Using M42 mount Carl Zeiss 50mm/f2.8 as enlarger lens

darkosaric · Dec 20, 2009

Hi,

so I have been thinking is it making any sense - to use lens from camera as enlarger lens ?

With little trouble I can put M42 Carl Zeiss 50mm/f2.8 lens in mine meopta axomat. From enlarging lenses I have el nikkor 75mm f4, and 50mm meopta anaret f4.5 lens. Will I get better results with Carl Zeiss than with anaret? Did anyone done something like this?

thanks,

Ian Grant · Dec 20, 2009

No the Anaret's are excellent enlarger lenses and optimised for that use, so unless the 59mm lens is in poor condition the Tessar certainly won't be any better and is unlikely to be as good.

IAn

darkosaric · Dec 20, 2009

Thanks Ian. Anaret lens is new, so I will continue to use it, will not play with mounting the Tessar

Ian Grant · Dec 20, 2009

At least you have a Tessar It could have been a Domiplan - perhaps the worst volume f2.8 50mm lens made, and by a once eminent optical company

(I have a few of both M42 or Exacta)

Ian

Anscojohn · Dec 20, 2009

Ian Grant said:
At least you have a Tessar It could have been a Domiplan - perhaps the worst volume f2.8 50mm lens made, and by a once eminent optical company

(I have a few of both M42 or Exacta)

Ian

*******
Years ago I read a test report in a U.S. photo mag of the Domiplan. It began with, to the effect, "We usually try to answer the question ' How good is it?' "
"With this lens, we'll answer: 'How bad is it? ' "

As with any lens, stopped down a few stops improves things. At it's best, I think it was rated "fair" at one or two apertures. :rolleyes:

I once used the M42 lash-up when I had to make a blow up of a small part of a neg; put my East German Zeiss Flektogon 35 2.8 on the enlarger. It worked.

kozesluk · Dec 20, 2009

Anaret 4,5/50 is rather poor enlarging lens
Anaret-S are better (selected ones for export) but still not comparable to the Meopta's top-of-the-line lens - Meogon-S
sadly, most Meogon-S are still worse than EL-Nikkors 2.8/50 N and other "today" lens.

in my opinion it will be best to buy something better.

ic-racer · Dec 20, 2009

Certainly a different lens, but my Zeiss Planar 50mm 1.8 and 1.4 both have some barrel distortion that I suspect might make them not very good at enlarging. Now, the 60mm Makro Planar would work but enlarging lenses are so cheap these days. In the last week I picked up a 80mm Componon and a 210 Componon, both with the appropriate Durst mounting plates for $25.

darkosaric · Dec 21, 2009

Lukas_87 said:
Anaret 4,5/50 is rather poor enlarging lens
Anaret-S are better (selected ones for export) but still not comparable to the Meopta's top-of-the-line lens - Meogon-S
sadly, most Meogon-S are still worse than EL-Nikkors 2.8/50 N and other "today" lens.

in my opinion it will be best to buy something better.

I am using el nikkor 75/f4 for everyday use, but for prints larger than 20x30cm I am using anaret, for obvious reasons. I am searching for some el nikkor 50 or some rodagon, but I am in not rush, usually I make prints on 18x24 cm and 20x30 cm size

Ian Grant · Dec 21, 2009

Lukas_87 said:
Anaret-S are better (selected ones for export)

Exported Imports there's irony there particularly as they are made by Schneider and identical optically to the Comparons

Ian

kozesluk · Dec 21, 2009

Ian Grant said:
Exported Imports there's irony there particularly as they are made by Schneider and identical optically to the Comparons
Ian

... wow. have you got any source for this information at hand?

as the normal Anaret lenses are made in the Czech Republic and are pretty cheap there I have got about 10 of them (but thrown them to some beginners) and all the lens were pretty bad compared to 5.6/80 nikkor N (the only good lens I have at that time).
but it is important to point out that a friend of mine has one anaret 4.5/50 (not the -s version) and uses it all the time - one lens selected from a huge bunch (something about a 10 l bucket full of anarets) that performs better than his rodagon (well - I don't know, but he says so).

quality control (especially the cheaper photographic lenses suffered a lot from this) was never strong point of meopta's manufacture.

Ian Grant · Dec 21, 2009

Look at Silverprint's website, also read Barry Thornton's Enlarger lens tests in "The Edge of Darkness" the Anaret S is an exceptionally good lens. I'm sure quality may have been variable at times.

Interestingly I have a 1939 BJP Almanac with a double page advert for "Czechoslovakia's Predominating Optical Equipment", lenses, enlargers, binoculars, (open at the page right now), the book would have come out late 1938 but before Czech history took decided turn for the worse.

Ian

Trond · Dec 21, 2009

I used to use an Anaret 80mm 4.5 on my Meopta Opemus IIa, and got very good results from it. The tiny thing didn't look very impressive, but certainly performed well enough for me.

Ronald Moravec · Dec 25, 2009

Macro lenses make good enlarging lenses. Standard camera lenses not so good.

Janos · Jan 2, 2010

darkosaric said:
Hi,

so I have been thinking is it making any sense - to use lens from camera as enlarger lens ?

With little trouble I can put M42 Carl Zeiss 50mm/f2.8 lens in mine meopta axomat. From enlarging lenses I have el nikkor 75mm f4, and 50mm meopta anaret f4.5 lens. Will I get better results with Carl Zeiss than with anaret? Did anyone done something like this?

thanks,

Enlarging lenses are designed to give their best quality when used at close distances, so are sometimes good for macro bellows, etc.
Prime lenses have many more cemented groups of elements, so apart from having more aberrations by design, they are prone to separation from continuous enlarger lamp heat. would not be a problem with a cold cathode head.

Using M42 mount Carl Zeiss 50mm/f2.8 as enlarger lens

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