Lenses that swirl

guissimo · Feb 28, 2009

Lenses that swirl

I saw two shots taken with a Summitar 50mm f2 lens that show a swirly background (though not as extreme as some LF lenses).
Are there other 35mm format lenses that swirl (obviously, under certain circumstances) and that can be found at a reasonable price. To me a reasonable price will be less than $200 U.S?

I'm particularly interested in an LTM lens. If no such lenses exist, are there SLR lenses that have this property?
I'm aware there are LF lenses that swirl, but at the moment I don't have any interest in hauling around my 4x5 Cambo to take an occasional swirly shot.

These are the Summitar shots I'm talking about:

Flickr user:tetsuya miyoshi

Flickr user:Marc-A

Thanks.

mudman · Feb 28, 2009

The summar F2 does this as well
not the best example but

guissimo · Mar 1, 2009

mudman,

Thanks for the info.
It seems it might take a while to find one of those lenses in decent condition.
I found some nice examples taken with the summar that show the effect I want.

Flickr user:CarloBambino

Flickr user:Nobu35

mferrarini · Mar 1, 2009

Whoa there! Dizzying effects. Good thing I was sitting down when I viewed these examples.

Ole · Mar 1, 2009

Lenses don't come much more "inexpensive" than the FED 50mm f:3.5: (there was a url link here which no longer exists)

It swirls - and more bright points in the background would have shown it a lot more clearly.

manfromh · Mar 1, 2009

not ltm, but m42, but a Helios-44 (58mm f2) has some swirl. They are very very cheap also.
EDIT: they come in m39 also, but with a longer working distance so you cant use it on a RF.

guissimo · Mar 2, 2009

@mferrarini,
Yeah, the effect can be a bit overwhelming. I do like the effect for an occasional portrait or flower shot.

@Ole,
Thanks for the info. I'll look for examples with the background as you suggested to see how swirlies compare to the summar & summarit.

@manfromh,
Nice shot. Swirl and low contrast. That's exactly what I want. I'll check that lens too. Thanks for the info.

guissimo · Mar 3, 2009

Some nice examples showing the swirl effect.

Helios-44 58/2
Flicker user: terrosa

Flicker user:william eleven

kavandje · Mar 3, 2009

I've found the Voigtländer Nokton Classic 35mm f/1.4 for Leica M-mount has pretty good swirl going on at wide aperture.

It gives me the grooves.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kavandje/3322804937/

matti · Mar 3, 2009

So, what is swirl in optical terms? Astigmatism? Coma?
/matti

Prest_400 · Mar 3, 2009

matti said:
So, what is swirl in optical terms? Astigmatism? Coma?
/matti

Also never heard of it. I came to this topic being curious, just What the heck is swirl?
It look like coma for me...

guissimo · Mar 3, 2009

I don't know the exact details of what causes the swirl. From what I've read, it seems vignetting is responsible for the swirlies.

This guy explains the effect:
Scroll down to "Shape of the blur patch"

http://toothwalker.org/optics/bokeh.html

There is an old thread about the effect at the LF forum.
That Elusive Swirly Bokeh

-gm

Ole · Mar 3, 2009

Sometimes it's astigmatism, sometimes it's coma, sometimes it's a combination of many factirs - like the Petzvals with a combination of field curvature and mechanical vignetting (in addition to coma, sperical aberration and chromatic aberration and a healthy dose of astigmatism).

matti · Mar 3, 2009

Now you sound like my optician when she tells me it is going to be expensive!

/matti

Chazzy · Mar 3, 2009

kavandje said:
I've found the Voigtländer Nokton Classic 35mm f/1.4 for Leica M-mount has pretty good swirl going on at wide aperture.

It gives me the grooves.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/kavandje/3322804937/

Thanks for the warning: that's the last thing I want in a lens.

walter23 · Mar 3, 2009

Chazzy said:
Thanks for the warning: that's the last thing I want in a lens.

Yeah, that swirly stuff can be really distracting and in a lot of cases its nothing but detrimental to the image. I have to admit I have a petzval, but it only cost me $15 so I feel okay about it

I also have a Helios 44M, but it cost me about $25 and I've seen that in a lot of cases you can avoid the swirl by carefully chosing your background and composition.

elekm · Mar 5, 2009

One lens design that will give you this is the Tessar type (4 elements in three groups).

That includes the Tessar, Xenar and a number of other lenses. This effect is most pronounced when shooting wide open to about f/5.6 at close to medium distances (generally a maximum of 15 feet or so), as I recall.

guissimo · Mar 5, 2009

elekm said:
One lens design that will give you this is the Tessar type (4 elements in three groups).

O.K, so a Tessar type LTM lens would be the Elmar 50mm F3.5 and its copies like the FED 50mm f:3.5 suggested earlier.

elekm, thanks for the info.

By the way, I just found a Summitar at a decent price, so I'll try to get one of the cheaper lenses mentioned on this thread to compare the swirlies. I'll keep the one that has the most pronounced effect. Hopefully, it would be the Fed

Thanks all for your suggestions.

Lenses that swirl

guissimo

mudman

guissimo

mferrarini

Ole

Moderator

manfromh

Attachments

guissimo

guissimo

kavandje

matti

Prest_400

guissimo

Ole

Moderator

matti

Chazzy

walter23

elekm

guissimo

Lenses that swirl

Moderator

Attachments

Moderator

Privacy & Transparency

Privacy & Transparency