The Pentax 67 is a very special camera. It’s been enjoyed by several photographers over the years, especially as they continue to endure. We’ve even rated it amongst some of our favorite medium format cameras. And part of what makes it so special is the ease of use — there are no film backs to work with. There are also those incredible lenses. As time as gone on, you could simply just pick one of these cameras up and shoot with one. Based on our review, we’d recommend it. But we can also tell you how the get the same look.
Table of Contents
Inspiration: Photographers Shooting the Pentax 67
Before we hop into this, we figured that we’d give you some inspiration. We’ve interviewed tons of photographers over the years. Here are a bunch that are using the Pentax 67:
- Mauro Lepe: A Chilean photographer who makes some really unique portraits that we’d even say are conceptual.
- Lance Keeth: We think that you’re really going to love the images he makes and his use of color to make subjects stand out. That’s his image above. Notice how he uses three main colors to make the eye find the image simpler for the brain to digest. He combines this with effective lighting that appears also graduated.
- Jonathan Moore: Jon’s images are really difficult to pull off for most photographers these days shooting film. But he succeeds very well.
- Alex Medvick: It’s hard not to like what Alex makes with Cinestill film.
- Drew English: An absolute favorite of ours who does street portraits using the Pentax 67.
- Simon Chetrit: This camera is a favorite of Simon’s for many reasons.
These are just a few of the photographers that we’ve interviewed that use the Pentax 67.
The Right Focal Lengths
I used two lenses for this project; a 105 f2.4 and a 55mm f4. They each offer something different. The 105 has a fantastic vintage vibe and the ability to get an incredibly shallow, buttery depth of field. It has a look I haven’t seen elsewhere. The 55mm is the newest iteration of that lens and is super sharp. If I’m not mistaken, it may be one of the sharpest lenses ever made for the Pentax 6×7 system. It is a wide angle lens (28mm equivalent) but has an extremely close minimum focusing distance. I used it to bring in a little more of the background elements into some of the work. It’s great.
Drew English in our Interview
To get the look of the Pentax 67, you need the right focal lengths. And for that, you have to understand the reverse crop factor. We like using OmniCalculator that helps you figure out what lenses to use and correspond that to the list of lenses that the Pentax 67 has. But here are some of our favorites for each camera system along with sample images:
Canon RF 50mm f1.2
This lens is great because of the look that it delivers is like a 100mm f2.4 in 67 format. That’s close to what Drew English said he uses above Check out Sony 135 f1.8 G Master, and if you want to buy one, you can do so here.
Nikon Z 85mm f1.2
This is like a 170mm f2.4 lens. Check out our review, and if you want to buy one, you can do so here.
Sony 135 f1.8 G Master
This is liek a 270mm f3.5 lens. Check out our review, and if you want to buy one, you can do so here.
Leica 90mm f2 APO
This is like a 180mm f4. Check out our review, and if you want to buy one, you can do so here.
The Film Look
There’s a lot to get with the film look and your camera system. It’s easier for some systems than it is for others. For Canon, you can upload a film style profile to your camera. This look will be applied to the JPEG. The same goes for Panasonic Lumix’s Real Time LUTs. Leica has their own for the SL system too. Nikon and Sony really require you to do it in post-production, however.
Sorry, folks.
The Process
There’s a fairly simple formula for getting this process done. So here it is. We really recommend that you also consult with the interviews that we’ve done, which are previously linked in this article.
Shooting Wide Open
This is a given. Modern autofocus systems are good enough that they can get the face and eyes in focus with little fuss. So don’t even worry about that. Stopping the lens down eliminaes a bit of that special look that the depth of field of a 67 image has. 6×7 is much larger than 35mm, so that’s the only way you can get this look from a technical sense.
Get Close
Part of the special look that 67 cameras can do is that they can deliver a lot of bokeh at wider angles. To do that, get closer to your subject while being faithful to your ideas of framing. Alicja Zmysłowsk is a photographer that doesn’t necessarily get close to her subjects, but that still gets that look.
Center Your Subject
Consider the work of photographer Jovana Rikalo, who finds ways to put her subject near the center to get a lot more of that bokeh effect that a 67 format lens can give you.