Linhof II

With this kind of camera, you have a screen (the so-called ground glass) in the place of the film before you take the shot. This allows you to carefully set up the camera and compose your picture, with all the tilts and shifts that you might wanna use. It's actually very similar to a 'live-view' feature on a modern digital camera (apart from the fact that the image is not upside-down ;)! Then you have to take out the screen and put the film holder in its place. In this way, you make sure that the film will 'see' exactly what you have seen before. The image on the screen will usually be much darker than the surrounding light (I brightened it in the picture), which is the reason why photographers used to cover themselves and their cameras with large pieces of black cloth.