Almost, but not quite

OK you LF gurus, help the newbie.

I was really hoping this shot would come out...
This is from Missouri pass in the Holy Cross wilderness looking NW over Treasure Vault lake toward Middle Mountain. You can see Blodgett lake on the left too.

The lake and surrounding area is much more out of focus than I can tolerate. This is about as good as I can get this. I'm open to suggestions of course. I did not apply any output sharpening for the web.

I bracketed the exposure and used both velvia and provia to be safe on the exposure but I kept the focus the same once it was set.

Tell me if there is anything I could have done with movements or aperture to correct this. I was on a steep ridge, so the lake is considerably lower than I was and immediately below me. I only used back tilt, focusing on the flower in the foreground and Middle mountain in the distance.

The only thing I can think of is a smaller aperture. I shot this at f22 on a 125mm lens. I could have gone to f64. I chose f22 for sharpness.

Exposure was 125mm 1/15@f22.
scanned with silverfast AI on an Epson 4870
Adjusted in LR and CS3
July 2007

Yeah this is a common problem that I constantly am dealing with. In this case I can think of several things... First of all, your fore-foreground is not very prominent in the comp, so I might have let that go out of focus instead of the lake, or eliminated it from the comp altogether. Or maybe find a mid focus between the two. Then I would go ahead and close it down to f64. I shoot a lot at f32, sometimes f45, and a few times at f64.

I'm not as experienced with the 4x5 as some people here, but I am starting to think that the "f64 diffraction softness" thing is a bit overplayed. I mean yeah the peaks in background might be a little microscopically softer, but the lake would be drastically sharper. I've been surprised at how sharp some of my f64 shots have come out.

Thanks, Jack. I probably could have emphasized them more, but I wanted the flowers since they were the first sunflowers I'd seen up there and we were well above where I thought they'd grow.

I still have a hard time thinking of f22 as a middle aperture. I'll have to try the smaller apertures and pay more attention to the whole frame, not just the top and bottom.

Do you guys check the focus stopped down? I focus at the widest aperture and honestly, sometimes have a hard time seeing a crisp focus through the loupe, even under the hood. Maybe my eyes are getting too old. Also, I find myself fogging my loupe or glasses a lot. It gets tiresome holding your breath and ducking in and out of the hood.

In this case I probably had a little more time and good light, although I was fighting the wind. But at sunrise, when time is critical, I find focusing a real challenge. Maybe stopping down can save me. I'll start using the 'equally out of focus' technique

I think Jack and Darren summed it up pretty well. The softness from too small an aperture is far less an issue than an out of focus shot. In this scene, if you think of your two focal points as being on a plane, that plane would run much higher than the lake below. The focus near and far approach is a good approach, but you also have to watch out for anything that's well above or below the focal plane.

To your question, I don't always check the focus stopped down, but in a situation like this - or one where I have nearby trees sticking up above the focal plane - I will try to check focus after stopping down. If it gets too dark to be able to check, I stop down even further just to be safe. My normal aperture is f/32 and I don't think twice about going to f/45 or f/64 as necessary.

I share the same frustration when the loupe or ground glass gets fogged up. I did some research awhile back and came across some anti-fogging solutions that you can put on the loupe and ground glass. I don't recall the name, but a little Googling for "large format" and "anti-fogging solution" should turn up some leads.

If you're ever in the Littleton area, give me a call and I can show you how I focus the 4x5 in a matter of minutes. Also keep in mind that f45 on a 4x5 is approx. the equivalant (sp?) of f22 on 35mm as far as depth of field in concerned. The only time I shoot f22 or f32 on the 4x5 is when I can get the entire scene tack sharp on the glass (which isn't very often).

For this shot, it looks like you could have also used a little swing.

Kalin,

Great comp. We have all been there with problems like this. I do try to focus even in dismal light with loupe if needed. I think you could have used a little swing in this image but most likely to get it right would have required a smaller aperature. With LF it is always a tradeoff between sharpness and getting everything to focus. I guess best game plan is to try to keep it in the 22 range if possible but if you have any doubts then stop down more. Of course looking through the loupe (if you can) never lies.

RichieV

Thanks, guys. I did use a little swing for a couple shots, I can't remember if I did on this one.

Thanks for the offer, Tony. I'm always interested in other's techniques, I may call sometime.

I should get out with the polaroid film and play around with different situations.

Others have jokingly recommended using a snorkel while under the darkcloth to deal with fogging. Not a bad idea really unless you don't mind looking like a complete nut job.

Seriously though, beautiful picture Kalin! This sort of issue comes up all the time for me. Until I got my 4x5 I never appreciated the frustrating reality of how many separate planes of focus exist in most scenes. I agree with the others above who advocate routine use of f32 or f45. I would add that you often have to choose which part of the scene is most important to have in focus and then focus accordingly while stopping down to bring the rest of the scene in focus (or as close as you can get). For images requiring severe tilts you may never get the middle part in perfect focus. Remember though that thanks to the movements you're employing with the view camera you are able to get more of the scene in focus than with any other piece of photographic equipment. That is unless you forget that you left the front standard tilted forward and don't realize this until after packing up as I did a few weeks back in the Tetons after a morning of the best lighting I've ever seen at Swabacher's Landing. Ahh, the joys of 4x5....

Thanks, Brett. Snorkel ... hmmm

I often hold my breath under the focusing hood, and focus as much as I can without it.

Tony L,

I'll take ya up on your focusing demo. Would love to see your process. Let me know when you are available?

RichieV

Rich,

Just heading out to Crested Butte for a show this weekend. Give me a call some evening next week. Talk to ya later!

Tony

Rich,
Let me know if you set something up with Tony and I'll see if I can get up there too.
Kalin

Kalin, I think the way you set things up, seems like stopping down more would have done the trick. There is this method for figuring out "optimal" aperture by setting the plane and measuring in millimeters (if you have a scale) the range of focus between nearest focus and farthest focus. Then you're supposed to take that millimeter # and multiply by 5 and that's your minimum aperture number.

In other words, the way you set your focal plane would require more DOF from aperture than if you focused a bit passed the flowers. Sometimes I mess with this, sometimes I just stop down to f45.

I've got extra copies of the method given me by Rod Kluklas if you want it.

Laurent,
Thanks, I'd be interested in seeing that.
I've heard Charlie Kramer mention a 'focus guage' or something like that but I've never understood what he was talking about. Maybe these two things are similar or the same. The only thing I've got or seen that is a guage is the Calumet exposure calculator for bellows factor.

Let me know the form of what Rod gave you and how best to exchange it.

Thanks!
Kalin