You need to fashion a "bellows clip" to make it work. Many cameras have
these already on them. The idea is that maybe 5 or 6 pleats behind the
front standard you glue a little piece of fabric with a small ring
attahced and then place a small screw vertically in the middle of the
front standard. When the bellows sags, you hook the clip on the screw,
thus pulling the bellows tighter. My description might not be that
clear; just look at different 8x10 cameras and you're bound to find one
with this already on the camera and you can copy it. Far more efficient
and handy than other methods.


In article , Argon3
wrote:

Worked in a catalog studio where all the cameras were 8X10 and 11X14
Deardorffs. The bellows sag is a familiar problem but by no means limited to
'dorfs...I have a Lotus 4X5 and the extra long bellow that it came with (which
is a benefit in some cases) has a tendency to sag. Fortunately, the good
folks
at Lotus put a velcro strap and a "D" ring in the middle of the bellows so
that
you can pull it forward and hook it on a stud on the top of the lensboard
assembly...they also make a great "hybrid" wide angle bellows with accordian
pleats on either side of a "bag" assembly.
We used to just stack 8X10 film boxes between the bed and the bellows to jack
the bellows up...real high tech! Probably still the most efficient and low
cost solution that you'll find.
You'll find that any extra long bellows will eventually sag...you might
consider having a shorter new bellows made and installed but i don't remember
the bellows being easily interchangeable on the Deardorffs so you'd be limited
to whatever exchanged the original bellows for.
They're still as excellent a field camera as you're going to find...I doubt
that any other comparable camera would be much different. As distasteful as
any of the work-arounds might be to you, it's just another of the
eccentricities of shooting LF...lots of jerry-rigging in order to get the shot
you want.

argon