Topcon lens quality

By the way, I am from Hong Kong, a place where exotic Topcon products are very rare.

I have a promotional leaflet from Beseler reprinting the November 1969 Camera:35 reviews of the Topcor lenses. They reviewed the 25/3.5, 35/2.8, 100/2.8, 135/3.5, 200/5.6, and 300/2.8 lenses. As a whole, they found them excellent, saying that you wouldn't need to look to other vendors to fill "quality holes" in the line.

 

That said, the 200/5.6 was clearly the weak link in the chain. The others all hit 80 lines/mm at one or more apertures in the center, some of them even hit 80 lines/mm at the edge at the optimal aperture. The 35/2.8 got particular praise, hitting 80 lines/mm wide open, and going up from there. The 100/2.8 also starts at 80 lines/mm wide open, but doesn't get any better. The 25/3.5 has "corner" problems. The 135/3.5 is very good, but not exceptional.

In the pre Nikon F era Exakta was often used for macro work; surgery images; copying slides; medical images of eyes. Since much of this medical equipment was big bucks the Topcon say Super D and others was used often for eye photography; since the the lens mount is the same as Exakta. A local medical doctor for eyes still was using a Topcon rig in the late 1990's.

With the super-D the lens quality was good enough that the US Navy bought them and affited even specialty lenses to them too.

I converted some topcon RE lenses to Pentax K by replacing the bayonet. I have to say they

are beautiful, sharp and good contrast. The 35mm has a very interesting bokeh. I can't wait

for the spring to finally kick in that I can try them out more.

 

Here the link to the conversions and sample pictures:

http://topconconversion.blogspot.com/

<p>I wonder if anybody knows if the UV topcor lenses are corrected into the UV range? (If so this could be useful if you are into Ultraviolet photography).<br>

Regards Peter</p>

<p>The UV Topcors are so named because they included the functionality of a UV filter in the lens, so you didn't need to add one if shooting with film with excess UV sensivity. So they are deliberately opaque to UV light.</p>