I have the instructions but didn't find them as helpful as I would have liked. A couple of things I have found with this lens are that I am unable to focus with accuracy at an apperture more open than 8.0. Soft focus and out of focus are not the same thing and you can get an effect with this lens of, for example, sharp eyes and glowing skin. I focus at 8.0 and then set the apperture at the setting I want to make the exposure. I do like the inserts, I have both and usually use the yellow insert instead of the red one. Most people I have talked to decided that they liked the effect of either of the inserts or no insert and settle down to using the lens that way most of the time. If you look at the lens from the front with the inserts mounted, you can see that they will have no effect after the lens is stopped down to the point that the opening in the apperture is significantly smaller than the opening in the center of the insert. Stopped down to f22 or so, this lens will produce sharp images with no soft focus effects. It takes a while to get the hang of this lens and to get the lighting the way you want it to produce an image you like. I got my lens from someone who had not really given it much of a chance and was disappointed with it. I really like the lens for portraits. It is incredibly flattering when you use a fairly open apperture and one of the discs with the right lighting. Lots of the minor skin imperfections that can be painfully obvious in a large format portrait just disappear.
Good luck,
Doug Webb