I plan to travel to the French Riviera in May for a few days. I would love to take my Deardorff but I can't imagine the difficulties involved. Would anyone know of a LF rental service in Nice, France? Other suggestions?

-- Bruce Schultz (schultzredfish@aol.com), January 19, 2001

Answers

Use this trip for reconaissance: take only an Mleica with fast film or- if you insist on being "serious"- with a light weight tripod and TMX100. Have the camera on your body at all times, also during travel to Europe. You will (dis)cover more photo locations, no equipment loss/burden/hassles.Plan a follow-up trip to the same area with your Deardorff for another time. Check out the camera stores in Nice. Maybe you can borrow mine (or carry it for me) since I'm there as well, in may.

Enjoy your travels!

-- Hans Berkhout (berkhout@cadvision.com), January 19, 2001.

Hey Bruce , I am french and I think it should be difficult to rent a LF at Nice ! At Paris , you would can find much better , but it is not so easy also . You can try to send an E mail to www.lemoyenformat.com (Paris)and ask them .( if you stop to Paris before to go to Nice ) For me , the best way is to travel with your LF , and I do not see any difficulties to take your material . The most difficulty is to find sheets , so take it with you . Au revoir

-- Luc Regnier (regnier.luc@wanadoo.fr), January 20, 2001.

Hey Bruce , me again Sorry , I make a mistake about E mail address , it is a web site ! The real address is : Le Moyen Format , 50 Boulevard Beaumarchais . 75011 . Paris . france Phone : 33 1 48 07 13 18 Fax : 33 1 48 05 23 18 Bon voyage !

-- Luc Regnier (regnier.luc@wanadoo.fr), January 20, 2001.

Hi bruce

I also live in france. And i just can say that if you want to rent a field camera as your deardorff it could hard to find even at the moyen format store at Paris. You could rent a sinar or other studio camera without problem. You planned to come with an 8*10 or 5*7. Because depending on the format it could not so easy to find film. There is only 3-4 store open to all, in Paris which have large format film in stock.

finally as I am aslo a large format user and get in the usa, in greece in many country of africa with my 8*10 I would just say take your camera with you, there is no problem to do this.

-- Nzé christian (cnze@club-internet.fr), January 20, 2001.

Bruce I am living 20 Km from Nice and cannot advice anything else than : bring your camera and film!

-- Jean-Marie Solichon (jardin-exotique@monte-carlo.mc), January 20, 2001.

Bruce, I gave it a second thought : I know a shop in Nice which sells used (and expensive) LF gear. You may ask them if they are willing to rent. Their fax number is + 33.4.93.13.89.73. In the phone directory I also found an adress in the section called "cinema and photography gear-renting" give it a try : Agence Top Images Productions fax n° + 33.4.93.89.90.90. As far as film is concerned : bring it with you; LF film is rare and expensive here. Are you interested in photographing cities or backcountry nature? You may find useful info and links if visiting my (modest) web pages : http://perso.monaco377.com/soliroca/.

-- Jean-Marie Solichon (jardin-exotique@monte-carlo.mc), January 20, 2001.

Bruce, If you go to Nice, you will have anyway to stop by Paris. Go to PROPHOT ( www.prophot.com ), they are Rue Condorcet in the 9° arrondissement. This is "The Shop" where you can find any sheet film, BW including Bergger, Color neg or E6 in 4x5 to 5x7 and of course 8x10. They are very competent and friendly. I take there my Bergger film in 8x10 and 4x10. So you really have whatever you want.

On the same street, you have an excellent rental shop who rent field (4x5) or studio 8x10 and any lense you want. It's Claude Rigal's Shop. I can give you more infos on that, but.

But it's going to be difficult for you to rent.. because you need "caution check" and bla bla bla... It's better to bring your Deardorff,rent the tripod (it's cheap so you can deal for the caution) and buy film there.

Feel free to contact me. Regards

-- guillaume zuili (gzuili@noos.fr), January 20, 2001.

Prophot is indeed the only place in Paris where I was able to find Polaroid 55 film in 4x5. This tells you about the scarcity of LF resources. The film was twice as expensive as B&H.

-- Q.-Tuan Luong (qtl@ai.sri.com), January 21, 2001.

The problem of price is simple : VAT at 19,6 %... Yes, you can be scared !

-- guillaume zuili (gzuili@noos.fr), January 21, 2001.

The place in Paris to rent LF is Claude Rigal's shop as mentionned above. It's name is Compact Photo Pro and its URL is at http://www.compact-photopro.fr/uk/index.html I mention a lot of other hiring shops (Bip Photo, Abdon ...) in Paris at my page http://www.multimania.com/cesarigd/photo8.htm (in French, a training for your tour?) But, you are going to the French Riviera. I can't suggest anything, but there surely are retailers there.

-- Dominique Cesari (cesarigd@club-internet.fr), January 22, 2001.

Has anyone from the US gone to Italy lately? I am going next fall and was wondering about the X-Ray problems during customes and traveling alone in southeast Italy. Do they hand inspect and take your word that film is the only thing in the boxes? Or do they insist on opening them and ruining $200 worth of film? I am planning on bringing my 4x5 and 2 1/4 cameras with all the film I am planning to shoot. What were your experiances? Any problems? Anyone living close by that would like to meet and shoot together? James

-- lumberjack (james_mickelson@hotmail.com), January 22, 2001.

James, in the US, FAA regulations entitles you to hand inspection of film, but even though, I've often heard "we have to be able to see it, otherwise we'll x-ray it". In Europe, in several countries you cannot even require hand inspection of film, so don't expect them not to require you to have your film boxes X-rayed. On the other hand, nobody will insist in opening them as long as they go through the X-ray machine. If you're concerned about that, you can try my method, which so far has been successful: remove the foil to avoid setting the metal detector, and just carry the film boxes with you, preferably under your clothes.

-- Q.-Tuan Luong (qtl@ai.sri.com), January 23, 2001.