
Hasselblad: A Camera That Went to the Moon and Changed How We See It - pseudolus
https://www.npr.org/2019/07/13/735314929/the-camera-that-went-to-the-moon-and-changed-how-we-see-it
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Sharlin
Project Apollo Archive at Flickr [1] contains about 16000 photos from the
Apollo Project, digitized at 1800dpi (roughly 16 Mpix per 70mm frame!)

[1]
[https://www.flickr.com/photos/projectapolloarchive/albums](https://www.flickr.com/photos/projectapolloarchive/albums)

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wglb
Here is the Hasselblad press release at the time:
[https://cdn.hasselblad.com/e407a3b3-714b-4efa-
aa74-06cd9083e...](https://cdn.hasselblad.com/e407a3b3-714b-4efa-
aa74-06cd9083ea04_1969+moon+landing+press+release+-+english.pdf)

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marban
Really loved my 500CM / Planar 80mm and DIY B&W at home but 3rd party
developing & scanning medium-format have become so expensive that it forced me
to abandon this meditative hobby. Wish someone could take a stab and find a
solution to make it affordable again.

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i_am_proteus
If you have a digital camera (SLR or mirrorless), which most people who shoot
film do, you also have an excellent scanner. I scan 35mm, 120, and 4x5 with a
DSLR, inverted tripod, and macro lens. The results are better than any flatbed
scanner.

Use a rocket or canned air to keep the dust off, and a sheet of anti-newton
glass to keep the film flat and focused while scanning.

Developing B&W at home is economical if you use a shelf-stable developer (I
like Kodak HC-110, a half-open bottle keeps for years) and fixer (Ilford
Rapid). Per-roll developing cost is between 50¢ and $1.

I shoot a few rolls and throw them in a big Paterson tank. Two rolls of film
take 30 min to develop and 15 min to scan. Not much longer than the time to
drive round trip to the photo lab.

No darkroom necessary- I load film in a dark bag. Post-process the scans in
Lightroom or Darktable. Batch-processing means it's pretty fast. If I want to
make prints, either I send out the digital positive to ProDPI or I rent time
at the community darkroom.

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ska
Glad it’s working for you, but part of this doesn’t make any sense to me. One
of the big selling point of medium format is how much more resolution and
detail you can capture than if you used 35mm. You are suggesting applying a
35mm system resolution _at best_ being applied in a lossy manner.

I’m sure you can get well focused results in this way, it it sounds like you
are throwing away most of your resolution. Am I missing something? Are you
stitching I ages together? If so how are you managing positioning?

If I haven’t missed something: if you compared this to a digital back on a
’blad with otherwise the same image and blew them up I expect the difference
would be blindingly obvious.

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iguy
6x6 film captured much more detail than 35mm film. But modern digital cameras
of "35mm frame" are way beyond this, that's why nobody uses them with lenses
from last century. So it's not crazy to hope that using one as a scanner
(which is ideal conditions) might not leave much detail behind, from negatives
shot on an old Hasselblad.

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Drdrdrq
> But modern digital cameras of "35mm frame" are way beyond this, that's why
> nobody uses them with lenses from last century.

I would be really interested in hearing more about this (noob in this area).
Are you saying the old Nikon / Canon lenses from 90s are a bad choice for
modern DSLRs from these companies, or did I completely misunderstand you? If
so, why is that?

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i_am_proteus
Newer digital sensors can resolve a higher 'resolution' than 35mm film.

Using an older lens with a camera sporting a 20+ MP sensor will give you less
sharp results than a similar new lens. But the image will be no worse than
that old lens shooting film. And the lens will be much cheaper!

If you (or others) like the results, the technical details do not matter.

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Drdrdrq
Thank you!

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kebman
First time I looked into the viewfinder of a Hassie, I knew it was something
special. Ever since, I've wanted one. And I got my chance as a photographer
friend of mine simply let me lend his 500CM on a trip to London. That got me
some of the best pictures I've ever taken. Finding out that nearly the same
model went to the moon was just a bonus.

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anta40
I once owned a Blad, and kinda regret selling it. D'uh. Now my main medium
format gear is a Rolleiflex TLR, use it for shooting anything... but still
miss the Blad due to it's versatility: interchangeable lenses and film backs.

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supernova87a
How I always wished I could own a Hassy! Just to be able to experience the
mechanism, hear the shutter, advance the film. And the contact sheets you
would see were always so amazing with detail and it seemed like it conferred
instant professional quality.

Alas, even now, that gear still sells for $500+ (even broken stuff) on Ebay, I
can't bring myself to buy one. How is it still retaining its value? Just like
Leicas. Who's taking photos and getting film developed that gives it strong
market pricing? Nostalgic people unwilling to admit the camera is useless
anymore? A puzzle.

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stephen_g
I just bought a Mamiya 645 (they call Mamiya the 'poor man's Hasselblad').
Spend about $800 on gear, looking forward to trying it out. The developing and
scanning here is expensive but it's a fun hobby and I'm looking forward to a
more considered, tactile kind of shooting.

They're certainly not 'useless' \- this camera with good film should resolve a
similar amount of detail as my Nikon D810 with a good lens. Obviously given
the inflexibility you wouldn't use it for, say, photojournalism or most types
of commercial photography, but medium format film is still used a lot in art
photography and portraits.

~~~
supernova87a
Of course I exaggerated a bit to say they're useless. But it wouldn't be an
exaggeration to say that they're seldom used.

Unless you're really consciously going on a photo-taking trip, you're
generally not carrying around these huge old mechanical cameras, getting the
film developed, etc. Every step of the process is more involved and time
consuming -- where are you getting the negatives/slides printed afterwards?

Unless you're a high skills photographer, it just doesn't match people's use
cases these days. Also, I've seen friends take up medium format as a fad, but
they generally lose interest after a year at most.

That said, I borrowed an old Bronica several years ago, and I enjoyed it a
lot. There something so satisfying about loading that film up, winding,
exposing, and getting your hands wet on the chemicals, and having a big
negative to look at, with sharpness outdoing anything you see even today in
digital.

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germinalphrase
My father was a commercial photographer, and inherited a Hasselblad from him.
Shot it for a few years and took some wonderful pictures, but I fell out of
love with the darkroom process. Maybe I’ll invest in a digital back at some
point, but the cost of doing so seems excessive for amateur purposes.

Beautiful camera. Joy to handle and work with.

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alexellisuk
I still have 500CM / Planar 80mm and develop the film at home in a Patterson
"daylight" tank.
[https://www.flickr.com/photos/alexellis/albums/7215762778787...](https://www.flickr.com/photos/alexellis/albums/72157627787875334)

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bayesian_horse
There is an argument for debunking the moon landing conspiracy theories I
still find mind-blowing:

With the technology of 1969 it was easier to build a rocket and land on the
moon to take such pictures (and the video transmissions) than to fake the
pictures.

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c8g
just lacking some stars :)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ev9oPUNaqXE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ev9oPUNaqXE)

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Kenji
Wow! These photos are astounding (I know they're old, but I never took time to
really look at them before). Some details:

In the first picture, notice how Walter Schirra wears two watches and how Paul
Becker has like 7 pens in his pockets.

In the second picture, it says "MAIN MOM TALK" on the astronaut's chest. (see
here to find out what it means:
[http://www.collectspace.com/ubb/Forum29/HTML/000717.html](http://www.collectspace.com/ubb/Forum29/HTML/000717.html)
)

In the picture with the rover, interesting details of the wheel can be seen.
It appears to be a weave of some kind, with crosses of bolted sheets of some
kind along the middle.

