While I was browsing Flickr and searching for some inspiration for my next portrait assignment, I came across some beautiful medium format portraits taken by excellent photographers using Hasselblad and Rolleiflex cameras. I remember it happened in a rainy afternoon. In this article, I would like to show a glimpse of what the Rolleiflex 2.8F is capable of and share my experiences with this classic old timer camera. However, in my opinion, they provide a photography experience that cannot be matched by any recent digital single-lens reflex (or mirrorless) camera. Twin-lens reflex cameras are certainly an odd species nowadays. The lens at the bottom of the camera is the one that takes the picture (often called ‘taking lens’), while the other is used in the viewfinder system. The special feature of TLR cameras is that they have two lenses of the same focal length with their focal planes aligned. For people who are unfamiliar with how a TLR camera looks, the picture below shows a studio “portrait” of the Rolleiflex 2.8F, one of the most legendary TLR cameras in the history of photography.įuji X-E1 with Fujinon XF 35 mm f/1.4R f8, 1/125 So starting to take pictures with traditional twin-lens reflex (TLR) cameras was a very interesting experience for me. In the past 10 years, I have been taking pictures exclusively with various types of digital single-lens reflex (mostly Canon) cameras. Although my first serious camera was a Russian Zenit TTL, I consider myself a photographer of the digital era.