Rollei pano heads

[baachitraka]

Its a handy tool for panos and apart from that are their any uses with that?

 

[BrianShaw]

Nope

 

[ic-racer]

Mine has a Rolleifix and a bubble level.

 

[Down Under]

Several versions of these were produced by F&H for only Rolleis. They do what they were meant to do. Spirit levels to balance a TLR on a tripod. Click stops to allow for even rotation so panorama images can be pasted together effectively and easily, or in this computer era linked together seamlessly on a PC or laptop.

I have two. they were not inexpensive to buy as anything for Rolleis comes at a premium. One is prewar (or maybe postwar) and is longer then the newer versions. The other is maybe late 1950s, smaller and more elegant. Both fit easily in a pocket.

What other uses did you have in mind? They are basically what they are. I use mine maybe two times every year as they really do not work well with DSLRs, the click stops are evenly set up for the 6x6 120 film format. I have never tried them on my Nikons, so I really do not know.

 

[BrianShaw]

The later model works acceptably on a Hasselblad with 80mm lens. I tried it in a view camera with a 90mm men’s and 120 film back. It seemed to work but I misplaced the negs before I could try making a pano. There is about a 20% overlap built in to the flux stops so I think it may have worked...

 

[Michel Hardy-Vallée]

I bought one a while ago, and never got around to trying it. Having to haul the tripod, find a suitable place, then stitch everything together has not yet won over my laziness.

Perhaps I could make this my second-half-of-2021 resolution.

 

[reddesert]

They relieve you of carrying a separate fidget spinner, so that's less weight in your bag.

I have the version (older style?) of the panorama head that offsets the pivot point forward to be close to the entrance pupil of the lens. It has two ears that stick up with little pins that fit into the front of the Rollei. The head will fit under some other TLRs, but there are no sockets for those pins, so it's a little less rigid, but one could use it.

It's designed to cover a full circle in 10 steps, so each step should be 36 deg. The horizontal fields of view of the 75mm and 80mm lenses should be ~41 and 38 deg, so there is a little margin. In principle it would work with another camera and lens that have a >36 deg field of view (like a 50mm on 35mm film, or a 90mm on 6x7). However, how well the mount offsetting feature works, depends on the location of the tripod mount and the entrance pupil of the lens. This isn't an absolute necessity but it preserves some foreground/background relations. For large cameras this version of the head might not fit under them, due to the ears.

The pano head is a bit of a curiosity, but if you were going to do a project with a lot of multiple exposure panoramas, it would start to be a worthwhile time-saver. I keep meaning to use it for this, but haven't yet of course.

 

[baachitraka]

Yes there are two heads. I meant this one,

 

[BrianShaw]

Both versions have their benefits. The benefit of that later version is that it’s easier to use with cameras other than a Rollei TLR. But still no other use except making panoramic images.

 

[dpurdy]

The older version had the proper offset built in whereas the newer version needs to have a Rolleifix attached if you want the turning axis to be the middle of your lens.

 

[Arthurwg]

I've used mine (late model) to make long panos and it worked surprisingly well. I didn't use a Rolleifix but all the frames fit together as expected. Now I'm planning to use it to make two-frame segmented pictures.