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| Bertha Support | |
| Author | Message |
|---|---|
| evegir Joined: 13 Jun 2001 Posts: 12 |  Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 11:51 pm Post subject: Bertha SupportI recently was lucky enough to land a very nice Big Bertha (based on the Home Portrait with the 1/1000 press shutter) - not a BIG Bertha, as it is a 50cm lens rather than the 40" so commonly seen. The whole unit weighs in at 32 pounds, bag mag and all. The question is - what did the old guys mount these things on? Pictures of the camera are out there, but I've only seen one image of a 40" in use. I'm imagining a head of some sort mounted directly to the grandstand, balcony or what-have-you rather than a tripod. Can anyone shed any light on this for me? |
| Woodyspeed Joined: 10 Mar 2009 Posts: 8 | Posted: Wed Mar 11, 2009 6:49 am Post subject: Big bertha Kind of a long time coming for an answer, but we used the big berthas on heavy tripods, and when in the Navy, had two mounted on an aircraft gun turret. |
| glennfromwy Joined: 29 Nov 2001 Posts: 903 | Posted: Mon Mar 16, 2009 5:01 pm Pictures of press boxes at sporting events I've seen show them largely just balanced on the rail. I rather suspect those guys didn't do a lot of focusing during the action. They probably focused on the center of the field, stopped down and waited for something to happen. I can't imagine myself trying to shoot fast action with one of those bazookas. |
| Les Joined: 09 May 2001 Posts: 2682 | Posted: Mon Mar 16, 2009 6:04 pm |
| bruiser Joined: 15 Oct 2006 Posts: 260 | Posted: Tue Mar 17, 2009 1:02 am Those photogs must have drunk a LOT of cases of beer to think they could shoot at night with that thing!! Cheers, Bruce |
| pv17vv Joined: 22 Dec 2001 Posts: 255 | Posted: Wed Mar 18, 2009 4:58 pm Well, they shot !!! Hats off...  |
| DHF845 Joined: 20 Jul 2008 Posts: 103 | Posted: Wed Mar 18, 2009 10:10 pm Post subject: Big Bethas Look in 1st edition of Morgan and Lester's Graphic and Graflex Photography Jan. 1940. A chapter is devoted to special purpose cameras. There's also info & pictures of the ringside camera, predecessor to the 45 Combat graphic. Photos of a Bertha on tripod, others mounted on wood brace along bleacher railing. Focus was with pre-set shift lever: Preset for 3 or 4 focus points, shift from one to another to focus fast. Chech out the press photogs using them. Apparently, it took a big man to handle a Big Bertha! BTW, the "Big Bertha" name was applied to any big Graflex with a permanently mounted long lens-not just the 40 inch monsters on 5x7 Home Portraits. |
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