Darlot petzval question

**Jim Noel** · 3-Jan-2009, 09:59

I think you better throw it away. I will be happy to send you the address of my trash can.

Jim

**papageno** · 3-Jan-2009, 11:50

Your lens was originally used as a projection lens for an early 35mm movie projector.

Aaaah, so it is not a Magic Lantern lens. And not from XIX century.
I remember, that there was quite a lot of exactly the same looking lenses for sale on Ebay about a year ago. And they keep appearing from time to time. Certainly, they must have been made in decent quantities, not some sort of rarity.

I tried to make a portrait with that lens, and finally gave up because I was afraid, that the subject would not be able to recognize himself on a photograph. With some help from a subject, I attached with a duct tape Gasc et Charconnet petzval monster lens to the camera and made a beautiful picture with it. Although its construction looks like a petzval, it has completely different characteristic from Darlot, sharp, but with nice rendering and perfect bokeh.

Now I think, that I am going to try that Darlot once again for a portrait. But this time I will place the face (or eyes) exactly in the center of the frame, and crop unused portion later. I do not see the other way to do it right.

**papageno** · 3-Jan-2009, 12:00

Now I think, that I am going to try that Darlot once again for a portrait. But this time I will place the face (or eyes) exactly in the center of the frame, and crop unused portion later. I do not see the other way to do it right.

I do not know, why I did not think about using camera movements to do it without the need for any cropping.

**goamules** · 3-Jan-2009, 19:19

There are a couple of other things to consider. To me it looks like the myriad of magic lantern lenses Darlot made around the turn of the last century, not a 35mm, but a projector is a projector. I think it was Ole that mentioned in another post that some of these projector lenses were not color corrected, or were optimized for one color. A filter may increase your sharpness.

Also consider that with most makers the quality varied. Though the petzval is a simple design, some are slightly better than others, even by the same company. I bet Darlot didn't put the same effort towards quality into projector lenses. I've had 4-5 Darlots, and the sharpest was one that was actually made for photography. Unfortunately, I let it go!

**Dan Fromm** · 3-Jan-2009, 22:17

Originally Posted by Gene McCluney

Your lens was originally used as a projection lens for an early 35mm movie projector. <snip>

Interesting. Gene, why do you believe that?

I ask because the VM, which isn't always right, gives the very strong impression that by the time movies came in Darlot had gone over to making anastigmats.

**Gene McCluney** · 4-Jan-2009, 09:29

Originally Posted by Dan Fromm

Interesting. Gene, why do you believe that?

I ask because the VM, which isn't always right, gives the very strong impression that by the time movies came in Darlot had gone over to making anastigmats.

Because the Petaval is the almost universal "type" of lens used for earlier movie projectors because of extreme sharpness over the narrow field required and the speed of the lens, which could be faster than other designs of the period. It "is" possible that the lens is for a magic lantern (slide projector)...but the same design criteria holds. (Speed, sharpness in a narrow field)

As a Petzval comment in general, the early photographers did not use their Petzvals in such a way as to use the edges of the field of coverage. Modern photographers tend to use these lenses on larger-format film sizes which shows the swirly edges.