Idle curiosity about "exotic" medium format telephoto lenses

[Chuck1]

Since this is about idle curiosity,
Anyone ever repurpose the zoom/helicoid from a mamiya rb or rz 100-200mm, I've never touched one but I'm tempted

 

[lobitar]

What I know about the Kowa 250 and 500 you need the Kowa six M with mirror lock up. The standard Six has a lot of mirror vibration. The Super 66 has better damping and the mirror lockup was removed.

I always wanted the M, but newer saw it around.

 

[MMfoto]

Since this is about idle curiosity,
Anyone ever repurpose the zoom/helicoid from a mamiya rb or rz 100-200mm, I've never touched one but I'm tempted

Very interesting idea. Just looked at photos of this lens and I can see the promise. 77mm filter size. There are many optics that could fit with some adaptation.

 

[flavio81]

All are toys when you consider the 800mm f4.0 (four!) from Pentax,
which would give an angle of view and depth of field more or less similar than a 400mm f1.7 lens on full frame 35mm.

 

[RezaLoghme]

All are toys when you consider the 800mm f4.0 (four!) from Pentax,
which would give an angle of view and depth of field more or less similar than a 400mm f1.7 lens on full frame 35mm.

View attachment 411653

The photo shows that even large lenses can be portable.

 

[DREW WILEY]

I think they used those during our American Civil War too, but mounted on wheels and stuffed with a cannon ball and powder. Nearly as loud as a Pentax 6x7 mirror slap, at least.

 

[flavio81]

The photo shows that even large lenses can be portable.

All equipment is portable as long as you only need to move it a couple of steps.

 

[Dan Fromm]

Hmm. More idle curiosity.

No one has mentioned the 12"/4.0 TTH Telephoto that flew on AGI F.134 and F.139 and Vinten F.95 cameras. These beasts shot 6x6 on long rolls of 70 (?) mm film. According to the VM it just covers 4x5 (not medium format, and not what it was made for). I have one that works very well on a 2x3 Speed Graphic.

Has anyone else here used one?

 

[Paul Howell]

I had not thought of a barrel lens that would work on 2X3 Speed. The L.A times had a modified 4X5 Speed with a box that acted like a double bellows for a very long lens, like a 70 inches, might have been longer that was used for sports, shooting football from the press box. Depth of field must very shallow. For a 2X3 maybe a 24 inch barrel lens?

 

[mshchem]

Hmm. More idle curiosity.

No one has mentioned the 12"/4.0 TTH Telephoto that flew on AGI F.134 and F.139 and Vinten F.95 cameras. These beasts shot 6x6 on long rolls of 70 (?) mm film. According to the VM it just covers 4x5 (not medium format, and not what it was made for). I have one that works very well on a 2x3 Speed Graphic.

Has anyone else here used one?

I have no idea what you are talking about.

 

[Dan Fromm]

I had not thought of a barrel lens that would work on 2X3 Speed. The L.A times had a modified 4X5 Speed with a box that acted like a double bellows for a very long lens, like a 70 inches, might have been longer that was used for sports, shooting football from the press box. Depth of field must very shallow. For a 2X3 maybe a 24 inch barrel lens?

I've sort of done that.

Version 1, brackets to hold two 2x3 Graphics in alignment and a coupler that fit between them and kept the dark in. It worked with lenses up to 480 mm. A pain to set up, not hard to use and did what I needed.

Version 2, a 2x3 Graflex RB Ser. B. that hung on the back of a Cambo SC1 (2x3er). The longest lens I have for it is a 900 ApoSaphir. Failure, internal baffles in the Graflex vignetted seriously with lenses longer than ~250 mm.

 

[Dan Fromm]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

Translations:

TTH = Taylor, Taylor & Hobson, still in operation as Cooke.

The cameras are all aerial cameras. British, used by air forces all over the world.

The lens in question is sharp, contrasty and has quite a short back focus (distance from rear of barrel to film plane when focused at infinity). I think it is the longest lens that fits comfortably on a 2x3 Speed. Should be adaptable to other cameras with focal plane shutters.

 

[mshchem]

Translations:

TTH = Taylor, Taylor & Hobson, still in operation as Cooke.

The cameras are all aerial cameras. British, used by air forces all over the world.

The lens in question is sharp, contrasty and has quite a short back focus (distance from rear of barrel to film plane when focused at infinity). I think it is the longest lens that fits comfortably on a 2x3 Speed. Should be adaptable to other cameras with focal plane shutters.

Thanks! I had a Graflex B slr. I had to enlarge the opening on a 12 exposure roll holder to take a 2x3 insert. Great camera. I always have wanted a 5x7 Graflex, what wonderful stuff. Aero Ektar oh yeah.
God Save Good King Charles!

 

[Craig]

I think the Xenar's are 4 element Tessar configuration. A Tessar is adequate, but not an outstanding performer. Tessar lenses have three weaknesses. One is that they exhibit a great deal of spherical aberration, and the image plane is not as flat as it is with Gauss lenses. The last is the angle of view ( image circle) is limited and the max apertures are typically limited to F4.5-5.6.

 

[Sirius Glass]

My longest MF lens is the Hasselblad C 500mm which I sometime use the Hasselblad 3XE extender. That is longest I have found for my MF camera.

 

[Paul Howell]

There was story in Shutterbug in the 90s about a middle east oil Sheik who had Hasselblad custom make a 1000mm lens for birding. There was photo of it on a body, could tell which body.

 

[reddesert]

I think the Xenar's are 4 element Tessar configuration. A Tessar is adequate, but not an outstanding performer. Tessar lenses have three weaknesses. One is that they exhibit a great deal of spherical aberration, and the image plane is not as flat as it is with Gauss lenses. The last is the angle of view ( image circle) is limited and the max apertures are typically limited to F4.5-5.6.

Generally a Schneider Xenar is a Tessar-type design. But a Tele-Xenar is not.

Neither Tessar or double-Gauss designs are telephotos, in the sense of "focal length is longer than flange-focal distance", where the rear group has some diverging power. The other issues with Tessars vs double-Gauss lenses (aberrations, field flatness, coverage, speed) are all cases where double-Gauss lenses can be superior, but tessar types can be perfectly good especially in medium or large format. Also, I don't think it is accurate to say tessar types have a great deal of spherical aberration, unless mis-designed. But anyway, it's not typically relevant to telephoto lenses. Some telephotos appear to have design heritage from the Sonnar design, though.

 

[Craig]

Also, I don't think it is accurate to say tessar types have a great deal of spherical aberration, unless mis-designed.

It was a quote directly from a Nikon lens designer, so I have no reason to disbelieve him. I suspect it means relative to other types of lens formulas.

 

[MMfoto]

I think the Xenar's are 4 element Tessar configuration. A Tessar is adequate, but not an outstanding performer. Tessar lenses have three weaknesses. One is that they exhibit a great deal of spherical aberration, and the image plane is not as flat as it is with Gauss lenses. The last is the angle of view ( image circle) is limited and the max apertures are typically limited to F4.5-5.6.

This particular 300mm Tele-Xenar is a 6/6 configuration.