Ross Xpress Survey EMI f6.3 lens 20"

[jimgalli]

This is a post WWII Photogrammetry "mapping" and reconnaissance survey lens. Lovely in it's purposeful "an airplane is carrying me I can be heavy as stones" build. Throws a gorgeous image onto the glass.

My curiosity is in the initials E. M. I. and please don't tell me electro magnetic interference. No one had thought of that on a post wwii lens and it makes no sense.

Just hoping someone out there remembers or has come across it before. The lens is mentioned in REPORT OF COMMISSION 1 - PHOTOGRAPHY TO THE SIXTH INTERNATIOAL PHOTOGRAMMETRY CONGRESS AND EXHIBITION
which is on line in PDF form and dates to 1948. This lens would have been used for high altitude work on 7X8.5" format aerial cameras, iow spy cameras.

 

[Dan Fromm]

Extra Marginal Illumination.

The outer elements are larger than usual for the design to reduce mechanical vignetting.

 

[jimgalli]

Thank you! You're worth your weight in good wine. I wondered why it was so enormous. Too big to leave the studio . . . Unless of course I could buy a C-47 somewhere cheap.