Re: Flash with everything...?

[P3D Gregory J. Wageman <gjw@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Tanker writes:

>The Realist is X-rated meaning that the shutter is fully naked when 
>you get flashed and as George says "mine is better than yours".

(Well, OK, maybe that's not *exactly* what he wrote...)

I sent this in private e-mail to George, but now I'll repeat it here, too.

I have a memory of reading that among the other services that Ron Zakowski
will provide is "converting the Realist to a true X-sync flash".  Am I
hallucinating again, or does anyone else remember seeing this, or am
I thinking of someone else's services possibly to another camera, or
something else entirely?  Help??

>Now a bulb setting is entirely different. In a bulb setting the shutter
>is only partially open when the bulb begins its burn to climax. If timed
>correctly the shutter and bulb achieve climax at the exact the same moment
>and it is a totally satisfying experience for both the film and the
>photographer. 

Now, that *is* what Tanker wrote!  Honest!!

I haven't opened up the Revere to confirm this, but here's one possibility.
The Revere manual says that at speeds to 1/25th, it's M & F (as opposed to
S & M) synced.  At speeds of 1/50th and above, it is X-rated.

Those old flashbulbs have a max. delay of about 20 milliseconds, which is
1/50th second (there are also 5 millisecond delay bulbs, but since they're
faster they don't concern us here).  Thus, if the shutter is open for
1/25th second or more, it will still be open when the bulb pops after its
1/50th second delay, even if the bulb only begins to fire when the shutter
reaches wide-open.  So you see, they could use purely X-sync timing, and by
recommending shutter speeds of 1/25th and slower, it would work with
flashbulbs at slow speeds and strobes at any speed (unlike Corvairs).

	-Greg



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