contax 645

[Belle&Sebastain]

hi!

as i mid term plan i like to purchase a medium format for my work in 3 years time. I'm looking very closely at the contax 645 systems now, does anyone have any user feedback on this beauty?

 

[marios_pittas]

Have been using it for a while now.. 3 years I think(?).. I have not had a problem with it. I like the lenses character and the usability of the camera.

Is there any specific information about the camera or a specific focal length lens that you are after? I have used the 35mm, 45mm, 80mm, 140mm and 1.4x along with a number of extension tubes.

Marios

 

[mattlock]

it's a beautiful camera, but the price is crazy
in 3 years time the photography landscape is gonna change big time, so you should wait and see
esp with a camera like the mamiya ZD coming out!

 

[Belle&Sebastain]

i like to find out the 35mm, 80mm and 140mm macro lenses especially,

 

[marios_pittas]

i like to find out the 35mm, 80mm and 140mm macro lenses especially,

35mm is my favourite, assuming you are a wide angles person you will love it (it is 21mm or so in 35mm photography). If you shoot the normal lens (some do some don't) then the 80mm is quite a performer even at f/2. The 140mm is a fine potrait lens but is NOT a macro (the contax 645 macro is 120mm which is a manual-focus lens. I have heard some say that one should skip the 120mm macro lens and buy an old Hassy macro lens along with the Hassy-> Contax converter, which will still yield a macro and manual focus lens but apparently a cheaper combination, I do not know, I get macro doing some other workflow).

Note that the 1.4x can only be used with the 140mm, 120mm (I think) the 210mm and the 300mm (check that price ), but not with the 80mm. The front elements of the converter move into the back of the lens; the 80mm's elements reach till the back-end of the lens leaving no space for the converter's elements to fit in.

From other users of the lens, I was told that the 210mm is very heavy and that I was blessed to choose the 140mm and the 1.4x combo instead (it still gives f/3.5 maximum). My previous experience with medium format taught me not to choose the 210mm based on my style of shooting and instead choose the 140mm - I found it more useful).

Personally I have used extensively (maybe 60% of my shooting) the 35mm, and lesser the 140mm (20%) and 80mm (20%). I am still not clear why I bought the 45mm. One of the nice things of the system is that out of the box, the camera prints the data about the f-stop, speed, mode (AV etc), 1.4x converter etc at the top of the frame, which is useful is you are considering what to put in your back.

Very recently, I did some enlargements that came from working with these and I am very very pleased (if you were at the travel exhibition this year at the Singapore History Museum, the Cyprus photos were taken with this system).

 

[singscott]

At that price and time invest in buying the contax 645 you might want to consider hasselbald H1. I have tried both cameras and find H1 is faster like fousing, but what H1 won me over is that hassel have leaf shuttler mean that you can use any shuttler speed for flash :bigeyes: and the contax only have 1/125 x scyro speed Althought the Hassel lenes are made by fuji they are of very good quality, it is a very little known fact that fuji actually made high quality professional lenes for latge format camera. :think:

 

[Belle&Sebastain]

35mm is my favourite, assuming you are a wide angles person you will love it (it is 21mm or so in 35mm photography). If you shoot the normal lens (some do some don't) then the 80mm is quite a performer even at f/2. The 140mm is a fine potrait lens but is NOT a macro (the contax 645 macro is 120mm which is a manual-focus lens. I have heard some say that one should skip the 120mm macro lens and buy an old Hassy macro lens along with the Hassy-> Contax converter, which will still yield a macro and manual focus lens but apparently a cheaper combination, I do not know, I get macro doing some other workflow).

Note that the 1.4x can only be used with the 140mm, 120mm (I think) the 210mm and the 300mm (check that price ), but not with the 80mm. The front elements of the converter move into the back of the lens; the 80mm's elements reach till the back-end of the lens leaving no space for the converter's elements to fit in.

From other users of the lens, I was told that the 210mm is very heavy and that I was blessed to choose the 140mm and the 1.4x combo instead (it still gives f/3.5 maximum). My previous experience with medium format taught me not to choose the 210mm based on my style of shooting and instead choose the 140mm - I found it more useful).

Personally I have used extensively (maybe 60% of my shooting) the 35mm, and lesser the 140mm (20%) and 80mm (20%). I am still not clear why I bought the 45mm. One of the nice things of the system is that out of the box, the camera prints the data about the f-stop, speed, mode (AV etc), 1.4x converter etc at the top of the frame, which is useful is you are considering what to put in your back.

Very recently, I did some enlargements that came from working with these and I am very very pleased (if you were at the travel exhibition this year at the Singapore History Museum, the Cyprus photos were taken with this system).

i heard the macro lens (its 120mm :embrass: ) is one of the reasons ppl bought the contax system.

 

[Keltzar]

If you want to buy an H1 cheaper, look for the Fuji GX645 in Hong Kong... its Fuji's Japan market version. But the problem is I think support could be an issue, as I hear that Fuji will only OEM this model for Hassy in future....

re: Contax 645AF. From all I know about the Yashica/zeiss partnership... it seems to be crumbling. The G and N-systems are all but dead.... there have been no new products or promotions done for some time. That's similar for the 645AF.

Zeiss released some new lenses at Photokina ... incl. some in M-mount & Rollei, but as far as I am aware, none for G-mount, N-mount or 645AF mount...?

If you are only planning to buy in 3-years, I think it will be quite clear by then who the survivors are. At the moment frankly, I think only the Mamiya 645AF for sure... with the Hassy H1 , hassy V-system, Rollei 6008AF and Pentax 645AF a "maybe".