I just had a look at my Canon tubes and it does appear that there is enough room with a lens mounted to take off another four millimeters or so. The electrical pins are on a spring assembly and cutting them down or putting in new shorter ones should not be a problem. There's a pretty high tech machine shop next to my studio and I'll have the guys there have a look at it. They're also the people machining the Gitzo safety plate to keep the columns from falling out of the tripods.
Roland W wrote:
In case you need it, use this crazy application as an excuse to run out and buy a 5D mkII with live view and a pretty good LCD to look at things on.
Or as an excuse to get another 17mm lens--one to leave wide open for composition, and another to mount when you're ready to take the shot.
You could even buy six of them and keep one set to each full-stop aperture!
