Article on Tomioka and their Industrial & Enlarging Lenses

I've been writing an article on Tomioka - first and foremost their enlarging and industrial lenses - for quite some time. While a couple of things are still missing or incomplete, I wanted to share the first draft in order to let you know what I was able to gather so far.

There are actually two articles:

1.) THE TOMIOKA STORY
https://deltalenses.com/the-tomioka-story/

a little bit of background in terms of history of Tomioka as a company.

and

2.) TOMIOKA INDUSTRIAL LENSES
https://deltalenses.com/tomioka-industrial-lenses/

an overview of three notable lens families (EXXC minilab lenses, The Osawa Tominon enlarging lenses and the Polaroid MP4/5 macro and repro lenses) + a couple of other Tomioka made industrial lenses I found along the way.

This whole topic has gotten way bigger than I had ever imagined, so please forgive me, if there are still some errors or missing pieces in there.

I'd love to hear what you think about the article, or some of the lenses, if you have some experience with any of them. And if you happen to know some good sources I'm missing, please let me know as well, so I can further refine this write-up!

Here are a couple of sample shots made with these lenses:

Way closer... to Spring by simple.joy, on Flickr

Don't worry, we're just playing ball here! by simple.joy, on Flickr

Bad leather front by simple.joy, on Flickr

Mandatory morning breathing by simple.joy, on Flickr

Bumping heads by simple.joy, on Flickr

Ballways online by simple.joy, on Flickr

Absence can be felt. by simple.joy, on Flickr

My macro swan song by simple.joy, on Flickr

Densely populated by simple.joy, on Flickr

Pretty or just pre-tea? by simple.joy, on Flickr

Silence of the lamps by simple.joy, on Flickr

Thanks for posting this link in the FORUM.

I posted the link a couple of days ago in another thread.

You certainly have done a lot of GREAT work -- thanks!

Duplicates deleted!

I wish there were more mention of the enlarging lenses. I have been using the Yashica Minox-style cameras lately and was glad to see inclusion of the ENLA Yashica enlarging lens for the tiny 8x11mm images.

xkaes said:

Thanks for posting this link in the FORUM.

I posted the link a couple of days ago in another thread.

You certainly have done a lot of GREAT work -- thanks!

Click to expand...

I'm glad you think so! It would be great if a good number of people see it, because that would raise the probability of someone having additional information in regards to some of the open questions significantly... that's why I really appreciate it when it's shared. Thanks a lot!

ic-racer said:

I wish there were more mention of the enlarging lenses. I have been using the Yashica Minox-style cameras lately and was glad to see inclusion of the ENLA Yashica enlarging lens for the tiny 8x11mm images.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the interest! Glad you found the ENLA lens - it's a tiny, but pretty fine lens, at least from my limited experience. I'm not sure what you mean by "more mention of the enlarging lenses" though... Are you referring to the article? As far as I know I mentioned every single enlarging lens Tomioka ever produced in there. Or do you know anything else, I'm not yet aware of?