Monthly Archives: April 2020

2 posts

PS Visual Quality vs. PS945

The Cooke Portrait PS945 is a modern classic large format lens, designed to recreate the soft focus look of the classic lens of old. At an aperture between F8 and F11, it is sharp where it counts, with a 3-D rendering that rolls off into the out of focus area like butter. Of course the soft focus effect is best demonstrated with a large aperture opening, something at F4.5 to F5.6: Dreamy… but wait, that’s not an image from the Cooke PS945! What is this? It’s a Pinkham and Smith Visual Quality Series IV (PSVQ IV from now on) No. […]

Sheltering in Place with Expired 4×5 Films

My friend visited from a land-of-far and gifted me some boxes of 2012-2013 Arista 100 (rebadged Foma 100). So, with nothing much else to do, other than dayjob, cleaning, filing for Small Business Disaster loan, taking care of a departed friend’s estate as I am the executor, cooking, cleaning, dog walking,… anyway, I have some times on my hands. Luckily, now I have a lot of films, and a reluctant but mostly cooperative model. First up is the incomparable Cooke PS945. First effort was a MEH, because my XTOL just went up and died on me. Sadly, I have not […]