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Which 90mm f/4.5 or f/5.6?

henningw

Member
I'd agree with almost all of that, except that I sold my f8 Nikkor when I finally found a Sinar-branded 09 SA MC. Many chalk it up to urban legend that the Sinar and Linhof (Technika) branded versions of the Schnieder and Rodenstock lens line were superior performers due to being hand-selected at the factory. In my case, I owned three such lenses and they were all my top performers of all time in their respective focal ranges -- 65, 75 and 90 SA MC's.
That's true; the Sinar and Linhof branded lenses are all high performers of their line. At least those companies made sure the lenses were mounted correctly. I still have a couple of old Linhof lenses that are very good.

With respect to the Nikkor, although it's an f/8 lens at f/11 it's quite useable, and it's image circle at f/11 and its ultimate image circle at f/22 is considerably larger than that of the other f/8 lenses. It's also a newer and more complex design than that of the other f/8 lenses and that also is evident in the performance.
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
With respect to the Nikkor, although it's an f/8 lens at f/11 it's quite useable, and it's image circle at f/11 and its ultimate image circle at f/22 is considerably larger than that of the other f/8 lenses. It's also a newer and more complex design than that of the other f/8 lenses and that also is evident in the performance.
Agreed, it is a stellar optic, especially when you look at the used prices!
 

carstenw

Active member
The f/4.5's from Rodenstock and Nikon are really not that good. The performance at f/4.5 is far enough off the optimum that even focussing and composing can lead to misinformation. They really have to be used at f/16 thru 32.
Henning, could you confirm that you have experience with the Rodenstock Grandagon-N 90mm f/4.5? Everything I have read about this lens elsewhere says that it is usable even wide open, that the falloff is good and so on. This is the first post I have seen which questioned its sharpness.
 

Stuart Richardson

Active member
Carsten, I don't want this to sound flippant, but have you considered a flashlight? I mention this totally seriously, because I had this exact problem of how to focus when its dark -- I do a lot of night photography, and I find that a simple flashlight will allow you to focus properly when the light is too dim, even if your lenses are slow. This of course does not work at infinity, but for something inside 20-30m, a good flashlight will give you enough light to work with. Since your concern with the lens speed is not so much for shooting, but rather for composing and focusing, I think this could actually work for you. Especially if your main subject is going to be gravestones which are only 2-3 meters away I would guess.
 

carstenw

Active member
Interesting idea. I will throw a flashlight into my bag, but I must admit that I would see that as a last-ditch procedure, not a routine measure. I would still prefer a fast enough lens to do most of my work without.
 

carstenw

Active member
Jack Flesher said:
I think you really want for your gravestone project is an older Schneider Xenar, like the 135 f3.8 or maybe 105 f3.5 or the rarer f2.8 "Xenotar" if you can find one.
Is the 135 f/3.8 preferable to other 135 Xenars, like the 4.5?
 

carstenw

Active member
It is *very* hard to find good information on these lenses. I found a single comment that the 135/4.5 was not spectacular, but without knowing the author of that comment, it is hard to know what to read into that. I found a couple of comments that the 3.8 made nice portraits but had no room for movements.

Anyway, I picked up that 135/3.8 Xenar from Canada you pointed out, Jack. It was cheap, and I am curious. In the end, if I don't like it, I will sell it. I guess I am about to find out how a decent classic Tessar renders :)
 

routlaw

Member
Anyway, I picked up that 135/3.8 Xenar from Canada you pointed out, Jack. It was cheap, and I am curious. In the end, if I don't like it, I will sell it. I guess I am about to find out how a decent classic Tessar renders :)
Carsten if this one does not work out, I can absolutely guarantee the Rodenstock Sironar S 135 will be superb. Everyone I know who has this lens including myself swear by it. Its probably the sharpest LF lens I have.

Hope this helps.

Rob
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Cardten:

I had a 135/3.8 before and while I would agree it wasn't stellar, especially when compared to a modern plasmat like the Rodie 135 APO S (one of the sharpest LF lenses i ever owned), but you could shoot at f3.8 with the Xenar! (Which is very difficult to do with a Rodie or Schneider or Nikkor or Fuji plasmat :D) Moreover, it renders a much creamier bokeh than the plasmats. I think you'll like it for your project.

One other thing about buying older, used LF lenses. For whatever reason, old gen LF lenses tend to grow fungus, so make sure you check all used purchases out very carefully. I recommend shining a good light through both ends and inspecting each surface carefully.
 

bensonga

Well-known member
I couldn't find a Nikkor f8 when I was looking for a 90mm......so I ended up with a fairly new Schneider SA f8. Is it worth keeping or should I continue looking for a Nikkor 90/8?

Gary
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
I couldn't find a Nikkor f8 when I was looking for a 90mm......so I ended up with a fairly new Schneider SA f8. Is it worth keeping or should I continue looking for a Nikkor 90/8?

Gary
Does it make sharp images across the negative at f16? If so, then you're not likely to see a lot of difference in the Nikkor ;)
 

carstenw

Active member
I had a 135/3.8 before and while I would agree it wasn't stellar, especially when compared to a modern plasmat like the Rodie 135 APO S (one of the sharpest LF lenses i ever owned), but you could shoot at f3.8 with the Xenar! (Which is very difficult to do with a Rodie or Schneider or Nikkor or Fuji plasmat :D) Moreover, it renders a much creamier bokeh than the plasmats. I think you'll like it for your project.
Yes, it could come handy for certain subjects, like the stone angels that I often find. FWIW, I heard only disparaging comments about the 135/4.5, not the 135/3.8, which seems well-liked. I am not expecting it to be as sharp as a modern lens, don't worry.

The particular copy that I am getting has some ills, like slight haze somewhere, and slower shutter speeds which may not be accurate, but if I do end up liking it, I will send it for a CLA. Does anyone have a recommendation for a good LF service place in Europe/Germany? Has anyone used Batchvarov & Thiel?
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Careful on haze -- haze can = fungus, especially if it's "spotty" or "in one area only." Slow speeds in older shutters that have sat unused for lengthy periods are common and a good CLA will spiff them right back up.
 

carstenw

Active member
Hmm. I suppose I will do a CLA then regardless... I have read other users' accounts of cleaning up fungus with bleach, so there is at least some hope for a clean lens after a CLA?
 

bensonga

Well-known member
Does it make sharp images across the negative at f16? If so, then you're not likely to see a lot of difference in the Nikkor ;)
I guess what I meant to or should have asked is this: are the Nikkor f8 and Schneider SA f8 lenses of the same optical type (Plasmats?), so their performance (assuming good copies) should be roughly similar? Or is there something special about the design of the Nikkor 90 f8? There were a few comments here suggesting it was the best of the f8 90s.

Gary
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
I guess what I meant to or should have asked is this: are the Nikkor f8 and Schneider SA f8 lenses of the same optical type (Plasmats?), so their performance (assuming good copies) should be roughly similar? Or is there something special about the design of the Nikkor 90 f8? There were a few comments here suggesting it was the best of the f8 90s.

Gary
Yes, yes and no :D. Bottom line is that there are specific tradeoffs in lens design. As you remove distortions, you impart aberrations and falloff and as you balance the design for absolute resolving power, you lose total contrast. So here, Nikon, Schneider, Fuji and Rodenstock all took slightly different stances on what they balance to. Nikkor leans to high contrast where Schneider is on teh opposite side leaning to absolute resolution.

Nikkor LF lenses arguably have the highest contrast. High contrast is often mistaken for superior resolution in an image because you can distinguish the edges better. However, in reality, the Schnider lenses I tested on my Air force resolution target with the Betterlight scanning back showed that the Schneiders out-resolved almost everything else. Rodenstock generally falls next after Nikkor in favoring contrast, but changed the bias on their APO S lenses toward resolution -- more in a minute*. Fuji is sort of next, or may be even lower contrast than most Schneiders depending on specific lens.

*With the Rodie APO S design they really pulled the stops out and figured out a way to maintain almost as high a contrast high contrast and get excellent resolution. But then Schneider figured it out pretty quickly too after that and released their newer APO L designs. At the end of the day, you'd be hard-pressed to distinguish a Rodie APO S shot from a Schnieder APO L shot, though IMO there remains a slight bit of smoothness advantage to the Schneider APO L and a bit more contrast in the Rodie APO S, but we are really splitting hairs at 100% pixel view when compared side-by-side and you'll never ever ever see these subtleties in a print of any size...


If I understood correctly, the interesting thing about the Nikon is the larger image circle?
Finally, IC specs vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, so you need to be careful when comparing, and generally the Germans tend to be less forgiving than the Japanese. Almost all LF glass *ILLUMINATES* well beyond its stated IC, but at some point resolution has fallen off to a less than acceptable level. And this will vary from sample to sample of the same lens, so manufacturers pick a mean and use that as the spec. In the case of Rodenstock, this might be 30LPMM resolution, where with Nikon it may b 20LPMM -- note that I do not know the precise values, this is just an example. The other item is actual manufacturing and QC tolerances, and these probably vary between manufacturers too. ("Bad" lenses are sold out the back door and get a 3rd party name stamped on them or sent back to the technicians to get re-benched and adjusted to come within spec.)

So we are talking about the same basic lens design with subtle biases between manufacturers that make a difference in how the lenses render -- but that difference remains pretty subtle, so at the end of the day, ANY of these modern plasmats if not damaged by some user in the chain of custody will all render quite well.

I would say the *only* reason to consider a switch is to get a uniform rendering of color, contrast and edge characteristics across your focal range -- and that is the precise reason I ended up with mostly Schneiders. But I could have been just as happy with a selection of Rodies. Nikkors in general I found too harsh in contrast, but like the color (my preference only). I found Fujis in general a bit to variable in color rendering, but liked the other characteristics. Rodies were cooler than Schneiders and a bit harsher on contrast, so why I ultimately ended up with Schneiders. But YMMV based on which criteria strike you...

Hope that helps!

BTW, here is an online chart that lists manufacturer specs for many 4x5 LF lenses: http://www.largeformatphotography.info/lenses/LF4x5in.html

Here is a broader link to other LF format choices: http://www.largeformatphotography.info/lenses/

Cheers,
 
S

SCHWARZZEIT

Guest
Thanks for that very informative post, Jack!

When you tested those lenses for absolute resolving power with the Betterlight back were you able to see that the lenses actually limited the resolution?

AFAIK these scanning backs have a rather large pixel pitch that only allows resolving up to 70 lp/mm at most which is easily within reach of most modern LF lenses at the IC center.

-Dominique
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Thanks for that very informative post, Jack!

When you tested those lenses for absolute resolving power with the Betterlight back were you able to see that the lenses actually limited the resolution?

AFAIK these scanning backs have a rather large pixel pitch that only allows resolving up to 70 lp/mm at most which is easily within reach of most modern LF lenses at the IC center.

-Dominique
Actually yes. Note that I am measuring line-PAIRS per mm or LPmm, which is half the measurement of lines PER mm or L/mm. The BL I had at maximum res (9000 interpolated x 12000 actual pixels) could discern around 56 LPmm on my test target. In some cases --- the Rodie APO S and Schneider APO L, I had a few lenses at a few apertures outresolve (or at least match) the camera -- notably the Schneider 120 APO L, 150 APO L and 210 APO W; in Rodie, the 135 APO S and 150 APO S did as well. My Sinar badged 90 SA MC and Linhof badged 65 SA MC both made 52, as did one of the Schneider 110 SS XL's I tested. However in most cases, you could see the lenses fall off before the sensor, usually around 50/52 LPMM for a great lens, 45/47 LPmm for a good lens, and 40/42 or so for most normal 4x5 lenses. Most of the older lenses only managed mid through high 30's, and the worst I tested managed a 26 or 28 -- but that was an old turn of the 20th century Tessar. But keep in mind, for a 16x20 print, all you really need is about 25 LPMM on a 4x5 neg for as sharp an image as you can see with your naked eye on that print...
 

henningw

Member
If I understood correctly, the interesting thing about the Nikon is the larger image circle?
Yes, that is correct. The lens construction of the Nikkor is basically different than that of the other f/8 lenses. As I mentioned previously, the Nikkor uses basically the same formula as all the manufacturers use for their faster f/4.5 and f/5.6 lenses, but kept the aperture and size down. It is also a slightly better lens than at f/11 than most of the faster lenses.

The other manufacturers used a simpler formula for their f/8 lenses, and that resulted in a smaller image circle.

Nikon and Fuji have at times issued claims for image circles which were, to put it gently, optimistic. This is particularly true for Nikon's 'M' lenses and Fuji's 'A' lenses. However, in the case of the 90/8 the claims are true and the image circle is the same as that of the 90/4.5 Grandagon and Schneider 90/5.6SA. I've owned and used all three extensively.

Henning
 
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