schneider apo digitar 72mm L vs apo digitar 90mm N + WRS vs WRS TS panels

[guphotography]

Hi guys,

I'm thinking about retrofit my lenses with cambo wrs panels, what's your opinion / experience with those two lenses please?

I don't think I can afford to convert both 72mm and 90mm, their focals lengths might be too close for 44x33 sensor, please share your input so I can make a decision.

My current lenses are 35 xl, 47xl and 55 ASD, a longer focal length should serve me well, and I shoot architecture, interior and some landscape with the setup.

My second question is regarding standard lens panels and tilt swing version. At what focal lengths onwards do you feel T/S would be beneficial? My feeling is that either 72mm or 90mm would be good to have tilt swing, not anything wider.

I'd love to hear your experiences, thanks in advance!

Cheers

 

[rdeloe]

I can't speak to the 72mm, but the Apo-Digitar 90/4.5 is a superb lens. The image circle is large enough to allow generous movements.

To your second question, most people seem to prefer having tilt capability with wider lenses. I use movements, including tilt, on all my lenses, from 24mm to 150mm. If you want it for a longer lens, the 90mm is certainly worthy.

 

[guphotography]

I can't speak to the 72mm, but the Apo-Digitar 90/4.5 is a superb lens. The image circle is large enough to allow generous movements.

To your second question, most people seem to prefer having tilt capability with wider lenses. I use movements, including tilt, on all my lenses, from 24mm to 150mm. If you want it for a longer lens, the 90mm is certainly worthy.

Thank you Rob.

Wouldn't wide lens give you plenty depth of field already to do away with the need for tilt?

 

[vjbelle]

The 72mm Schneider is an outstanding lens. I don't own the 90/4.5 so I can't speak to its qualities or lack of. With regards to tilt I agree with Rob in that all lenses can benefit from tilt/swing regardless of FL.

Victor B.

 

[rdeloe]

Thank you Rob.

Wouldn't wide lens give you plenty depth of field already to do away with the need for tilt?

My pleasure.

Millions of photographers are making photographs without tilt, so in that sense, yes, wide lenses seem to be able to provide enough depth of field for them. However, most of those millions are not using larger sensors. My phone camera doesn't need tilt and can shoot wide open all the time to produce plenty of depth of field because the sensor is minuscule compared to my 33mm x 44mm sensor.

I use tilt all the time even with my widest lens (24mm) because for a lot of what I do there's no other way. Here's one example. In this scene, I wanted everything in focus, from the first pixel of the foreground, to the top of the near tree trunk, and out to the leaves on the trees. At a focus distance of 0.5m and f/16, total depth of field was around 0.5 to 0.6m. The wind was blowing so there was lots of movement; that means focus stacking would not have worked well -- plus I don't like focus stacking. Tilt on this 24mm lens allowed me to get what I want. Nothing else would have.

Note that this is not an unusual scenario for me. I don't tend to shoot grand landscapes; I'm usually "in the weeds", where depth of field on 33mm x 44mm is very shallow to begin with -- which is why I put together a camera system that gives me tilt with every lens I'm carrying.

 

[Steve Hendrix]

Hi guys,

I'm thinking about retrofit my lenses with cambo wrs panels, what's your opinion / experience with those two lenses please?

I don't think I can afford to convert both 72mm and 90mm, their focals lengths might be too close for 44x33 sensor, please share your input so I can make a decision.

My current lenses are 35 xl, 47xl and 55 ASD, a longer focal length should serve me well, and I shoot architecture, interior and some landscape with the setup.

My second question is regarding standard lens panels and tilt swing version. At what focal lengths onwards do you feel T/S would be beneficial? My feeling is that either 72mm or 90mm would be good to have tilt swing, not anything wider.

I'd love to hear your experiences, thanks in advance!

Cheers

They're both great, and underrated, IMO. I shoot the 72mm more than the 90mm, so I'm a bit biased, but every time I shoot the 72mm, it impresses the heck out of me. However, I would lean toward thinking they are close enough that your decision should probably be based on which focal length is the best fit.


Steve Hendrix/CI

 

[Shashin]

I would say correcting wide lenses for perspective with software is harder with short focal length lenses than long ones. I feel being able to control for perspective in camera is more important with short lenses. Software perspective control is pretty powerful. Long lenses are pretty easy to correct as you tend not to have a great deal of convergence to deal with.

Normally, when I chose focal lengths, I start with factors of two, either doubling or halving the focal length on my normal lens--I always have a normal. I think the 90mm would go better with your current lenses giving you a more equal spread visually. The 72mm would be kind of close to the 55mm.

Naturally, the best solution would be to buy both.

 

[guphotography]

I would say correcting wide lenses for perspective with software is harder with short focal length lenses than long ones. I feel being able to control for perspective in camera is more important with short lenses. Software perspective control is pretty powerful. Long lenses are pretty easy to correct as you tend not to have a great deal of convergence to deal with.

Normally, when I chose focal lengths, I start with factors of two, either doubling or halving the focal length on my normal lens--I always have a normal. I think the 90mm would go better with your current lenses giving you a more equal spread visually. The 72mm would be kind of close to the 55mm.

Naturally, the best solution would be to buy both.

I wish I could!

The perspective will be taken care with tech cam, I was more interested in finding out the need for tilt and swing.

 

[Kipoz]

Hello, I come back to this post which talks about the SK 72mm, You are talking about the SK 72mm XL or the digitar 72mm L, I would like to have information on these two lenses, for an IQ3 100 back on the one hand and for film on the other hand. Is it possible to share your opinions and experiences? Thanks

 

[Paul Spinnler]

Why do you need tilt in long lenses in architecture?

I would assume you shoot buildings straight on most of the time?

Tilt is most useful with wide angles to get foreground and background sharp in landscape photography.

You could use swing for parallel swinging into a perspective shot of a fleeing view of building facades, but IMHO tilt swing is not really needed for your area?

If you shoot scenes head on from above and want background and foreground sharp yes, but this is not often the case with longer focal lengths?

Maybe a cityscape from a mountain overlooking a city? But then you’d probably have sth wider than 70mm on crop?

I’d say not necessary if your focus are buildings… landscape and macro other topic ...

 

[vjbelle]

Hello, I come back to this post which talks about the SK 72mm, You are talking about the SK 72mm XL or the digitar 72mm L, I would like to have information on these two lenses, for an IQ3 100 back on the one hand and for film on the other hand. Is it possible to share your opinions and experiences? Thanks

I am not aware of 'any' 72XL. It is not listed in any of the extensive literature I have for Schneider lenses. The 72 L is the lens I own and am always impressed with.

Victor B.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

The 72 XL is one of the best 4x5 archi wide angles!

 

[daz7]

I love my 72mm more than any other Digitar that I've tried.
72L is an outstanding lens.

 

[daz7]

72L digital and the super angulon 72XL are completely different lenses but both stellar for what they were designed for: 72xl for film and 72L (75mm in fact) for digital
72L has virtually zero distortion, nice IC of over 100mm, high resolution, impressive MTF that puts the 60XL to shame and CA lowest of all digitars I think.
What I like the most in my 72L is the perfect balance between sharpness, contrast and the great angle of view.
That's my favourite non-macro digital lens.

I have never used the 72XL for film but there are generally only good reviews of that lens and some photographers use it for digital and stitching and film alike. Gursky comes to mind for example.
So, yes, both lenses are great.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

Yes, that's what I meant. The 72XL is an analogue wide-angle classic. It is great for analogue, but in digital it starts to smear because of the design and lower performance of the optics once you shift. I have all my analogue lenses in Arca so I can play with the F metric with film and digital and when you use the 72XL, because the optics were built to a different tolerance and resolution target, is unfortunately not as good as soon you shift beyond 20mm.

On film its awesome.

The 72 Digitar – what people say – is a great lens, but it has been superceded in all regards by the 60 XL, which was one of the last lenses ever developed by SK. A true masterpiece.

43 XL and 60 XL are all you need for architectural photography in MFD. Big fan of the 60XL.

 

[vjbelle]

I should have checked my large format Schneider files as the 72Xl does exist but for film. Certainly not in the same league as the 72L for digital which is what we are mostly concerned with. The 72L is an outstanding lens somewhat overshadowed by the 60XL but should't be. Much smaller and lighter and can be shot wide open with excellent results which cannot be obtained with the 60XL until stopped down to at least f9.

A lens I would never sell.....

Victor B.

 

[Paul Spinnler]

Agree – its a great lens. Hell, all SK lenses are great; BTW 4x5 Australian also tested the 35XL and was able to extract significantly more rise than 7mm on BSI.

 

[Kipoz]

Ok, thank you for all these answers, so for you, if I have to choose between the two 72mm, for use on my IQ3 100 and also for 6X7 film, which would be the best option?

 

[4x5Australian]

Ok, thank you for all these answers, so for you, if I have to choose between the two 72mm, for use on my IQ3 100 and also for 6X7 film, which would be the best option?

The Super-Angulon 5.6/72 XL (film lens) and Apo-Digitar 5.6/72 L (digital lens) have entirely different designs and serve different purposes.

The Super-Angulon 5.6/72 XL (film lens) has a wide-angle Super-Angulon-type design, a field of view of 115 degrees and an image circle of 229mm. It provides huge shifts on 4x5.

The Apo-Digitar 5.6/72 L (digital lens) has an Apo-Symmar-type design, a field of view of 62 degrees and an image circle of 90mm. It provides excellent resolution on digital sensors.

The diagonal of the 56x70mm film frame is 89.6mm. Accordingly, the Apo-Digitar 5.6/72 L (digital lens) just barely covers the 6x7 film frame.

If you want to use camera movements, neither lens will fulfill both your purposes adequately.

Buy both!

Rod

 

[daz7]

The Digitar 72L is far much better on digital sensors than a Super Angulon 72XL.
72L will easily cover 6x7 film and give you much better results than 72XL.
You should only consider a 72xl for shooting large format films like 4x5 and maybe even 5x7 or if for some reason you need an image circle of around 25cm in diameter.
If you would like to have a separate lens for medium format film then 75mm Angulons and Grandagons make a bit more sense.