magnifications beyond 1:1 for macro work with medium format

[bobgeldart]

does anyone have any suggestions as to how I can obtain quality

magnifications beyond lifesize with medium format cameras. I believe

that Rollei made an adaptor for their cameras that allowed the

Schneider M-Componon lenses to be used (I use a 28mm M-Componon macro

lens on a Linhof with a 6x9 back but it is very slow to operate but

at least the lens is made for magnifications in the 12:1 to 1:12

region). Does anyone have any experience of using enlarging lenses on

bellows for this purpose? any recomendations gratefully recieved.

 

NB. I have both Canon and Nikon 35 mm macro/micro systems and yes I

would prefer to use medium format if possible. If its possible to get

good magnification on large format why not medium format?

[paul roark]

I'm not sure if it's relevant to your situation, but I use my 90 mm Apo-Rodagon enlarging lens on my Rollei SL66. It does an excellent job, but I haven't really done any critical work at greater than 1:1. I'd guess that reversing the lens would help. I think that the design magnification of the optic is rather important. (Rollei offered special lenses for the SL66 for the real critical, scientific work.) I've heard that the enlarger lens route might be less than optimal because those lenses are designed for fairly wide open shooting (the Apo-Rodagon appears to be sharpest at f 5.6), and in macro you may want to stop down more to get some depth of field. However, for my uses, the Apo-Rodagon and SL66 has been the best outfit I've used (beat my 4 by 5).

 

Paul Roark http://www.silcom.com/~proark/photos.html

[douglas_cummings]

Remember you can reverse a lens (say your nikon 50mm) as an excellent diopter onto your medium format prime (say a 150mm) while retaining auto diaphragm function: magnification is prime / diopter here, 3:1.

Experiment, vignetting can happen but a tube can help. This is where a tilt AUTO lens would really shine, but none exists save the Rollei SL 66$$

[danny burk www.dannyburk.]

Hi Bob, I have a Contax 645 with 120 macro (which is a terrific lens) and bought the bellows recently for greater than 1:1 work. So far I've only gone up to 2:1, with wonderful results, but it will go to around 3.5:1. The bellows is quite a piece of work, and offers full movements including tilt, shift, etc, virtually converting the 645 into a miniature view camera for close work. (Too bad one can't focus to infinity while using the bellows!) The only drawback is that the bellows is outrageously priced, but after getting it, I'm glad I did.

[kornelius_j._fleischer]

There is a perfect solution for the task: Zeiss Luminar lenses. They were made to bridge the gap between life size and microscopic magnification (which is considered to begin at 20x and going up from there). Their optical design is optimized for this kind of magnifications.

 

Luminar lenses are small, approximately the size of the cork in a wine bottle, less than 1 inch in diameter. This gives a lot of freedom when illuminating the small objects in front of the lens. Normal photo lenses whith their relatively large diameter barrels get almost always in the way of your lighting in larger than lifesize work.

I have two (out of 5: 12,5, 25, 40, 63, 100 mm) Lumimar lenses (the 25 mm and the 63 mm). I use them with that abovementioned Rollei adapter with built-in central shutter plus Rollei extension rings. Also, I have a Hasselblad lens barrel with built-in central shutter to be used with any 500 series Hasselblad camera (this lens barrel can be purchased for a few hundred DM as spare part from the Zeiss service department) and a custom made adapter ring to connect the microscope lens thread of the Luminar lenses to the thread in this Hasselblad/Zeiss lens barrel. Otto Hahnemann at the Zeiss camera lens division did all this for me. You may contact him via the Zeiss website www.zeiss.de/photo.

 

The photographic results of these specialized optical tools are very rewarding, to put it mildly. Actually, they blow everything else away that has been taken using other equipment. If you want to get more information about Luminar lenses from other sources, try Ernst Wildi´s book "The Hasselblad Manual". Ernst has been a very experienced user of Luminar lenses for decades.

 

There is only one sad thing about Luminar lenses: they went out of production years ago. And before that, they were carried by the Zeiss microscope division, not the camera lens division.

 

Maybe there is another sad thing: Doing larger than lifesize photographic work is so much more demanding in terms of photographer´s technique, convincing results are so much harder to achieve, that our put-a-wunderplastic-zoom-lens on your auto-everything-wunder-slr photo society may not want take this challenge. OTOH: Striking visuals wait to be explored in this field of larger-than-lifesize. And there is not much competition to be expected. Luminar lenses are limited in quantity and availability, but can still be found on the used market. One dealer who almost always has some Luminar lenses is Foto Huppert, Contax specialist, Cronenberger Str. 332 a, D-42349 Wuppertal, Germany. His phone no.: +49-202-401199.

[struan_gray]

As an inveterate cheapskate I have played with jury-rigged solutions

with my Kowa (for which there is a tilting bellows but I have never

met, or even heard of anyone who owns one). I found that reversing a

35 mm format lens in front of a MF short tele always vignettes, but

reversing the Kowa's 55 mm on the 150 worked well enough.

 

Simply reversing the shorter lenses on their own also works, and with

a short extension tube gives up to 5:1 magnification in fixed steps.

The retrofocus design of MF wide angle gives you a bit more working

distance than you get reversing the same focal length from the 35 mm

format, but things are still a bit tight at higher magnifications.

Any competent machinist should be able to make a reversing ring from

scratch or adapt an extension tube.

 

Novoflex make a generic bellows wide enough for MF use, with body and

lens adaptors for several camera brands, including 35 mm. With this

you can experiment with mixing lenses from disparate camera systems.

At high magnifications 35 mm lenses cover larger formats prefectly

well, and you could use your Canon and Nikon lenses on 6x6, although

image quality is something that you'll find easier to measure than

predict.

[julian oliver bell, photog]

I use a reversed f5.6 60mm Componon enlarging lens on an old shutter, mounted on my 4x5 Tachihara or the 6x9-7-6 Graphic Century. I'm happy with what I get, see http://www.webstar.nl/~job/rosepage.html

[bobgeldart]

thanks for the answers, think i will make an adaptor to fit my 28mm macro lens on the front of an extension tube which will raise the questions:-

 

which medium format cameras have mirrors which are accuratly positioned. i heard rumors that the mirror in rb67 cameras can be as much as 2mm (3/32") out of line.

 

does film flatness become even more of an issue with macro work.

 

would it be more beneficial to mount my medium format cameras on the back of my large format equipment rather than make an adaptor to fit my large format macro lens to the front of my medium format camera.

 

i know it seems a lot of work for little gain given the 6x9 back/linhof/schneider system works so well, but i now have so much work that i do not have time to use a non slr based rig.

 

many thanks

 

bob g.

[john_hicks___]

I've used an enlarging lens successfully.

 

A single wrap of paper tape around the 39mm threads on an enlarging lens makes it a press-fit into a #1 shutter; for safety's sake, the Schneider adaptor ring for this is a worthwhile purchase.

 

I put an 80 Componon-S in shutter on the front end of my 4x5, a rollfilm back on the other end and voila, medium format at greater than 1:1 with good results.

 

But it's rather cumbersome...

 

Tips:

 

The effective aperture is much smaller than the marked aperture so use camera movements as possible so that you can work at the largest aperture you can, just enough to meet DOF requirements. And don't forget the bellows factor.

 

It's lots easier with back focusing; the position of the lens determines the repro ratio and the back is moved for focusing. If you have only front focusing you end up sliding the whole rig back and forth etc.

[john_hicks___]

> do not have time to use a non slr based rig.

 

Assuming you don't have a camera, my first choice would be an enlarging lens or macro lens on a Rollei SL-66.

 

I've also successfully used an enlarging lens installed into a body cap on an RB-67, but without a shutter it was a major pain to have to turn out the lights, pull the darkslide, pop the flash and then reverse the process for each shot. Worked fine though.

[thomas_diekwisch]

I am using a number of macro accessories on my Rolleiflex SL66E, all of them with great success. First of all there is the Rollei-Retrostellung (reverse mount) which is a lot of fun and allows even for semiautomated diaphragm with reverse extension ring and double cable release. Even without the cable release, the Retrostellung is a lot of fun to use. The following lenses might be recommended: the 120mm S-Planar (best image quality), the 80mm Planar, and the 50mm Distagon. A great advantage of the Distagon is that it easily provides 3:1 or more without accessories.

 

Another way to go are M39 enlarging lenses (Rollei even has an adapter for those). I am using an 80mm APO-Rodagon with great success. For macro photography, it is no problem that these lenses are corrected at wide apertures since you anyway don't want to close the diaphragm too much in order to avoid loss of sharpness due to refraction at small openings. Also, film flatness is less of a problem in high magnification macrophotography.

 

I agree with Kornelius that the Luminar lenses are superb and virtually without comparison. I have the 63mm Zeiss Luminar and the 12.5mm and 25mm Leitz Photar. A word of caution: the 12.5mm Photar is quite difficult to work with because of the narrow depth of field and the high magnification. Both the 63mm Luminar and the 25mm Photar are outstanding however. Luminars are also frequently available via ebay. Your 28mm M-Componon is in the same range.

 

Compared to 4x5, I do prefer medium format for macrophotography. Relatively, there is more depth of field in medium format for the same magnification/f-stop. Also, the reflex viewfinder of the medium format camera gives greater control, even though there is some vignetting due to the mirror. Using the mirror lock-up function of a medium format reflex is easier for me than changing 4x5 matte screen and film holder. At high magnifications, electronic flash helps against camera shake and is TTL controlled, both in the Rolleiflex SL66E and 6008i. Determining the correct exposure for 4x5 high magnification pics is feasible via light meter attachments but less than convenient. Because there is less bellows extension in medium format you need less external light or are less likely be dealing with the Schwarzschild effect and discolored color pictures.

 

So, lots of pros for medium format and high magnification macro photography.