which I'm told is because my video card is a significant bottleneck to my CPU (video handles converting and displaying the image frames, CPU does the sound processing). It does also affect gaming, but I don't game that heavily. I can upgrade from a GTx 750 to GTx 1660 Super for about $400 -- that along with an OS upgrade over the next couple long weekends, which will let me use a more up to date video driver, is supposed to fix the video lag issue.

I may wait to order the new video card until after the software work is done, though. Just in case the driver update solves the problem...

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Donald, I'm running Windows with 24MB RAM memory and 256gb SSD. I've never seen memory needs go above 12mb while I'm running video editing programming (Adobe Premiere Elements)and Lightroom at the same time. I have 3.40 gigahertz Intel Core i7-4770 processor. The Dell computer is about 6 years old.

The display consists of AMD Radeon(TM) R9 270 [Display adapter] driving a NEC PA242W [24" 2K Monitor] using Spectraview II calibration. No problems there either.

Have you checked your internet speed? Maybe the bottleneck is there. What speeds does the test indicate for you?
Speed check: https://www.speedtest.net/

 

[MattKing]

Donald lives in the Linux world.
I expect that his problem is with the interface between the graphic card he uses and the Linux drivers he employs.
That being said, I doubt that he needs a high end video card. I expect he needs a video card that is well supported in Linux.

 

[Alan Edward Klein]

Donald lives in the Linux world.
I expect that his problem is with the interface between the graphic card he uses and the Linux drivers he employs.
That being said, I doubt that he needs a high end video card. I expect he needs a video card that is well supported in Linux.

Early this year I got my wife her first desktop. She insisted on an Apple because she has an iPhone. I use an android phone and Windows desktop. I told her I'm refusing to learn Apple software. I've got enough problems with Windows.

 

[Donald Qualls]

I have 16 GB RAM and 8 cores/8 threads at 4.2 GHz max. As you suggest, Matt, there may be an issue with the drivers, but nVidia produces their own drivers for Linux (I'm not using the Nouveau free/open one, it sucks on performance).. The issue might be that I'm locked into a driver that's a couple years out of date, because nVidia quit backporting for Ubuntu 16.04. I'll be upgrading to 20:04 presently, which ought to help some at least with currentness of my drivers.

That said, I'd rather spend money on camera gear than a video card, so if I can make it behave without the hardware upgrade, it can wait until the next time I need to rebuild the whole system (likely 2-5 years out).

Say, @MattKing can you suggest what cards might have better Linux support than nVidia? Last I heard, AMD had completely dropped development on Linux drivers -- and that pretty well covers the market. I'm on PCIe X16 hardware, not sure what else I could do.

 

[MattKing]

Say, @MattKing can you suggest what cards might have better Linux support than nVidia? Last I heard, AMD had completely dropped development on Linux drivers -- and that pretty well covers the market. I'm on PCIe X16 hardware, not sure what else I could do.

Sorry Donald, I'm not the one to ask. My post reflects past experience, not current sourcing!

 

[Donald Qualls]

Sorry Donald, I'm not the one to ask. My post reflects past experience, not current sourcing!

Understood. Unfortunately, askunbuntu.com, my usual go-to for Ubuntu questions, will mark such a question as off-topic due to being a "list" or "shopping" question, so I'm not sure where else to look. They also pretty much won't help with anything else until I upgrade -- with 4 months to EOL, that's the only advice they'll give. "Install 20.04 and add the nVidia ppa, see if that fixes it." Thanks, I'll get back to you after spending a weekend I'd rather have spent in my darkroom...