One film camera that will probably never appear on this blog is the Hasselblad Xpan. Though I love the shots I have seen taken with it, I cannot even attempt to justify the expensive. Then I saw this video…
…and thought, ” Gosh I love his videos”…and then, “Why not try something similar?”
Though I didn’t have the same fancy camera he had, I did have a spare Panasonic DMC-FS11 that I got for £1 because there was a bump on the front and the screen had pixel damage. And it had a film grain mode. So I taped off the screen as suggested and took it for a walk around my local area…which is the complete opposite to the area he walked around. So really, my trial was nothing like his apart from the tape.
The tape did really help, of course the final photos were the full image and I had to crop them down to the 3:1 ish ratio of the original X-Pan. Here are a few of the full crop versions.
Then I chose 24 of the ones I shot and cropped them. I measured the pixels on the long side and divided that by three to get the ratio I wanted. When you use Preview on Mac the crop gives you a live readout of the pixels which helped enormously.
Here are the fake-pan versions. Yes all 24 🙂
I do like the results, though why do film modes always choose to represent an expired film from 1980, just look at that grain. Film would definitely look better, sharper. I think I will print one of the silver birch photos to see what it would look like. This did not inspire me to buy a real x-pan, not even if I win the lottery tomorrow.
And all that because it wasn’t raining and I didn’t get a job today. Have to fill my time somehow 🙂
Camera Go Camera 
Hi Peggy Anne–
Lovely photos! The one of the birches especially caught my eye. I haven’t sorted out how to get the thing printed yet, but the Brancopan by Cameradactyl is going to be my Xpan alternative. I supported the Kickstarter (now closed) but I believe you can buy the files and plans for the camera pieces from Ethan.
https://petapixel.com/2019/12/24/the-cameradactyl-brancopan-a-35mm-panoramic-camera-you-can-print-at-home/
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I did see that, very interested to see/try one. I am thinking a 3D printer would be on my wish list if I won the lottery 🙂
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Love them, instead of using film mode try bumping the iso a bit to produce grain, might find it finer and you’ll have a degree of control. Bizarrely older digitals are better as tend to be noisier at lower is so you don’t run out of shutter speed so quickly
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What I should have done was test it before I went outside, as the tape covered the menu. I wanted to get out before the weather changed.
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BTW My Olympus Pen digital can be set to 16:9, maybe yours does, at least it’s a little closer in format.
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It can 🙂
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My Fake X-Pan of choice is the Minolta Riva Panorama
https://www.flickr.com/photos/vicvl/albums/72157698880715670
Wont break the bank
Wont have super sharp edges
Will deliver a huge viewfinder for composing panoramic images easily
For some reason I take a lot of vertical shots with it.
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Good to know, I do like the stairs shot of yours. I have tried a Riva before and found the same focusing issue. I did like it though.
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