I read the old thread on the BTZS cloth. I have very bad eyesight and need to change my glasses, take them on and off, under the focusing cloth and use a loupe. Can you get your hands inside of the BTZS cloth?

-- jeff schraeder (jeff@engineperformance.com), June 24, 2001

Answers

Jeff, assuming the BTZS is the group in AZ, yes, the cloth is specifically designed to put your hand up through a velcro opening to use a loupe... It is a great dark cloth, once you use it, nothing else will suffice. I use one on 8x10 and 4x5.

-- Bill Glickman (bglick@pclv.com), June 24, 2001.

Jeff, it's got to be the best thing I've ever found for easing the pain of constantly changing glasses. Incidentally, I had my oculist order "flip-up" reading glasses to use with my bi-fokals ($17). I can now see close enough to focus, and far enough to view the entire screen to compose. Ahhhh, 'tis wonderful!

-- Bill (bmitch@home.com), June 24, 2001.

I instigated a thread about the new fangled dark cloth last month after joining the view camera fraternity (albeit with a 'Baby' Linhof). Anyway, like many I came to conclusion that the old fashioned horse blanket could be improved on and being a tight Yorkshireman I also reckoned that the $50+ asking price for the BTZS could also be improved on. In the event I designed my own cloth and had it made up by a friend. Total cost was less than $12 plus a bottle of wine for the seamstress. It fits round the camera perfectly, you can put one, both or no hands inside and for those with leaky bellows also folds over the camera to shade the dark slide, bellows and lens once the composition and focus have been sorted. The basic design can be adapted to suit any camera - if anyone wants the pattern I will gladly e-mail it to you.

-- Clive Kenyon (clivekenyon@hotmail.com), June 24, 2001.

The old "heavy" black Tee shirt works great! Sew some elastic in the waistband... and voila! Arm holes and all.

-- Matt O. (mojo@moscow.com), June 24, 2001.

I would look into a bright screen... It brightens the viewing at least 2 times and makes it so you almost don't need a dark cloth... Beattie is a good one as well as a few others.

-- Scott Walton (f64sw@hotmail.com), June 25, 2001.