RealitySoSubtle 6×6 VS Zero Image 6x9

marciofs · Jan 13, 2016

Update...

I did my project with success and I still want to shoot a lot more as soon as I find models.

Here a video I made to present my pinhole portraits:

[video=youtube;rplUgkxu1xI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rplUgkxu1xI[/video]

I also bought the RealitySoSubtle 6x6 this month and I love it.
Not very good for portraits but great for architecture and so on...

Here some shots:

Poisson Du Jour · Jan 13, 2016

marciofs said:
Yesterday was released the Reality so Subtle 6×6. I was waiting for it while trying to make up mind between it or Zero image 6x9.

My indecision is because I actually prefer the bigger frame (6x9) from Zero Camera.

But Reality so Subtle 6×6 has up level pinhole, framing lines orientation, you can move the film backwards if needed and seem to be more compact. It also has a shutter in the camera which I consider better. Zero Image cameras has nothing of it.

On the other hand, Reality so Subtle 6×6 has a focal length of 20.5mm which seems to be way too wide for me, because I am really looking for a camera to do portraits and in a such wide image of 108º the edges of the image seems to be too stretched for portraitures.

While Zero Camera 6x9 has a focal length of 40mm, so the image is less wide and the edges of the image much less stretched.

In resume, I think Reality so Subtle is much better as tool. But the bigger frame and less stretched edges from Zero Image seems to be more appropriated for my portraits shots.

I was wondering if the experience of people here doing portraits with very wide pinhole camera can help me decide if it is worth get the Reality so Subtle 6×6 or if would be more recommended the longer focal length of Zero Image Camera.

Any advice?

The Zero Image 6x9 is a multiformat camera (I own two). Pull out the dividers and set it to 6x6, and that's your problem solved. The dividers also set up for 6x4.5, 6x7 and 6x9. Framing/view guides are superfluous to what is a thinking person's camera, somebody who conceptualises the image without need for guides and lines to help them. I wouldn't go wanting for a camera with such things.

michaelorr · Jan 13, 2016

Marcio, these photos are really sweet, and nicely executed. I especially like the last one, it just has so many elements

Does anyone have input to the perennial discussion of the laser bored hole or the filed down knife-edge aperture, as pertains to the diffraction?
I have not seen sources of ready made knife edge apertures.

marciofs · Jan 13, 2016

michaelorr said:
Marcio, these photos are really sweet, and nicely executed. I especially like the last one, it just has so many elements

Does anyone have input to the perennial discussion of the laser bored hole or the filed down knife-edge aperture, as pertains to the diffraction?
I have not seen sources of ready made knife edge apertures.

Thank you.

About your question I actually never thought about it.

KC2PED · May 17, 2016

I have one of James' 4x5s which was a great camera until I moded it to take a accept a Grafmatic 4x5 film back. Now I have light leaks, but have finally figured out where they are so I may be able to fix them. It is a solid camera and makes good images.
For years I used a Roleiflex and then a Hasselblad and loved the square format. When I got a PHD digital camera I set it up to make square images until I found out it couldn't save square images as RAW files. And my favorite lenses are wide angle. But I try to get people out of my images, not hard with pinhole, rather than making portraits.
If I were on the fence about a 6x6 vs a 4x5 I would go with the larger format. But I don't see that much difference between 6x6 and 6x9 unless you really want rectangular pictures.
Right now my biggest concern with roll film photography is that there isn't enough contrast between the backing paper color and the printed frame numbers for me to see the numbers in the little red window.

summicron1 · May 17, 2016

the nice thing about the ZeroImage 4 by 5 is that you can use any type of back on it -- I've used regular film holders, Grafmatic backs and also a 6 by 9 roll film back. The multiple-distances also comes with three different rotating pinholes set for each distance.

pretty sweet outfit, all in all, that I sadly don't use enough.

europanorama · May 23, 2016

DWThomas said:
Actually, just that name "RealitySoSubtle" has to be worth something!

I may be mis-remembering, or thinking of some other camera, but didn't Zero Image have an arrangement (or a particular model) with multiple sections that could be stacked to change the pinhole to film distance? That might be an attractive idea.

The first pinhole work I did (in recent history) used a 4x5 press camera for which I made a new lensboard with a pinhole and flap shutter. That camera had a flip-up wire-frame finder arrangement which essentially compensated for the pinhole to film distance as it was changed by using the focus rack-and-pinion mechanism. A similar camera, perhaps one of the smaller format ones, with a rollfilm back would be a good foundation for a flexible pinhole setup. (I stopped using that camera, as I was somewhat dissatisfied with it. But I think I just need to make a new pinhole for it knowing everything I know now.) One could presumably unscrew the lenses from a shutter assembly and install a pinhole if one wanted a fancy shutter.

The beauty of the pinhole camera concept is that there are a thousand ways to get there!

Skinkpinhole has Retro Pro Copal for that. Read this in details
http://web.archive.org/web/20151119015956/http://f295.org/home
only lacking shutter which 18°(3s-krpc on ebay) has but pinhole-shutter only. maybe they could build-in zoneplate/zoen sieves from skinkphoto.

europanorama · May 23, 2016

summicron1 said:
the nice thing about the ZeroImage 4 by 5 is that you can use any type of back on it -- I've used regular film holders, Grafmatic backs and also a 6 by 9 roll film back. The multiple-distances also comes with three different rotating pinholes set for each distance.

pretty sweet outfit, all in all, that I sadly don't use enough.

I doubt this:
"The multiple-distances also comes with three different rotating pinholes set for each distance."
the three different items are the frames 25, 50 and 75mm nothing rotated. its fixfocus in pinhole always.
if pinholes have the same size but FL change then the cameras have different filmplane to pinhole-distances.
read these explanations-german and english about sized matching multiple FLs.
http://skinkpinhole.com/wp/webshop/shop/grossformat/

europanorama · May 23, 2016

KC2PED said:
I have one of James' 4x5s which was a great camera until I moded it to take a accept a Grafmatic 4x5 film back. Now I have light leaks, but have finally figured out where they are so I may be able to fix them. It is a solid camera and makes good images.
For years I used a Roleiflex and then a Hasselblad and loved the square format. When I got a PHD digital camera I set it up to make square images until I found out it couldn't save square images as RAW files. And my favorite lenses are wide angle. But I try to get people out of my images, not hard with pinhole, rather than making portraits.
If I were on the fence about a 6x6 vs a 4x5 I would go with the larger format. But I don't see that much difference between 6x6 and 6x9 unless you really want rectangular pictures.
Right now my biggest concern with roll film photography is that there isn't enough contrast between the backing paper color and the printed frame numbers for me to see the numbers in the little red window.

Pity James is unwilling to make RSS4x5 international back-ready. Good to know about light leaks,
Maybe you could share the results of modding.

DWThomas · May 23, 2016

As I read the Zero Image 4x5 page, you can get the basic frame with two extensions and a "turret" that allows selecting one of three pinholes or one of three zoneplates. So yes, the angle of view will change depending on 25, 50 or 75 mm setup, and the f/stop may change some depending on which pinhole you select. Presumably one of the three pinholes/zoneplates is optimized for each of the three "focal lengths." That suggests it is ready to use with a very flexible setup (if purchased with all the options). 25mm focal length in a 4x5 will be extremely wide angle (and I suspect likely have noticeable edge fall-off).

I know some of the most impressive work I've seen on the annual WPPD galleries comes from Zero Image cameras, so they appear to know what they are doing. Myself, I like and accept the challenge of do-it-yourself.

summicron1 · May 23, 2016

europanorama said:
I doubt this:
"The multiple-distances also comes with three different rotating pinholes set for each distance."
the three different items are the frames 25, 50 and 75mm nothing rotated. its fixfocus in pinhole always.
if pinholes have the same size but FL change then the cameras have different filmplane to pinhole-distances.
read these explanations-german and english about sized matching multiple FLs.
http://skinkpinhole.com/wp/webshop/shop/grossformat/

hey, do I have one of them? Yes I do.

There are 25, 50 and 75mm film-to-pinhole distances, depending on how many frames you stack up. Because the optimal size of pinhole changes with distance, the camera includes three pinholes, on a little turrent disc inside the camera. You set the disc corresponding to the distance. The instructions also include time calculations for each distance/pinhole combination.

There are also three different zone plates, but I don't use those much.

kier · May 24, 2016

summicron1 said:
hey, do I have one of them? Yes I do.

There are 25, 50 and 75mm film-to-pinhole distances, depending on how many frames you stack up. Because the optimal size of pinhole changes with distance, the camera includes three pinholes, on a little turrent disc inside the camera. You set the disc corresponding to the distance. The instructions also include time calculations for each distance/pinhole combination.

There are also three different zone plates, but I don't use those much.

I also have the Zero Image 4x5 w/the extra frames. And as summicron1 pointed out, it has a turret with 3 pinholes, one for each focal length. Works perfect - high quality pinholes - except when you forget to turn it to the right pinhole for the frames you're using lol

europanorama · Jun 9, 2016

distance is the wrongest term here: Distance to filmflane is correct.

IanBarber · May 17, 2017

KC2PED said:
Right now my biggest concern with roll film photography is that there isn't enough contrast between the backing paper color and the printed frame numbers for me to see the numbers in the little red window.

I have not long ago acquired a Zero 2000 6x6 and I am really struggling to see the frame numbers through the red hole, in fact, I have wasted a few rolls of film now with not getting the numbers right.

I suffer from Red/Green Color Blindness and black on red can be hard sometimes. Is there a reason why its red, could it be removed and replaced with another color ?

europanorama · Nov 3, 2019

europanorama said:
I doubt this:
"The multiple-distances also comes with three different rotating pinholes set for each distance."
the three different items are the frames 25, 50 and 75mm nothing rotated. its fixfocus in pinhole always.
if pinholes have the same size but FL change then the cameras have different filmplane to pinhole-distances.
read these explanations-german and english about sized matching multiple FLs.
http://skinkpinhole.com/wp/webshop/shop/grossformat/

sorry i was so ignorant about the turret. was not aware of it. Pity editing is omitted.,
I am actually in 3s-krpc(ebay) cosmos circle shutter. it has manual(not advised) trigger and standard thread for cable-release(M3.2 x0.5)
shutter can be triggered with whatever cable-solutions to get 1/6 sec. shorted. he can deliver pinhole-plates with M22 x 1m-thread.
shutter -mount itself has M30(pitch must be confirmed 0.75 or 0.5) i think its 0.5 since its made to be used on copal 0-lens-board.
will use the shutter in a vermeer 6x7 camera. and more ideas about this camera. will come back when time is ripe. cosmos circle working on 4x5-bodies shorter than 60mm(here for 58/65mm fixedfocus-lenses. there is a 65mm helicoid-4x5-cam on ebay 3s-krpc.

bernard_L · Nov 3, 2019

IanBarber said:
Is there a reason why its red, could it be removed and replaced with another color ?

(I know this was 2+ yrs ago, but nonetheless...)
Red window is a tradition from the time of orthochromatic films, providing added protection against light leaks. Now with panchro films, any color behaves the same, with the light protection relying on the proper design of the film back. It is still a good idea to close the flap (or stick black tape) when not using the window, i.e. 99.9% of the time.

RealitySoSubtle 6×6 VS Zero Image 6x9

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