New To Medium Format, Any Tips?

Just stick to film for now. It'll be much better than the old digital backs.

Get some of that new Portra 160 and 400. Both seem like incredibly nice films. I haven't tried them yet, though.

Oh and get a scanner.
 
Or simply buy slide and you will be amazed looking for so big positive. Fuji fp100 is my choice.
 
Just get out and shoot film, and try as many different films as you can to see which you like best and which suits your style and workflow. I'd highly recommend Ektar, of those I've tried so far it's the one that stands out.
 
I don't know about the Mamiya 645 but it it is quiet easy with the MF cameras I use to put the film in upside down and end up with nothing.:bonk:
 
yeah, never go a miss with velvia and 50 is perfect for those landscapes, hit it up with a large stop ND filter and take some daylight long exposures. Also probably worth shooting some b and w slide film, always looks awesome, try get some pinky/scarlet skys with the velvia, will look awesome!
 
Just a word of warning though, don't expose Velvia 50 for 4 seconds or longer without using the relevant magenta colour correction filters and reciprocal compensations. Otherwise you will get underexposure and a green cast. Of course the cast is usually correctable with scanning, but Velvia is notoriously tight on exposure and if you want to project then obviously you cannot correct it. These are in the datasheet here on the second page under 'long exposure compensation:

http://fujifilm.co.uk/professional/films/pdfs/fujichrome_velvia50.pdf

Its quite straightforward, basically add on the relevant exposure compensation and magenta filter when using an exposure between each time. For example, between 4 and 8 seconds you would add on a 1/3 of a stop and a 5M colour correction filter, between 8 and 16 1/2 a stop and a 10M filter and so on. As a rule though, don't expose it beyond 32 seconds as the cast and exposure is normally uncorrectable.

With longer exposures the film loses some of its sensitivity and deviates from a reciprocal curve so you need to increase the amount of light for the given time by either increasing the exposure time or the aperture. Hence the name 'reciprocal failure', its also known as the Schwarzschild effect after its original researcher.

This can of course end up with fantastically long exposures, with Tri-X for example, a 100 second exposure is recommended to last 1200 seconds or increase the aperture by 3 stops and a 30% reduction in development time. I would love to see digital guys being able to take pictures that long without the grain from hot pixels or having to use extremely dark ND filters! That is one advantage of film, it doesn't go grainy with long exposures if exposed correctly.
 
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Another reason for using Ektar.. very forgiving with no compensation required at least as far as 120 seconds, although there is a slight colour shift.
 
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