Street photography with an old Rolleiflex

Q.G. · Jan 3, 2011

Paul Verizzo said:
I'm thinking Q.G. must have been mightily abused by a TLR as a child and suffers trauma to this day! Wow, such passion over something that is mostly mere opinion. I guess those are the things that arouse passion because objectivity usually quelches one side of an argument.

Uhm... No passion on my side. I couldn't care less.
But i did indeed encounter a lot of (blind) passion when i said that TLRs are indeed archaic.

That did (and it's bad of me, i know. Sorry!) did give me a quite a bit of amusement.

Q.G. · Jan 3, 2011

dpurdy said:
Looking up archaic it seems mostly to mean antiquated and from a previous era and no longer in use. Judging by the number of Rolleis in use and selling daily on ebay for very high prices, and the fact that they are still made new today (I myself the proud owner of the newest version) I think you could easily make a case for Rolleis being very current and up to date with human use.

Blind to the two other aspects contained in the dictionary definition, i see.

dpurdy said:
So it doesn't qualify as archaic yet any more than QGs Hasselblad.

It does, but we've been over that. What i want to say is that as far as i am concerned, this has nothing to do with 'my' Hasselblad.
Why do you all (well, it was mentioned often enough) keep coming up with that? I haven't heard anyone say anything about 'my' archaic Rolleiflex. Something you will indeed have to think about for a while.

Mark Crabtree · Jan 3, 2011

Paul Verizzo said:
I'm thinking Q.G. must have been mightily abused by a TLR as a child and suffers trauma to this day!
...

Or simply would just rather have attention focused on himself rather than the fine photography done with a Rolleiflex that was being discussed here. The photographer chose a camera that suited her well and made great photographs with it. That I find interesting.

dfoo · Jan 3, 2011

Q.G. said:
What you call close-ups and what other people call close-ups do differ enormously.

How arrogant! How do you know what I call a close up?

dfoo · Jan 3, 2011

Q.G. said:
Uhm... No passion on my side. I couldn't care less.
...

In other words you are nothing more than an example of the lowest form of humanity on the internet. A troll.

Q.G. · Jan 3, 2011

Mark Crabtree said:
Or simply would just rather have attention focused on himself rather than the fine photography done with a Rolleiflex that was being discussed here. The photographer chose a camera that suited her well and made great photographs with it. That I find interesting.

So do i.

The attention, Mark, focusses on the archaic bit. Someone said TLRs are not. I said they are. I would have been more than happy if it had remained at that. But apparently some people don't like that, and made it the centre of attention.

It's fun so i don't mind.
But there's no point in continuing this 'if you don't like the message, shoot the messenger' thingy. It doesn't work, not even when veiled in this 'i find the photographs interesting'. It could have been convincing, without the preamble.

dfoo · Jan 3, 2011

dfoo said:
How arrogant! How do you know what I call a close up?

The 55mm lens on a C330 has a reproduction ratio at closest focus of 1.14. True its not 2x, or 3x but that is still pretty close up!

blockend · Jan 3, 2011

This thread has taken a turn for the surreal. It was originally posed to illustrate the usefulness of twin lens reflex cameras, and the Rollei in particular, as a street photography tool. Both sides have had their say but the last word will go to Vivian Maier, who proved that her Rollei was an art-reportage camera par excellence.

Nobody asked what a Rollei was like as a sports camera, a macrophotography instrument, or how useful it was for the moonshot. I think some people need to show their own street photography and leave the public to judge how it compares with Vivian Maier's TLR work before bigging up their choice of camera.
p.s. the only obsolete camera is one that doesn't work, can't be fixed and for which film is no longer available.

Cromlech · Jan 3, 2011

blockend said:
p.s. the only obsolete camera is one that doesn't work, can't be fixed and for which film is no longer available.

I agree with this whole heartedly.

Paul Green · Jan 3, 2011

This is such wonderful work. Thank you to the OP for sharing the link.

dfoo · Jan 3, 2011

dfoo said:
The 55mm lens on a C330 has a reproduction ratio at closest focus of 1.14. True its not 2x, or 3x but that is still pretty close up!

In fact, I just found this definition:

Close-Up Photography is where the reproduction ratio is from 1:10 to 1:1 - ie from 1/10th life-size to life-size.

By that definition all lenses are capable of close up photography on the C330.

Paul Verizzo · Jan 3, 2011

Children! Children!

Let's all go back to our seats and sing another round of "Kuimbaya!"

Sheesh, really.

dpurdy · Jan 3, 2011

Interesting to look up Kumbaya! Apparently a African American dialect that started as Come By Here my lord. It came out as Kum By Ya my lord.
It is definitely outdated and archaic.. (sideways smiley face)

wblynch · Jan 3, 2011

TLRs are still being manufactured. The plastic Blackbird Fly, the Gakkenflex, the Lubitel 166 (I believe), the Chinese Seagull and --tada!-- the famed Rolleiflex is evidently back in production.

What amuses me is that 30, 50, and 75 year old film cameras are still useable and enjoyable (hardly archaic) yet there are 10 year old digicraps that can't be used anymore because no one makes their memory cards, batteries, or software anymore.

In the digicrap world, anything over 3 years old is archaic.

I still use a Yashica 44 TLR that uses 127 film. I can make my own rolls even though 127 film is archaic.

That little baby TLR is a joy to use and on the street people love to see it and approach me to ask questions. They all want their picture taken by it. It's a great street photography camera.

Mainecoonmaniac · Jan 3, 2011

She's an extraordinary photographer. It didn't look like she was a good self-promoter or else she might of had some sort of fame. But the negs at least are in the good hands of John Maloof.

eddym · Jan 3, 2011

Mods, this thread has been hijacked by a troll. Could you please delete the OT posts (including mine)?

BrianL · Jan 3, 2011

Strange way this thread has progressed; for me the Rolleiflex is far from archaic. Film is currently available. You load it in the body, crank the advance/shutter, set the speed and aperature, look through a viewfinder and fire the shutter. It seems to be the same process as with my Bronica, Leica, and not a whole lot different than my Olympus when in manual mode except no film to load. Since I have a distain for zooms and most shooting is with a single lens having a fixed non-interchangeable form is nothing that makes it archaic and in fact there is the new GX100 coming out soon that also is a fixed focal non-interchangeable digital. Now, don't argue since I am about to have my Rolleiflex T completely serviced and put it back in full time service in lieu of using the dslr that has results that are so far short of the Rollei it is almost laughable.

Sirius Glass · Jan 3, 2011

blockend said:
This thread has taken a turn for the surreal. It was originally posed to illustrate the usefulness of twin lens reflex cameras, and the Rollei in particular, as a street photography tool. Both sides have had their say but the last word will go to Vivian Maier, who proved that her Rollei was an art-reportage camera par excellence.

Nobody asked what a Rollei was like as a sports camera, a macrophotography instrument, or how useful it was for the moonshot. I think some people need to show their own street photography and leave the public to judge how it compares with Vivian Maier's TLR work before bigging up their choice of camera.
p.s. the only obsolete camera is one that doesn't work, can't be fixed and for which film is no longer available.

I was wondering how many people use for 1:1 photography for street shooting. The OP asked about street shooting, not "my camera is better than your camera".

Steve

Sirius Glass · Jan 3, 2011

Paul Verizzo said:
Children! Children!

Let's all go back to our seats and sing another round of "Kuimbaya!"

Sheesh, really.

Hey, man, can't we all just get a bong?

Q.G. · Jan 4, 2011

eddym said:
Mods, this thread has been hijacked by a troll. Could you please delete the OT posts (including mine)?

Geez... Just because someone disagrees with you...

TLRs are still usable. They still produce good pictures (at least the good ones do).

That has nothing to do with why they are made the way they are, with two cameras stacked on top of each other.

It doesn't take much to learn and understand why they were made that way, and why noone in his right mind would now ever think of designing a camera to be that way. Not, unless there is yet another, new problem that needs to be circumvented that way.

Are TLR-users so insecure about your camera that you can't live with that? You would say so reading most of this thread. But i know (luckily) that it's not true for all TLR-users.

It has nothing to do with "my camera is better than your camera", Steve. But everything with why TLRs are TLRs.

blockend · Jan 4, 2011

I'm not a TLR user and haven't been for more than twenty years but it doesn't blind me to what they're good at, which is precisely the kind of work Maier and Arbus did. You seem to have an issue with their viewfinder Q.G. and the fact it resembles a taking lens. The camera hangs vertically from a neck strap which means the photographer can take a picture quickly without raising the camera to their eye. That's the way I used mine and there are very few medium format cameras that hang upright from a strap. It's a real advantage, you should try it.

Paul Verizzo · Jan 4, 2011

Hard to think of Vivian shooting with a Hassy.....

"Kuh-Lunk!"

I've done what I'll call "surreptitious photography" and the only reasonable contenders have been my Rollei and my digital, the latter with a flip up back viewer and no audio effects on the shutter. IMNSHO. The digital has been great, too, for just having it slung on my side walking past people on the beach. Lots of misaimed pics, but the "film" is free, s it's just another reasonable MO.

Anything eye level just announces to the world "I'm looking at you."

So, how about that Vivan Maeir? Enough camera stuff.

I think there are several things that make this story so powerful. First, of course, the GREAT photographs. Then we pile on these facts: She never displayed them, sought an audience for them, tried to make money from them. That they were almost lost to the world, forever. That she apparently never printed them. That someone who knew nothing about her or photography tripped over the cache, understood what he had, and had the cash (catchy play on words here, eh?) to buy not just the first tub, but ones that others bought.

The old phrase "You can't make this stuff up," sure applies here.

blockend · Jan 4, 2011

The photographs by Vivian Maier that have emerged so far suggest she's one of the giants of the medium. Any curator can see that immediately, there's no hyperbole required to see her work is truly great. Stuff about what camera she used is fluff and spin.

dfoo · Jan 4, 2011

Q.G. said:
...
Are TLR-users so insecure about your camera that you can't live with that? You would say so reading most of this thread. But i know (luckily) that it's not true for all TLR-users.
...

Give it up man. I can't speak for anyone else, but for me it has nothing to do with insecurity. I'm not wedded to any particular camera or format. I own lots of different types of cameras and use and love them all. What you said, however, is just plain not right and you were deliberately trollish and confrontational about the whole thing.

lorirfrommontana · Jan 4, 2011

Great Photography. I'm so glad it was shared. Got it bookmarked. My tlr is my favorite camera for candid work. It's great for taking candid shots of todays kids who don't know what it is. When the slr comes out they all get a cheesy grin because it looks like a camera!
-Lori

Street photography with an old Rolleiflex

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