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First Exposure by Ron Eggers
Bronica RF645

Some of the earliest roll film cameras were rangefinder and viewfinder models. They were flat-bodied, usually with bellows-mounted lenses that were extended on tracks. Some took 127 film, others 120. The photographs they took were actually quite good, but the advent of professional medium format cameras like the Hasselblad and Mamiya, with their square bodies, interchangeable lenses and removable backs, made those earlier roll film cameras fall out of favor.

Fortunately, there’s a new generation of compact medium format roll film rangefinders reaching the market that is bringing new life to the product category. Several camera manufacturers have brought out medium format rangefinders. One of the most interesting is Bronica’s RF645, which has many of the capabilities of a full-featured professional medium format, such as interchangeable lenses and extensive creative controls, in an easy-to-handle and easy-to-use configuration.

It’s obvious by its layout and design, a lot of thought and planning went into the RF645. Taking more than four years between the first mock-up and the production model, it has been in development since the fall of 1996. At that time, the company’s camera designers were challenged to come up with a medium format that was compact, lightweight and easy to use, yet met the operational requirements of working professionals. Judging by the RF645, they accomplished their goal.

It’s a well-built camera. For the most part, Bronica has stayed with metal components, to ensure long operational life. It has a magnesium alloy molding for an upper casing. The front plate, which serves as the main body frame and interchangeable lens mount, is die-cast. The bottom plate is brass.

While it’s packed with sophisticated electronics, the RF645 is, basically, a manual camera. There’s no autofocus and there’s no motor drive. Like most manual cameras, focusing is handled with an adjustment ring on the lens while the film is advanced manually with a shutter-cock. The advance mechanism makes it possible to advance the film in either a full stroke or ratcheted manner. (Since it uses 120/220 film, there’s no need for a rewind function.)

Operations are about as simple as they can be. There are only three controls on the top of the camera, a handful on the back and a couple on the lens. The shooting modes and shutter speeds are selected with an oversized dial between the shutter-cock and shutter-release button. Both the cock-lever and shutter speeds can be controlled with the shooting hand, but changing shooting modes to either program or aperture-priority takes both hands.

The mode dial is very readable, so there’s no having to guess what shooting mode or shutter speed at which the camera is set. Similarly, a magnified frame counter next to the mode dial is easy to read. The shutter release is on top of the molded hard-rubber handgrip.

There’s a hot-shoe on top of the camera, which can take a dedicated, vertically oriented, Speedlight, as well as most generic electronic flash units. The compact Speedlight, which is available as an option, has a guide number of 20 at ISO 100. Its illumination angle is adjustable to match that of the interchangeable lenses. Since the RF645 utilizes a lens shutter, it’s possible to shoot with electronic flash at maximum shutter speeds (1ž750 second).

The back includes such controls as the main power switch, the ISO/film speed setting and an exposure-compensation dial, which makes it possible to adjust exposures plus or minus two stops, in half stop increments. Again, the oversized ISO setting and exposure compensation dials can easily be adjusted with the shooting hand, and, because of their size, there’s no question what the ISO of the file is or whether exposure compensation is set or not. Even someone with marginal eyesight can use the camera. But there’s no separate eyepiece-compensation adjustment.

Shutter speeds range from B (bulb) to 1ž500 second in the manual mode. (That extends to 1ž750th using program autoexposure at f/8 or less). The slowest shutter speed is one second. A sophisticated automatic exposure system, with a five-segmented metering sensor, provides highly accurate center-weighted light metering. An automatic exposure-lock button makes it possible to retain the exposure setting of the first frame for a series of subsequent exposures.

Unlike with many newer camera bodies, there’s no data LCD on the body. Instead, a backlit vertical LCD panel in the viewfinder displays exposure data. It not only includes shutter speed and aperture settings, it also displays the exposure compensation setting, the strobe status and battery indicator, as well as other information.

Manual focusing is handled through the coupled rangefinder. There are three lenses currently available for the RF645, a Zenzanon 65mm f/4, which, while slightly wide-angle, is the standard lens, a 45mm f/4, a wide-angle lens that comes with a dedicated external viewfinder, and a 135mm f/4.5, which is ideal for portraiture and other moderately close-up applications.

Working with the 65mm lens (which is approximately the equivalent of 40mm on a 35mm cameras) is the easiest, since the viewfinder coverage is approximately the same as the lens coverage. It’s just a matter of focusing and shooting. Using the external viewfinder with the wide-angle lens (which is roughly the same as 28mm for a 35mm camera) is a little more complicated. It’s a matter of framing in one viewfinder and focusing in the other. That’s not a major problem, but it is somewhat cumbersome.

Framing with the 135mm (which is the same as 80mm on 35mm cameras) is simpler, but it’s important to remember that the image in the framing angles of the viewfinder, rather than the entire frame, is what will be captured on film.

Like most medium format rangefinders, the RF645 takes a vertically oriented image. That makes it possible to get 16 frames per 120 roll and 32 frames per 220 roll. A small window, also with magnifying glass, indicates the type of film that’s loaded in the camera.

It’s quite affordable, more so than most medium format options. The camera, with the standard 65mm lens, has a suggested retail price of $2132. The 45mm lens is priced at $732 while the 135mm costs $665. The Speedlight has a list price of $305. Street prices for all the equipment are about 15 to 20 percent less. For example, the camera and lens combo has been seen advertised for $1799.

Whether shooting as a vocation or an avocation, many serious photographers who work with 35-mm gear talk about moving up to medium format. Somehow, migrating up from a 35mm camera to a conventional medium format camera seems like such a giant leap. The RF645 bridges the gap very effectively. It makes it easy to make the transition because it feels more like shooting with 35mm, but with the negative size and image quality of medium format.

Ron Eggers is a senior editor at NewsWatch Feature Service. His e-mail address is 71210.3556@compuserve.com.