Like many of you, I enjoy panoramas. They can be fun to look at and they can be fun to create. Digital, film, doesn’t matter. It is it’s own unique perspective that sucks us in.
When it comes to film photography, there are several ways to create these beautiful panoramic photos with different cameras. There are the 35mm P&S cameras, the Widelux, the Horizon’s, the XPan’s and so on. However, there is another option for 35mm film and that would be with a medium format camera. That’s right. You can create 35mm panoramas with your MF camera. In this case, it’s my Mamiya RB67.
The first thing you need to do is grab yourself the adapter set. They’re 3D printed, don’t cost much and you can easily find them on eBay. For the RB67, I used my 220 back and I managed to get 15 panoramas. What’s cool is you get the sprockets exposed and what’s not cool is that you have to take the film back to a dark bag to remove the film. It’s worth it. You do want to make sure the emulsion is exposed to the opening of the back. Now some people go through the hassle of taping the 35mm film to the 120 backing paper, not me. It’s too much work.
Anyways, a few days ago I had an hour or so to venture out and shoot a couple of rolls of film. It was a beautiful day and after that day I knew the weather would be rain and cold so I wanted to make sure to get out while I could. I’ve been eyeballing an old T-Bird in a lot for some time. RB67 with the new to me 65mm 4.5 lens.
Everything worked out just fine. I wasn’t sure if I would have any issues with the 220 back but it’s all good. For this particular roll, I ended up shooting a roll of Arista Edu 100 and for development I went with Xtol 1+2. Attached are a few of the panoramas created, enjoy!
