process & equipment

Updated April 2010

All photographs on this site are copyright © John Austin or Rae Starr 2010 and may not be used in anyway without the prior written permission of John Austin or Rae Starr

DARKROOM

The four enlargers on the left of my black and white darkroom are the finest available. The monster at the far end is a 10x8" (20x25cm) negative size DeVere 5108

The black and white film processing line opposite the big DeVere uses Agfa 17 replenished developer dates from May 1985 and, like me, continues to improve with age

BLACK & WHITE PRINTING

Black and white photographic printing. With Harman/Ilford/Kentmere being the only major manufacturer of black and white photographic printing materials in the world I worry about the future of photography. If this company fold there will be no fibre based silver gelatine paper and without silver gelatine paper there will be no way to make good photographic prints. Digital print output is for fools and those who have never seen a real print

OBSCURA OBJECTS OF DESIRE

Cameras & personal experience
This section is placed here as my means have become an anachronism.

The 1950s and 1960s was a golden period for the development of mainly early 20th Century camera concepts. In this period the Rolleiflex F series, the SL66 and revolutionary electronic SLX were released.  Hasselblad evolved to the Compur shuttered SLR which became an industry standard. Leitz introduced the M mount cameras and the motorised Robot camera developed into the range finder Robot Royal series.  The Zeiss Contax went to Japan after WWII to become the Nikon S3, whence it evolved into the Nikon F. Other single lens reflexes were the Asahi Pentax, the first production camera with an instant return mirror, and its followers. In Switzerland Alpa went through an amazing evolution.  Also in Switzerland Koch developed the Sinar monorail and in Germany the Linhof quickly evolved from a not very nice metal field camera into the superb Super Technica series, virtually the camera in production today. Returning to twin lens reflexes Mamiya introduced the interchangeable lens C cameras

In England the startlingly innovative original 1951 Wrayflex prototype had instant return mirror, integrated side mounted pentaprism and through the lens metering, well over a decade before anything like it appeared from Topcon, Asahi or Alpa information from Michael Parker, Photographic Trader, Australia, nr.132 pp24-26

All these and many other cameras represent a breadth of design solutions for photographers unrivaled today.  They are all thoughtful designs which solved functional criteria in different ways and if well maintained will work for decades and produce high quality fine prints or digital scans

Camera collectors who have the cameras featured on this page should go out and find photographers who will exchange working cameras for prints

The cameras I know intimately - Alpa, Gandolfi, Hasselblad, Leica, Linhof, Nikon, Rolleiflex & Sinar The exclusion of other cameras is because this article is about the cameras I have used extensively and that have produced my favourite work, but I am adding the Zeiss Super Ikonta 533/16 "pocket Linhof"

There are a few older lenses replacing existing newer ones. This is because I prefer the way lenses like the Voightlander Heliar and Taylor-Hobson Cooke lenses move light and have a softer bokeh. As I only print to 20x24" maximum bitey sharpness from a 10x8" or 5x4" neg is not crucial. In any case my 5x4 goes to a maximum print size of 16x20" and 120 to 14" square because of tonal smoothness

Lenses are dealt with separately at the end of this page

REFLEX CAMERA

SWITZERLAND

My first Alpa Reflex camera was a 6b, similar to the first camera illustrated, but with a front to back lever wind like the 6c shown on the right. This was my favourite Alpa Reflex. This winding system was one of the many attempts to increase speed of shutter and film winding that came in to replace knob winding. Another answer was the coffee-plunger Voigtlander Vitessa. Very soon the back to front lever wind of the Leica, Nikon etc came to be the standard. However, I remember the speed and the ease of keeping the camera to the eye that the Alpa Reflex system gave, no danger of finding your right eye hanging off your thumb

My best memory of my Alpa Reflex cameras, I had a 6b, 6c and 10d, was the superb Alpa Schneider 35mm f2.8 Curtagon. At the end of 2007 I bought a 35mm f2 late model Leitz Summicron M. After testing it I compared some old negatives from my 35mm Alpa Schneider Curtagon. The Leitz Summicron is the first post-Alpa Reflex camera 35mm lens to better it, but only by a little

The reason I sold my Alpa Reflex cameras was to move up-format to Rolleiflexes as I was demanding better image tonality than could be achieved with 35mm, but without lugging my 5 x 4" kit around. It is worth noting that the limitation with 35mm is not sharpness but image tonality, a factor dependent on film speed and magnification, 35mm slow films do not to give the same results as medim speed films from medium format cameras - However, I like the quality of 35mm/400asa for the myriad of subjects it is right for, and in many situations only 35mm will get you in there

Apart from moving up format I was frustrated with the fact that all the lenses I had for my Alpa Reflex cameras were from different manufacturers, Angieneux, Kern, Schneider, Zeiss. They all seemed to have focusing and aperture rings, and a knob, that went in different directions. Also, finding second hand Alpa Reflex bits was next to impossible

The Alpa Reflex camera, although later an anachronism, ushered in many design innovations and the series went through three major transformations - Alpa Reflex had the second, after Wray Cameras Ltd in England, patent on a through the lens metering system - however, through these transformations Alpa Reflex kept the superb front to back lever wind and the Exacta like front automatic diaphragm mechanism

I read in a UK magazine that Alpa Reflex's reputation for innovation caused them to be the but of an April issue joke in a European photographic magazine, possibly Camera Magazine Lucerne. The history/legend/myth was about the "Alpa Reflex XS", a camera which used an electrosensitive reflecting/transmitting plate instead of a mirror. This gave a staggering range of speeds and was without moving parts, noise or vibration. Gone were the mirror, shutter and all those springs and things. This was a joke, or a joke about a joke, but just think. . .

FOLMER ANNIVERSARY SPEED GRAPHIC
USA

29th June 2010
The Speed Graphic project has been abandoned as I need camera movemements, particularloy for landsacpe photography. The camera has had its original viewfinders replaced and will be sold with a 135mm lens and correct roll film back. The only modification to this camera is the addition of a third SG tripod socket in the camera bed at the balance point for a long heavy lens, very similar to the forward tripod socket on a Linhof STv

If interested please email me, test negatives will be suppled with camera and lens

GANDOLFI FIELD CAMERA
LONDON, now ANDOVER, ENGLAND

One of the most beautiful cameras ever built, up there with the Sanderson. One reason this camera is now sold is that mahogany field cameras do not keep straight when taken from cold wet Tasmania to the hot north west Pilbara desert region and on to Perth's humid summer - I should have kept it for one climate. It settled back to square after a few days. I could have kept it on a shelf, but I hate having unused cameras around so I sold it. Like other goodies, if it is not being used it gets passed on. However I regret selling the 165mm Zeiss Double Protar That lens has an exquisite way of moving light

I now use the Linhof STv for field work, but the way the Gandolfi rear standard focused behind the front standard was superb. Modern Japanese copies of wooden field cameras have a sloppy sliding system to get the rear standard up behind the front standard for wide angle work, but these are rough and never get the back standard parallel to the front - Optical logic insists that at close range you focus the back standard, not the front - this is one area where the Linhof Technica is a pain in the arse

What really kills narrow bodied wooden field cameras as far as I am concerned is wind vibration. Wind buffets the bellows and makes them vibrate the front and back standards of a wooden camera. This was the crucial factor in selling the Gandolfi. After a special journey to photograph the subtle charm of cold, dank, toxic industrial mud flats at Severn Beach all the Gandolfi negatives showed signs of wind vibration. However, with their quality workmanship Gandolfis suffer less from this than newer Japanese and Chinese copies. Have you ever seen a 10x8" landscape photograph that was taken in high wind?

For the rest of the English Littoral Series I used the Rollei 2.8F - see English Littoral page

Louis Gandolfi and Sons made a series of beautiful cameras, of which the 5x4" and 10x8" are still being made. A new series of Gandolfis, the Variant was in production which at first sight look a bit traditional. However, the Variant is a new and advanced design and is designed for landscape work with very wide angle lenses

HASSELBLAD SUPER WIDE C

SWEEDEN, BUT THE LENS AND SHUTTER ARE GERMAN

Hasselblad Super Wide C, the World's most expensive box camera, is a narrow body with the lens on one face and a Hasselblad back on the other. The lens is a Zeiss f4.5 38mm Biogon

In my opinion the SWC is delightful, the lens is beautiful, the body functional and light, the viewfinder sufficiently accurate and the clip-on screen precise

SWC view finding is by an optical viewfinder or a clip-on focusing screen like a view camera. I have wondered why Hasselblad didn't install a parallax compensating range/viewfinder for the SWC. Scale focusing is tricky when working fast. A 38mm lens does not give enough depth of field close in hand held at wide aperture. With the focusing screen you can use the 45° prism or the stove pipe, but this takes practice as the corners are a bit dark

The SWC is fast to operate and in landscape situations scale focusing is fine. The Compur shuttered Hasselblad lenses have a similar depth of field scale mechanism to the Rolleiflexes, but in Hasselblad two red markers slide over the focusing scale

For working close to the ground I prefer the Rollei WA with its' waist-level finder to the SWC, even with the 45° prism and screen. The SWC will focus to 28cm, but this can only be used accurately with the focusing screen

In one of the illustrations the Hasselblad Bellows Lens Hood is shown, this is very useful with wide lenses, although it occludes the lower part of the SWC optical viewfinder.  However, as the lens hood is easily removed this is not a problem in landscape photography or when the screen is in use. For hand-held work the bellows lens hood is a nightmare

I still have my old Hasselblad CM kit with lenses, tubes and all the fruit from my old commercial studio, I was going to sell it, but the current sale value is so low I have given it to a friend rather than almost give it to a stranger

LEICA M
Ultimate Costume Jewelry

BAVARIA - Getting it right and staying with it

While camera manufacturers particularly Canon with their EOS disaster, are moving deeper into the dung pit of bling Leica keep the simple style of the first M series, the M3. Any M series Leica, apart from the M5, is the ultimate in refinement, no need for designer label jeans, if you are wearing an M series Leica, whatever jeans you are wearing are THE designer label. The Canadian M4-2 is considered a bit uncool, but from a distance it is difficult to tell, particularly if you stick a false red dot on the front. Actually, the red dot is the most important bit on a Leica. My M2 does not yet have one, nor will it ever have

Apart from this first priority, M Leicas are small, light weight, fast, reliable and produce the optimum image quality possible with 35mm. Leicas are the first and the last word in 35mm cameras, 1914 for the Ur-Leica and 2006 for the M7

LINHOF SUPER TECHNICA 5

BAVARIA

Although awkward for wide angle and close work, this is otherwise a good landscape camera. For studio work buy a Sinar Norma. The practical wide angle focal length limit for this camera is 90mm. Using a 75mm lens is fussy and for 65mm or less a secondary focus accessory is needed. If you want wider than 90mm go for a Gandolfi Variant

The complaint that the Linhof Super Techica series are too heavy for landscape is not valid. The extra weight of the Linhof body over a well made wooden camera is small and in any case the tripod, lenses, meters, dark slides etc are exactly the same weight for all 5x4" cameras. The mechanical stability of the Linhof Super Technica outweighs the weight benefits of flimsy wooden cameras. (See 15th April 2010 update)

The linhof Super Technica has a relatively deep body shell, so the widest part of the bellows is protected from side wind with lenses from 150mm down to 90mm. Also its heavy front standard engineering helps greatly here.

By using a 135mm Schneider Symmar and, if I find one, a Schneider 90mm Angulon, the old tiny Angulon, I am making my Linhof kit as small as posible. The 135mm Schneider Symmar and Angulon will sit inside the closed Linhof body so it can hang off one shoulder by a strap. A meter, cloth, filters and dark slides then go in a very small bag on the other shoulder. The tripod becomes a balancing stick. Backpacks have the problem of having too much space, which easily gets filled with heavy things that never get used. In Australia less camera weight equals more water which equals greater range

Linhof note - Since the advent of the quarter plate Speed Graphic I have abandoned my attempts to keep the Linhof kit light weight and now it has the big lenses it works best with, a fat exposure meter, lots of filters, a RFB and a heavy cloth. A serious kit to carry for serious photography

15th April 2010
A troubling discovery

Now is the time to buy a new Linhof Master Technica, or drink more Guinness. Trying to find why a couple of Linhof negs are unsharp I discovered that the part of the track that corresponds to the 135 and 90mm lenses is worn to a kind of waist, allowing the front standard to slide back a tiny bit as I operate the aperture and shutter winding lever. This is compounded by the claw that grips the track not completely closing, which means finding out why this is, perhaps the spring needs re-locating or something

Two cures, retire the Linhof and buy a new one, or shim out the claw by gluing a strip of Guinness can inside the claw, which is slightly less expensive. (For the record, very soltice and equinox I clean and very lightly lubricate the Linhof tracks and beds)

How did Linhof get away with such a weakness? By comparison the Sinar system is beautiful and a Speed Graphic is so basic that it can't go wrong and if it does a hardware shop washer will fill out the space, which is how I have previously repared a Speed Graphic focusing lock

Later, following successful use of Guinness beer can aluminium shim to repair the Linhof front standard "claw" I have checked the squareness of the angle of the Linhof front standard locked slightly behind the relevant infinity stops. It is not always square. This really annoys me and answers a few questions regarding occasional lack of L/R sharpness in widish aperture work with the Linhof. The times I use the Linhof with the front standard locked slighhtly behind the relevant infinity stop is when using the tilt back to get increased DoF in landscapes, which means always. Now I wonder why I spent all that money on it when old Speed Graphics were being given away free

Sinar comes out of this sort of analysis with a golden glow. Now to get someone to carry the Sinar across the Australian desert for me. A few years ago I was about to sell my old Sinar for next to nothing when friend Roger said "you will regret it". He also said that of my Hasselblad outfit, which he now has on permanentish loan

Linhof and weight - Since the advent of the quarter plate Speed Graphic I have abandoned my attempts to keep the Linhof kit light weight and now it has the lenses it works well with, lots of filters, a RFB and a heavy cloth. A serious kit to cary for serious photography

More on 5x4" lenses, their drawing and "bokeh" at the end of this page

NIKON F

JAPAN

If ever a camera manufacturer got it right first time then cluttered a camera design it was Nipon Kogaku. My first Nikon was an FM, replaced by F2s and eventually I aquired the pinacle of Nikon design - the Nikon F - This is the most basic of the Nikons, and if you abandon the Photomic F'n head and use the non-metering pentaprism it is as simple as you can get

For steady long hand-held exposures I rest the tip of my right index finger on the slope of the Nikon pentaprism and release the shutter with the inside of my first index finger joint using a "soft release" shutter release extension

ROLLEIFLEX 2.8F, TELE ROLLEI & ROLLEI WIDE

WEST GERMANY

The next section is about the Rolleiflex 2.8F, Rolleiflex Tele and Rolleiflex Wide Angle twin lens reflexes. I write from the perspective of a professional user of these cameras.  I use them not because of some odd quirk but because they are direct in operation, produce outstanding quality and, from a practical standpoint, nothing better has come along.  My respect for these machines in not exclusive, I also use Hasselblad, but what I demand of all my equipment is that it is simple to operate, is reliable and is not dependent on batteries.  Complexity does not equal quality

According to the Wise and Wonderful Web, Rollei had plans for an interchangeable lens version of their twin lens reflexes, but the designs proved too complex and costly to introduce.  This idea sets my mind running to absolutely divine cameras, but if Rollei said interchangeable lens TLRs were impossible then they were!  So, despite the illusion, the Mamiya C series is a figment of your imagination.   Rollei did introduce Rollei Mutar clip-on supplementary lenses to give slightly longer and wider angles of view, but thankfully these have sunk without trace

During my 1993 survey exhibition, at a time when I thought I was using mainly Sinar, Hasselblad, Nikon,  I walked around the gallery with John Patterson.  He asked what proportion of the final selection of images were made with which camera.  A quick count showed the proportions came to 84% Rolleiflex, with 16% Gandolfi, Sinar, Hasselblad, Alpa and Nikon combined.  His point on simplicity was made, but in fairness the Rolleis and Gandolfi were used for personal work and the others for commercial work

Rolleiflexes are theoretically simple designs made from the finest materials built with superb craftsmanship.  Further, the Rolleiflex was one of the most copied designs of all time, which demonstrates the basic soundness of its concept.  Getting back to practical matters, twin lens Rolleiflexes remove the concern about the weight of the extra lenses - there aren't any

Because I live and work in the bottom left corner of the forgotten side of the least fashionable part of the planet, I need equipment which is reliable.  Rolleiflexes do not have mirrors, flaps, aperture blades, springs and levers flying around before the picture is taken. In my Fremantle studio I came across a subject who would blink at the cue of a Hasselblad starting up and have her eyes firmly closed every time the flash went off, a problem that does not occur with a twin lens reflex. Rolleiflexes let you see what is happening through the moment of exposure

A weakness of all Rolleiflex twin lens reflexes is the tripod fixing socket, which is attached to the folding camera back.  These sockets work loose, which means the camera can rotate slightly on the tripod screw, or even wobble around.  This can be solved with the use of the Rolleifix tripod fixing plate. Araldite squirted into the flange only works for a while.  Fortunately second hand Rolleis are often sold with a whole string of little pouches on the neck strap and hopefully one of them contains a Rolleifix

The placement of the feed roll and tripod socket was one of the great design improvements of the Mamiya C, which is not a Rollei copy

Although I personally find them awkward, the Mamiya C series are excellent cameras which are now cheap and have many good features, mainly interchangeable lenses. Anyone with a small budget who wants an interchangable lens 120 camera for landscape work is recommended to look for a clean, working Mamiya C camera

My main personal problem with the Mamiya C series is parallax error. I like the Rolleiflex parallax correction, which is simple and efficient. A lever attached to the lens panel moves a masking frame backwards and forwards under the focusing screen

Neck straps - if you are using a Rollei try to tear the leather strap off the camera attachment clip. Generally it will part with only the slightest tug. This in infinitly better than the leather breaking when jumping across rocks. The 5 minute shoe repair sites in shopping malls will undo the rivets and replace the strap with a nylon one for less than the cost of a beer. I have found I need to take in a the spare strap, which I cut to the correct length before taking it to the shoe repairer

The final and great weakness of Rolleiflexes is the lack of qualified service agencies outside of Germany. The sad loss of Jurgen Henning in Australia and the news I have read that Rollei no longer re-builds Rolleiflexes in Braunschweig is the greatest threat to these cameras. While simple in principle the F series is a complex piece of engineering. They are getting old and need qualified professional service every thirty years then they will work forever - the Stradivarius of cameras

Richard Avedon, Margaret Bourke-White, Bill Brandt, Carlotta Corpron, Imogen Cunningham, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Horst P Horst, Lee Miller, Helmut Newton (Tele Rollei), Irving Penn and many other world famous photographers have relied on these cameras for much of their work

ROLLEIFLEX 2.8F/3.5F Zeiss Planar/Schneider Xenotar
ROLLEIFLEX T Zeiss Tessar/Schneider Xenar
ROLLEICORD Schneider Xenar

The standard lens Rolleiflex cameras are listed in order of complexity, cost and weight - any of them in working order will provide outstanding quality

85% Of everything I am not the first photographer to say that a standard lens Rolleiflex can photograph 85% of everything - when professionals were asked what they would choose if they only had ONE camera the answer mostly came down to Rolleiflex

ROLLEIFLEX TELE
135mm Zeiss Sonnar

The Rolleiflex Tele was first introduced in mid 1959 only 4999 of this first batch were built.  A second batch was produced in 1971 with the facility to use 220 film and a slightly different direct vision frame in the hood, this batch consisted of 3377 cameras.  The f4 135mm Zeiss Sonnar lens has a tonal quality delightfully suited to produce negatives for fine black and white prints.

The Rolleiflex Tele, and also the Rollei Wide Angle, use the standard Rolleiflex focusing cam, which only gives a lens extension of 7.5mm on a 135mm lens.  This means the Rolleiflex Tele only focuses to an embarassing 2.59m, a portrait from head to hips.  To work at closer distances Rollei introduced special Tele-Rolleinars.  These Tele-Rolleinars come in two sizes, 0.35x and 0.7x and are one of Rollei's less inspired ideas, but they do get you to 96cm, which gives a tight head shot.  For portraits you need smoothness of operation, and adding or removing close-up lenses does not make for smoothness.  The 0.35x Tele Rolleinars are hinged for rapid changing, but this means you can't use the lens hood on the main lens, only on the Rolleinar

Even with the Rolleinar swapping I prefer the Rolleiflex Tele for portraits because it is quiet compared to the Hasselblad

The Rollei Pentaprism is an accessory which needs practice until it feels natural  The pentaprism is improved in the new TLR Rolleis as a 45° version which looks very like the Novoflex prism for the Hasselblad

A thought I have often had is why Rollei never got Voigtländer to make their lenses, given they were both based at Braunschweig - a Rollei with a 105mm Apo Lanthar and a close focusing cam would be a gem, and it would work with Bay III accessories

ROLLEIFLEX WIDE ANGLE
55mm Zeiss Distagon

For a while, when I worked in the forest I would go as far as I could drive, leave the Linhof in the car, and walk the rest of the way with the Rollei Wide Angle and a medium sized tripod.  For a while the Rollie Wide Angle now photographed most of my landscape work, even if I told everyone it eas the Linhof. Now I am retired I feel I need the exercise and drag my Linhof kit around.   The Rollei WA is light, the lens superb and the mechanism works like new thanks to the late Jurgen Henning

Franke and Heidecke produced the Rolleiflex Wide Angle from 1961 to 1967, during this time they made a staggering less than 4000 cameras.  The body is an E2 equipped with an f4 55mm Zeiss Distagon.  The camera body uses the same 7.5mm extension focusing cam as the standard Rolleiflexes, which in this case, means it focuses down to a very useful 61cm.

The lens focal length of 55mm is equivalent to about 34mm on 35mm, great for landscapes where a great wide angle is not wanted.  The depth of field at f22 is 1.5m to infinity.  This is a usable f22, although normally I try to not go below f11 or f16.  Most lenses, while great wide open, show diffraction at small apertures

Scale focusing is perfect for landscapes with this camera, aided by the white line indicator on the focusing knob. In this system two black markers slide over the white line at the top of the focusing knob as the aperture wheel is rotated.  Just focus the infinity symbol forward to the end of the white line and the hyperfocal distance is set without having to squint at tiny numbers.

Because less than 3999 WA-Rolleis and 8376 Tele-Rolleis were made they are hard to come by second hand. So if one comes along buy it before a collector grasps it to hide in a collection.

Good news was the Rolleiflex Wide Angle and Tele were reintroduced, the WA with a 50mm Schneider Super Angulon lens. As I am a pedant, I will say that as a slightly Retrofocus design it should be called Schneider Curtagon.  For details visit http://www.rollei.de  A hope I have is that the new Rollei screen range will fit my Wide, Tele and 2.8F.  The new screen range could mean salvation for many old Rolleis

One last puzzle for me is, given that both Voigtländer and Rollei were based in Braunschweig, why didn't Rollei use the superb Voigtländer lenses, which could have been delivered to the Rollei factory by bicycle

SINAR NORMA, 5x4" and 10x8"

SWITZERLAND
THE MOST ELEGANT MONORAIL EVER

I have finally started using the standard professional format, 10x8". The camera is a Sinar Norma and the lens set is being assembled. Ideally a Cooke XVb as the standard, but I will have to make do with whatever I can get to start, a 165mm Angulon, a 36cm Voigtlander Heliar and a 480mm red dot Goerz Artar. The camera comes with a 400mm Schneider Claron, but the seller could not find it when I picked up the camera

I have aquired a Sinar-Copal Shutter for use with the Sinar Normas. This device totally changes the use of the Sinar and makes my old commercial 5x4" studio camera into a new instrument for personal work. However, with a maximum shutter speed of 1/60 second this is for interior use

Looking through this camera and making my first test negatives I feel an excitement I have not felt for new equipment in years. Coupled with this are the sketches in my workbook, more theatrical than before, which will suit the theatricallity of the camera

I have already been treated to jokes about my 10x8" Sinar, like it being the ultimate camera to pose beside. Anther suggestion is that I make a brass tube with a flat glass at the front and hold a compact digital camera inside to make the real pix

Problems, with the 165mm it is the bellows locking up, but I can't use much movement with this lens anyway. The difficulty with using the Artar is that without a set of extension bellows and mid frame the smallest area I can cover is about 36" diagonal. It also takes about 5 minutes to walk from the back of the camera to the front to set the aperture and back again

LENSES

Drawing and Bokeh

A topic of the Wise and Wonderful Web is the Japanese term bokeh, the scent of a lens. Bokeh is a function of the way spherical aberation is corrected, or not

What bokeh reminds me of is advice from Derek Cooper in Bath who told me back in the very early 1970s that the quality of a lens is not only its sharpness but its "drawing". By "drawing" Derek meant the whole quality of a lens, its sharpness, the beneficial affect of flare on shadow detail, the unfocused qualities, now called bokeh, and everything

Christmas Day Bokeh While looking for information on early telephoto lens designs in Photographic Lenses, Conrad Beck and Herbert Andrews, pub London circa 1905 I came across the first sensible description of bokeh. If one looks at the rotten bokeh shown by video zoom lenses this description becomes very understandable. The attempt by Harold M Merklinger, Photo Techniques May/June 1997, to explain bokeh is giberish by comparison

The End of a Brief Affair

I tried to make the two TTH Cooke lenses work within my practise. However, pretty as they are they are not delivering the quality I want. I leave the original comments with some modifications

Here there were almost Dragons. I have never been a camera collector and during my commercial career only used standard professional cameras, with the exception of Alpa Reflex, but they produced very good work. With my rememberance of a long ago sold TTH Cooke Aviar IIIb and the very recent acquision of TTH Cooke VIIb Wide Angle and VIII Telephoto Anastigmat lenses, both for use with the Speed Graphic and Sinar with Sinar-Copal Shutter, I was in danger of chasing the Cooke Lens Dragon. However, this wouldl only happen if they produced images that generated beautiful prints that sold. However, if anyone reading this has a 10.25 TTH Cooke IIb Aviar for sale please email me

TAYLOR-HOBSON COOKE
Taylor-Hobson Cooke VIIb Wide Angle Anastigmat

This lens was sought out to fit on a Speed Graphic. The Cooke VIIIB is not sharp compared to new lenses, but at 16x20" from 5x4" or 6x9cm film, I thought bitey sharpness would not be an issue

The TTH Cooke wide angle lens was now mounted on a Speed Graphic panel and put into in use, almost. It produces beautiful negatives for luminous 12x16" prints at f16, but really needs to be stopped down to f32-f45. The problem here is that the SG shutter's slowest speed is 1/10th second, so I was forced away from the tiny apertures I wanted. The other problem I found was trying to focus at f6.3, almost impossible, f11, the first "working" aperture is much easier to focus with as the image actually becomes sharp

There is one crucial negative, a gift, right light, right time, right everything except it was not photographed on 5x4" with a newer lens, that can only be printed to 12x16. This image screams to be biger

Taylor-Hobson Cooke series VIII 15" Telephoto Anastigmat

First indications were that this would have been a beautiful lens to use. However, this lens has been returned to the owner with a test negative. It is a beautiful object but it does not have the resulution I desire, so has been returned. Yes, there was a huge temptation to buy it as an ornament, but I am a photographer, not a collector

The big lens purchase I am saving for is a brand new re-issued TTH Cooke XVa, the finest lens ever made for 10x8" photography

LEITZ (LEICA) LENSES

The theoretical standard for 35mm is 43mm, not the 52mm that Leitz introduced with the Elmax and has become the accepted 35mm format standard length. Logic (24 x 24) + (36 x 36) = 1872, square root = 43.26. Zeiss introduced 45mm as standard on the Contaflex. Leitz and now Cosina/Voigtlander have produced 40mm standard lenses. Many Leicaographers use the 35mm Summicron as their normal lens

The late model pre aspheric 35mm Summicron has reputedly the most beautiful bokeh of any 35mm lens

However, my use of Leica is to get images that would be difficult with larger format cameras, so often just getting the image pleases me

I used the 35mm and 50mm f2.8 Canon lenses in addition to Leitz and Cosina/Voigtlander lenses. I liked the Korean War quality of the Canon lenses. The 35mm Canon did the bulk of the work for the SFA documentation in the Arts section, "flare with flair" or "retro-glow". The Canon Lenses are now in a box 'till I find someone who wants to use them

NIKKOR LENSES

I use Nikon lenses from the 1960s and 1970s, including the legendary 2.1cm Nikkor, this lens did the bulk of my work documenting the late 1990s forest protests. I used the 2.1cm Nikkor to avoid threat to my 20mm f3.5 UD Nikkor. Now I discover the 2.1cm's US$ value, but this is a lens to use, not to stick in a display cabinet. With its Super Angulonish symmetrical wide angle design the 2.1cm Nikkor has very little glass out at the front and the rear element almost touches the shutter

NIKKOR LENS BOKEH
A recent test of 1960s/1970s Nikkors show them to have OKish drawing/bokeh, but not good. Before looking into bokeh I never really noticed anything bad about the unfocused areas with the Nikkor lenses. The early 200mm f4 is a bit rough and the 85mm f1.8 is bad if you have unfocussed points of light in the corners at f8. I have not bothered to test my 20mm and 21mm Nikkors as these are used with great depth of field, so bokeh is not an issue

VOIGTLÄNDER
Braunschweig, Germany
Voigtländer Heliar lenses 36cm and 24cm f4.5

The 36cm is from 1924 and the 24cm from 1963

Voigtländer ApoLanthar lens 15cm f4.5

The 1965 15cm Voigtländer Apo Lanthar which came with my Linhof kit. The 5 element Voigtländer lens was possibly the ultimate practical development of the triplet principle, but the symmetrical lenses that came soon after it are superior in terms of angle of coverage and sharpness across the whole field

The Voigtländer Apo Lanthar achieved its quality by using lanthanium and thorium in the glass. Perhaps the beautiful "drawing" of the Voigtländer Apo Lanthar is caused by pre-fogging of the film by radioactive alpha particles. This notion of beautiful tonality from nuclear radiation fogging is silly.

Voigtländer Skopar lens 13.5cm f4.5

This lens came in the package from New Zealand, it is possibly from about 1930, uncoated in a dial set Compur shutter. Tests show this to have some nice qualities, but I don't think I will use it much, so if anyone has the desire to use it, not collect it, please contact memore to follow

5x4" LENSES LENSES IN GENERAL

I use a 1962 135mm Schneider Symmar lens for landscape work and this is the lens in use for the Broke Inlet portfolio. 135mm is equivalent to 36mm on 35mm, given the theoritical standard for 5x4" is 160mm and for 35mm is 43mm. Logic (5"x5") + (4"x4") = 41, square root = 6.40" = 161mm,

Early Rodenstock Sironars and Schneider Symmars are described as "convertible", that is you unscrew the front lens component and use the rear component as a longer lens. I do not like the idea of unscrewing the front of a lens to let dust and moisture into the shutter. It was a sales gimmic and should be avoided

EXACTAMITES

Now I use Leicas extensively for 35mm work I don't see much of my friendly little Exactamites. Exactamites are mites that live in cameras and presumably live off shavings of gelatine. Normally they can be seen running around on the focusing screens of my Nikons, Rolleis and Linhof. Sometimes they leave mite-shadows in the sky; then they loose just a little of their charm. A Perth camera collector told me has even had one in a sealed lens system, where it died. The collector has yet to develop a fondness for them

The terms “Exactamite and Ihageemite” come from the observation, long ago recorded in the British Journal of Photography, that they were first noticed in Ihagee VP Exacta cameras from Dresden

If an Exactamiteologist states these specs of divinity are just dust mites I will be disappointed. To me they are special and keep me company when I am photographing the landscape