Best Recommendation for Medium Format printing lens

bnjlosh · Jul 5, 2006

Hi, I have just acquired a durst m600 and an omega b22 off freebay and need to know what the best lens would be for medium format printing...I am working with 6x6...

any ideas and pointers will be greatly appreciated!

brad

TheFlyingCamera · Jul 5, 2006

One very good lens which can be had for reasonable money is the El-Nikkor 80mm f5.6 . There are also excellent lenses from Rodenstock and Schneider, but as a general rule they are more expensive.

david b · Jul 5, 2006

I am using a Schneider Componon-S 80mm f4 lens and love the results. Pretty cheap on ebay.

Bob Carnie · Jul 5, 2006

My favorite medium format lens is an Apo-Rodagon 90mm f-4
Absolute wonderful lens.

wilsonneal · Jul 5, 2006

From personal experience, very much agree with Bob. If I could afford one, I'd get the Apo-Rodagon he mentioned.

I own and use a Schneider Componon-S, and it's very sharp. I bought it on eBay for less than $50 with a board, and make 90% of my prints with this lens.
Neal

David Brown · Jul 5, 2006

As stated, EL Nikkor, Schneider Componons, or Rodenstock Rodagons are all good. There are lessor lenses by each of these makers, tho. You want a 6 element, rather than a 4. Ask! For instance, there is a El Nikkor 75mm, which I believe is a 4 element. But, the 80mm f5.6 is 6 element, and a great lens IMO.

For 6x6, charts will tell you that a 75mm is enough, and it probably is. However, you can't go wrong with an 80 or 90, and there is a school of thought that the longer lenses give better edge sharpness since there's more "coverage" by the lens.

I've even used a 105mm for 6x6, when not printing too big.

My personal recommendation is an 80mm.

David

Stan160 · Jul 5, 2006

I'm very new to MF myself, but recently picked up a Rodenstock Rodagon 80/5.6 from ebay from £14.99. Not printed anything bigger than 10x8 yet, but seems very sharp so far.
Ian

Petzi · Jul 5, 2006

Any Schneider Componon and any Rodenstock Rodagon is at least a 6 element lens.

Ole · Jul 5, 2006

I'm still using my (4-element) Meopta Anaret-S 80mm, despite having a cupboard full of various lenses. I still haven't found a better lens than the cheap Anaret...

Phillip P. Dimor · Jul 5, 2006

If you can find one, a Fujinon EX 75mm.. My personal preference.

Claire Senft · Jul 5, 2006

What is the maximum focal length that your enlarger can handle? Can it be used with a 90mm or longer lens ? My memory seems to indicate that 80mm is the longest lens recommended for these two enlargers.

dancqu · Jul 5, 2006

David Brown said:
I've even used a 105mm for 6x6, when not printing too big.
My personal recommendation is an 80mm. David

I've a 105 EL-Nikkor f 5.6 for all my 6 x formats. Why?
Because for small prints the enlarger is not so low.
I can view close with out bumping my head. Also,
exposures can be reasonably long. The B8
Omega I use has enough bellows.

Now if I can find an 80mm that will for sure
cover 6 x 7. Dan

Loose Gravel · Jul 5, 2006

I printed MF this last weekend. I have several of the lenses mentioned here, but didn't like them because the f/numbers are too small or I didn't like counting off the half-stop clicks. I was only printing 8x10s, so I tried the El Nikkor 135mm. Nice. Brought the enlarger up to a reasonable height, the f/numbers are big (easy to read) and the clicks are whole stops. Perfect.

bill schwab · Jul 5, 2006

David Brown said:
I've even used a 105mm for 6x6, when not printing too big.

I've used a Schneider Componon-S 135mm f5.6 for over 25 years now for all my 8x8 inch prints (my usual size). The edge to edge crispness of the 135mm is hard to beat. It also gets the light source higher off the paper. I like having slightly longer exposure times allowing more burn/dodge time to build the print. If I go larger (rare) I use a Nikkor 75mm that gives good coverage.

Bill

GeorgesGiralt · Jul 6, 2006

Ole,
If I'm not mislead, the Anaret-S is a 5 lens design, the Anaret was a 4 lens setup.
My personal preferences are Nikon 105 mm and 80 mm. I also own a Computar 80 mm which is very very sharp.
Do not forget the Meopta's Meogon and, of course, Anaret-S lenses. They can be found for a song on *Bay and are really good value !
If you buy a 6 lenses design, of good make you can't go wrong unless the lens has been bumped or abused.

haris · Jul 6, 2006

dancqu said:
Now if I can find an 80mm that will for sure
cover 6 x 7. Dan

It will. I use 80mm for 6x7. I use Meopta's Magnifax 4 with colour head for VC papers. I use 80mm Rodagon or Componon-S with 6x7 mixing chamber for head of my enlarger or proper condenser if I use b/w head. I didn't noticed light faloff or sharpness problems using 80mm lens for 6x7 negative. For example, Componon-S line don't even have 90mm lens in offer, only 80mm (Apo Componon HS line has 90mm).

To make this long story short, you can use 80mm lens for 6x7 negative. Just be sure to use proper mixing chamber or condenser type for your enlrger head, for 6x7 negative size.

I also wasn't sure if 80mm will cover 6x7 when I started to work with 6x7. I got answers it will, and when tried myself, that was confirmed.

TimVermont · Jul 6, 2006

I second the 75mm Fujinon EX recommendation, it is an excellent optically and ideal for the limited column height of the Durst M600.

bnjlosh · Jul 6, 2006

thank-you

thanks for all the advice...I am currently scanning ebay for some deals

brad

Donald Qualls · Jul 6, 2006

Heresy follows: for 6x4.5 and 6x6, I'm now using an Anastar lens (still in Flash Kodamatic shutter, B, T, and 2-300 -- left open in T) from a Kodak Reflex II TLR. Four elements, four groups, coated, f/3.5-f/22, and click stops on the aperture. The prints look really good at 8x8 and cropped to 8x10, though I haven't gone much bigger than minimum crop for 8x10 yet. Price was right, too -- you can buy these cameras with sticky shutters, floppy viewing mirrors, or other failures for under $20. However -- PLEASE don't hack up a good camera that just needs a shutter cleaning; use it to make your images instead (excellent cameras, and though they're 620, they'll accept a trimmed 120 supply spool).

For 6x9 and larger, I use the same 135 mm Vivitar VHE (f/5.6-f/45, 6 element similar to Componon-S) that I use for 4x5, at least until I find a suitable 100-105 mm lens. *Killer* glass, and it came with my enlarger...

bnjlosh · Jul 6, 2006

Donald Qualls said:
Heresy follows: for 6x4.5 and 6x6, I'm now using an Anastar lens (still in Flash Kodamatic shutter, B, T, and 2-300 -- left open in T) from a Kodak Reflex II TLR. Four elements, four groups, coated, f/3.5-f/22, and click stops on the aperture. The prints look really good at 8x8 and cropped to 8x10, though I haven't gone much bigger than minimum crop for 8x10 yet. Price was right, too -- you can buy these cameras with sticky shutters, floppy viewing mirrors, or other failures for under $20. However -- PLEASE don't hack up a good camera that just needs a shutter cleaning; use it to make your images instead (excellent cameras, and though they're 620, they'll accept a trimmed 120 supply spool).

For 6x9 and larger, I use the same 135 mm Vivitar VHE (f/5.6-f/45, 6 element similar to Componon-S) that I use for 4x5, at least until I find a suitable 100-105 mm lens. *Killer* glass, and it came with my enlarger...

so, could I take my chinese seagull tlr that has damage to it and try this out??? hmm....

FrankB · Jul 6, 2006

Can anyone recommend any sites which give details of how many elements each make/model of enlarger lens has?

dancqu · Jul 6, 2006

FrankB said:
Can anyone recommend any sites which give
details of how many elements each make/model
of enlarger lens has?

You may also be interested in the magnification factor
for which the lens is optimised. IIRC, Rodenstock has
or had three series of enlarging lenses. Each series
is designed to work best at a certain ratio of
enlargement. Dan

ricksplace · Jul 6, 2006

Componons are hard to beat. I have an Ektar 75/4.5 that is every bit as sharp as my componon S 80mm. The Ektars come up infrequently on ebay for pretty cheap. IIRC, I think I paid $15 for the ektar. Apparently, the Ektar is a five element lens, as explained to me by someone on this site. Makes sense. I was wondering why what I thought was a four element lens made images as sharp as a six element componon. I use the Ektar for 6X7 too with good coverage at f11.

Donald Qualls · Jul 6, 2006

Re: enlarging through a TLR taking lens in shutter

bnjlosh said:
so, could I take my chinese seagull tlr that has damage to it and try this out??? hmm....

You could. IIRC, the shutter on those is buried in the front standard, like a Rolleiflex, so you'd have to do some disassembly to get the shutter and lens free, but once you get to it, the shutter is mounted to the moving standard with a standard retaining ring, I think. I did have to bore out a 25 mm lens board to fit the lens, since it's much smaller than the 39 mm "standard" enlarging lens mount, but fortunately I own a lathe and that was a trivial job, ten minutes setup and two minutes with a boring bar; would almost have been faster with a blank board to start from.

There could be concern with heat causing lubrication migration in the shutter, potentially requiring it to be cleaned and relubed before it is useful for timed exposures again, and if it doesn't have a T setting it would be inconvenient to have a cable release on it to lock it open in B. Some have claimed that enlarging duty could be harmful to cemented lens groups, also (the Anastar has no cemented groups), either due to the large amount of light flux or the heat, but the lens on my enlarger doesn't get anything like as warm as a camera lens would sitting in a car on a summer day -- and long term exposure to light doesn't seem to hurt lenses on cameras with focal plane shutters, where the whole lens sees light any time it's uncapped.

Another concern is that camera lenses aren't generally optimized for the close focus distances used in enlarging -- if your Seagull has the 4-element Tessar type lens, it's at its best beyond 15 feet or so. OTOH, since you already have it, all it costs to try it is some labor and possibly a lens board for your enlarger -- which last you'd need if you bought a 75-90 mm enlarging lens, also. A final issue with the Seagull is that if you have the triplet lens (found in the lower priced and older models), it has some light falloff on the negative (I had a 4-B for a while a few years ago, and often saw dark corners), and in enlarging this would make light corners, which are very distractin and would require corner burning every print; this is best countered by stopping down to f/8 or smaller (which will also reduce most of the aberrations that tend to make the image soft).

Bottom line: try it and see. If I didn't have the a Vivitar VHE 135/5.6 I'd probably be using a pre-1927 Tessar to enlarge my 4x5 negatives...

Best Recommendation for Medium Format printing lens

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