Kiev 88 wide angle ?

[k._rivkin]

7335.1

 

Dear All,

 

Thank you very much in advance for your help in this one, I'm really

in distress, I've also posted this question in Kiev Report:

 

I have Kiev 88 (working great, good year, no problems _at all_ _ever_)

with 45mm Mir, which is somewhat bad - you can see a bubble in the

coating. I just finished printing and realized to my great

missatisfaction that it seems that it does not have as much of a DOF

as seems to be advertised in the DOF table on the lens. Basically it

focuses fine, but much more seems to fell from focus than it should've

been. Also it's a little bit wide for my GND and polarizer so it's not

like I really need exactly 45, I would do fine with 50mm.

 

Contrast is also does not seem to be that great.

 

I'm shooting _only_ landscapes, I don't need non-wide angle lenses, so

I was wondering what would be the best solution for me:

 

a. To buy another 45mm thinking "I'll be lucky this time". The problem

that the new ones are 200+$ and is there a guarantee/good chanse to

get something good ?

b. Spend 300+$ on 55mm PCS, but do I really need shift, I'm not an

architecture guy...

c. Change to Bronica with 50mm PS (40mm will not fit my polarizer) by

selling my Kiev. But is Bronica that better ? Is it better ? I mean

I've seen the great testing job at kievaholic, but is it really at

f8-f11 ?

d. Keep what I have, stop down to f16 , focus to infinity and pray the

foreground will be ok.

e. Buy myself a Hassy/50mm.

g. There are no Schneiders and so on for 88, but are there some good

wide angle lenses ? I mean my Kiev is really _fantastically_ reliable,

I would not want to throw it away.

 

Thank you !

 

Sincerely yours,

 

K.Rivkin

[lacy_dillard]

My first thought was that if you are using a Mir 45mm (which really is of bad quality .. I have one myself) that you must have the Pentacon 6 mount on your Kiev 88. Have you thought about a Carl Zeizz Jena Flektogon 50/4 lens? There's also a 65/2.8. The CZJ lenses are supposed to be of very good quality, and they sell for very little money. You could pick up the Flektogon 50mm for between $150 and $250 easily.

[k._rivkin]

Thank you, but I have Kiev 88, not cm - 45mm comes in both mounts.

 

In this case, I don't really think buying Kiev 88cm (remembering the great pains I went through with choosing my 88) is an option for me...

[lacy_dillard]

Terribly sorry! I was thinking of the Arsat 3.5/45 .. which I own for my Kiev 60. Not sure what the answer is here .. The lenses for Bronica run almost twice that of those for the Kiev, but it's probably a more reliable system. The shift lens at $400 is about the same price as a wide-angle would cost for a Bronica right? So that $400 could get you a shift, which may come in handy, and allow you to keep the Kiev. Sorry I can't help much. Good luck!

[h._p.]

I think you may be mis-stating your problem and leaving yourself open to further disappointment.<p>

 

Depth of field is purely a function of the focal length of the lens together with the circle of confusion chosen. The circle of confusion in a measure of the diameter of a 'point' that appears as a point to the viewer. For a more detailed description <a href="http://www.northnet.org/jimbullard/CoC.htm"> <b>click here</b> </a> Thus, the depth of field of any two lenses of the same focal length will be the same whether they're made by Kiev or by Zeiss.<p>

 

Bear in mind, though, that there is only one true plane of focus (that will be curved to a greater or lesser degree) and that depth of field is a measure of how closely the out of focus image mimics the plane of sharpness. In other words, what will vary is the way in which the out of focus areas are rendered - is this what you're complaining about?<p>

 

You won't get greater depth of field from another make of lens, what you may get is gradation that appeals to you more. Speaking very generally, the more you pay, the better the corrections applied to the lens and the more pleasingly (perhaps!) the out of focus areas will be rendered.<p>

 

Incidentally, bubbles in optical glass are neither here nor there and, indeed, for many years the presence of a bubble or two in a lens was taken as an indicator of high quality.

[q.g._de_bakker]

<i>"Depth of field is purely a function of the focal length of the lens together with the circle of confusion chosen."</i><br><br>That obviously is not correct. Or rather not complete.<br><br>Should DOF only depend on focal length and COC, how is it that a 50 mm lens set to infinity shows more DOF than the same lens used close-up, say to achieve a 2:1 magnification? ;-)<br><br>The best way to look at DOF is to say it depends on magnification, COC, and aperture. And nothing else.<br>Focal length is, together with focussing distance, part of magnification, so it's covered.<br><br>Contrary to the "purely a function of" statement, this simple three-factor view is indeed correct (for all intents and purposes).<br>Yet it is already complicated enough. For instance: magnification is more than focal length and focussing distance, more than just the relation between size of subject and size of image on film. For DOF it also matters how large the print is. But DOF-scales do not take that into account very well; they only assume that a 6x8" print is viewed from "normal" viewing distance, by a person with "normal" eyesight.<br><br>Anyway... ;-)

[shambrick007]

"Terribly sorry! I was thinking of the Arsat 3.5/45 .. which I own for my Kiev 60."<p> Which also comes in the original Kiev 88 mount.

[h._p.]

"That obviously is not correct. Or rather not complete."

 

You're quite right but I was massively simplifying the issue for Mr Rivkin's benefit. That was why I included the link to Jim Bullard's excellent description.

[q.g._de_bakker]

Harvey,<br><br>One thing left unmentioned (mea culpa) about DOF is that even when magnification (and focal length), COC and aperture are the same, DOF can appear (and in a visual medium "appear to" = "is") to be different.<br>That occurs when comparing two lenses of different quality. DOF is nothing but "acceptable unsharpness". What is acceptable depends a lot on what you are comparing it too.<br>For instance, even though the "slightly out of focus" parts may be equally blurry, the difference between "in focus" and "slightly out of focus" bits produced by a high resolution lens will be much more apparant than it is using a low resolution lens. DOF will appear/be less in the high resolution lens, compared to DIF in the lesser lens.<br>And the way out of focus bits are rendered (that thingy called "bokeh" rears its head once again) may differ too, such that they look far worse (or better) in the images produced by one lens compared to those produced by another.<br>So K. Rivkin's "scenario" in which DOF appears to differ between lenses of same focal length, used in the same way, isn't that far fetched.<br>Whether a better lens will show more DOF... that i doubt very much. If anything, it will be less. ;-)

[h._p.]

"And the way out of focus bits are rendered (that thingy called "bokeh" rears its head once again) may differ too"

 

It's actually worse than you suggest because what is acceptable is highly subjective. However, the area which is within the depth of field is the same for different lenses given that they are all capable of resolving the same circle of confusion. As you so rightly point out, this is confused (sorry!) by those lenses which cannot resolve the required circle even at the plain of sharp focus. Zoom lenses were, at one time, good examples of this syndrome.

 

The problem is, after a while, you end up counting the number of angels dancing on the head of your pin instead of taking pictures. For myself, I just use the lens markings and decide if the picture's worth printing once I've got a negative to look at.

[h._p.]

"plain of sharp focus"

 

That should, of course, have been 'plane of sharp focus'.

[k._rivkin]

Thank you very much for your responces - now, after somet thinking I understand that I've started asking the questions before figuring out whether it's DOF, film plane or corner sharpness problems.