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645 Newbie I fear my 645

Hi Marc, it is weird if your first 645 eats batteries and the second one dos not. It's even weirder that your first one suddenly stop eatting batteries. How can that be possible? Can you explain this in more details? My one and a half year old 645 only last 5 to 6 rolls of 220 when using auto focus. How many rolls of 220 can your second one take with the lithium battery?
 
> About eating batteries, and later not eating batteries with the same camera - a dumb question for you: were you shooting in a cold environment when it ate batteries, and later in spring summer (warm) it did not? I know this would be an easy answer, and probably not the case, but thought I'd throw it in anyway). -Lynn
 
>Lynn and Guy, Keep in mind that only the Epson 2000 with archival inks (and the larger 9??? model) make prints that last longer than conventional prints. The Epson 2200 may make better prints (reviews say so) but the prints do not last as long as the Epson 2000 system. Epson claims the 2200 prints will last as long as conventional prints - just not as long as the Epson 2000 prints.

As for digital printing in general, my personal experience is that it is very hard to make the digital prints come out like what I see on them on the CRT screen - especially when dealing with skin tones. I print with an Epson 2000. I have profiled my monitor to help with the color management. I even purchased some printer profiles for my Epson printer. I get more predictable prints now, but still the difference is obvious and often very time consuming to correct.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com has some reviews of these printers.

Sincerely, Fred Stephens
 
As I said, this cannot be possible, so it has to be me doing something different...and I know one thing that would account for some of it...I now focus manually much more than I use to. For ex&le, I use some Hasselblad glass like the 110/2 F lens. And I also have an adapter that allows me to use a few select Mamiya 645 lenses like their 24mm Fisheye.

When shooting weddings I usually put new batteries in every camera and flash I'll be using. When using film I shoot at least 6 to 7 rolls of 220. Now I shoot
with a Kodak digital back and fill 4 or 5 one gig cards
(58 RAW images each). I've never had the camera battery go when shooting Digital. So, I wonder if the Lith battery for the digital back is providing some of the power?

The Epson 2000P is indeed more archival than the 2200. However, the 2200 prints are suppose to last at least as long as conventional prints. Not that anyone of us will be around to prove that point.
 
Fred,

I didn't know the 2000 could match the 7600/9600 series. Yes, the 2200 uses inks from a different manufacturer but they are still archival. According to Epson the 7600/9600 series are "rated" at 120 years. The 2200 is at 80 years, still almost double of what Ilfochromes are rated at these days.

As far as skin tones, try the 2200, Fred and I think you'll be impressed. I have been printing portraits (on Ilford Galerie Smooth Gloss and Semi Gloss) and have been very impressed with the skin tones. I use RGB 98 profile instead of the SP2200 profile and both my prints of Caucasian and Asian subjects have been really good with only minor adjustments.

Guy
 
I have to agree with Guy on the 2200. Using Adobe 1998 profile on all functions (including digital camera custom settings), nails the color dead on for me. I'm doing weddings, portraits and commercial work featuring mostly people and rarely have to fuss with the skin tones at all. For the most part, the 2200 also has solved the color cast problem in different viewing light that plagued me with the 2000P.
 
>Guy,

I suppose I wrote incorrectly about the larger Epson printers that do archival prints. The 5500, 10000, and 10600 are the ones that can use the Epson Archival inks that claim 100+ years depending on the paper used with them.

Fred
 
Marc, you mentioned that you saw a difference in battery consumption between two 645 bodies. Just a thought, but I wonder if sometimes a camera body, like most machines, benefits from being "run in"?

Twenty odd years ago I bought a Leica M3 that was itself about twenty years old at the time. It was butter smooth. A few years later I got a new Leica M6 and couldn't escape the conclusion that the shutter release and the film transport were just that fraction rougher and noisier in use. Another convert to the "they don't build 'em like they used to" school of photography was born!

However after a few hundred rolls of film I could no longer tell them apart. Perhaps lubricants had become more favourably distributed, gear clusters had mutually arranged themselves into more precise allignement, and infintessimal burrs on dozens of mating faces had been worn away?

At the start of this year history repeated itself when I traded that M6 in against a new M6 TTL and a new M7. The M6 TTL again had that almost imperceptable harshness, although the M7 right out of the box stood comparison with my now forty year old M3.

Maybe the battery consumption difference you observed is down to microscopic build variability issues, and usage itself delivers more mechanical efficiency? I'm no engineer but it seems plausible, actually thinking about it I've a Hasselblad 500CM that also dates back twenty odd years to when I was a photography student. It's so beat up it looks like a traffic accident, but the shutter and mirror pre-release are still softer than a relatively recent and relatively under used 503CW.

Regards, Gary
 
Oseas, sorry to hear about your focus issues, one simple test is to take a metre rule or yardstick, tape it horizontally at the ends to a wall, at the same height as the lens on your tripod mounted camera. Set the camera up at about a forty five dgree angle to the wall, with the mid point of the viewfinder precisely at the mid point of the ruler. Use a wide open aperture at the closest focusing distance, and fire off two shots, one on auto focus and one on manual focus. If there's any camera related focusing problems you'll see them straight away on the negs.

If there are any problems the most likely cause is an incorrectly seated focusing screen, even the tiniest bit of dust or lint underneath one corner will throw the result out.

If it were a Hasselblad Zeiss lens the second most likely cause would be that the rear element on the lens had slightly unscrewed itself due to transport related vibration, followed only then by a mirror allignement issue which is where most people go first. However, that's on a Hassie, I don't know for Contax.

Regards, Gary
 
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