Tilt-Shift PC Lens

Here is another fairly easy hack that if you like it, and use it, can save you goo-gobs of money. Build your own tilt-shift lens. I know there are people out there who would love to experiment with a PC Shift lens, but the cost of purchasing one is generally prohibitive unless you plan to shoot professionally with the lens. (A nikon shift lens with tilt functions cost over $1000, BTW: The Nikon guys once took a look over this and said, "why would you do that to such a nice camera? We sell that lens you know." I know. That's the point). There are companies out there that sell variations of this type of hack. Lensbabies in particular I am familiar with, and they look like they have a good product. This is the same thing, works on the same principle, except perhaps in some respects it might exceed the optical quality that you can get from commercially available PC lens hacks. The reason? The image quality here is determined by your lens, the lens that I use is an old Carl Zeiss 80mm prime lens intended for medium format. *Crisp* More than that however, they are also fairly inexpensive. Take a look for Pentacon Six lenss on ebay. They don't run very much.

A word about the lens. In this hack the key element is the lens, and you need something pretty specific for the hack to work. The lens you use must be intended for a format larger than the format you intend to use the lens on. IE: In this example i use a lens intended for 6x6 image on a 35mm camera. If I wanted to build this for medium format I would not only need a larger plunger, but a lens that was capable of at least 6x8, with 6x9 being preferable. The reason is that the lens works by playing with the fact that we can take advantage of the format differences (once again) to give us a little extra space between the camera body and then lens to add some rubbery stuff . In this case, a plunger. So, lets get to it.

What you'll need:

1. Lens - (see above)
2. Rubber Plunger - (any type will do, as long as it's flexible and not too large.)
3. Cardboard - (something stiff and not corrugated)
4. Plastic Body cap

I you notice I use body caps a lot in my work. They are the perfect way to attach your camera to something else, something it probably was never intended to be attached to. Anyway, pick one up.

Then, using a hobby knife, hollow out the inside part, and smoothen it down so there are no rough spots or burs.

Now take your plunger:

And cut a hole in the top where the stick is, just large enough to fit your lens.

Then go ahead and stick your lens onto the plunger to see if it fits. At this point I wouldn't really worry about gluing your lens down. In this particular construction the rubber will profile never provide decent enough support for you to feel comfortable letting your precious lens go without holding it as well. Just make the hole tight enough so that the lens is fairly snug. I even made groves so that I could 'screw' the lens into place. If you're enterprising enough, you could go out and buy the actual bayonet adaptor for whatever lens your using and then just screw it on.

Then you need to build your backing. Here I cut out a ring from the cardboard. The inner circle is the circumference and diameter of the lens cap, while the outer part matches the bottom of the plunger. I hotglued the parts together. (For expediency's sake. If you want to really use this lens set-up often, I recommend that you a: don't use cardboard or hotglue b: use screws for everything.)

Okay, go ahead and hotglue it together.

With your lens attached, you're all done and ready to shoot.

This lens works pretty well, surprisingly well actually. The image quality is awesome as the lens is a Zeiss and doesn't have any optical interference between your CCD Chip and the lens itself. You can use this lens for art photography or architectural stuff where you're trying to adjust for lens distortion. If you want to get serious about building something like this to use for something like architecture where you'll need to be able to hold the lens in one place for a long time, and very still, consider using this article as a guide to how you might build this using an adjustable frame that would provide you with greater control over the range of motions. If you build this with a frame, consider using bellows instead of a plunger. I chose the plunger as I was looking for something flexible yet sturdy at the same time. Here focusing is a matter of squeezing the lens down, and twirling it around. Very practical. :-) Here's a shot I took with this lens.

Notice how I am able to keep the eyelashes crystal sharp in the picture, yet blur her body as the image gets closer to the bottom? It's a very effective method of controlling the viewers gaze, and keeping it locked. You can do the same thing using gradient maps and Gaussian blur in photoshop, but in my opinion it never looks as good. Besides, you can do this on film. Enjoy!

PS: This article was originally published by me in the magazine, DigitalniFoto in the Czech Republic.