This seems like as good a place as any to share some freelensing photos! A few years back I was experimenting with this technique using some Canon FD mount lenses held in front of a mirrorless camera (GH3 in this case) to play with the focus plane and deliberate light leaks. It definitely took some practice to get focus where I wanted it and strike a balance on how big of an impact the light leaks have on the final result. Now that I have cameras with focus peaking, I think I'll try this out again. If memory serves, the lens was a Canon FD 35mm f/2 shot at f/2.
May 19, 2023
2
-
-
That's a interesting point, I only used freelensing in the earlier days of my adapting, when I wan'ted to play with tilt/shift. However I used a rubber gaiter to prevent light leaks, so perhaps it wasn't true freelensing. Focus definitely involved a lot of guess work & peaking should simplify matters.
Here's one of my efforts (trying to keep the ground in focus)
freelensing portrait by Mike Kanssen, on Flickr -
I'm not a purist, I'd definitely consider this freelensing 😁 I wound up cupping my hand around the gap to minimize light leaks but there's definitely some haze from the effect.
Looks like a good job getting the focus where you want it! And yeah, I got started with it a bit as a budget-friendly way to get tilt/shift effects.
