Rodenstock Apo-Macro-Sironar 120mm f/5.6 vs. 180mm

[David Solow]

Hi All,

Background:
I'm wanting to shoot people's eyes. In fact, really just one eye, as closely cropped around the iris as possible and would like to enlarge these images as large as possible. Ideally as large as 40" x 40".

I understand that both the 120mm and 180mm are capable of 2:1 magnification. If the eye is approximately 1.5" square, that would give me a 3" x 3" image on the film at 2:1.


Questions:
1- How much bellows extension do you need for each lens at 2:1. I have a Sinar P2 and plan to get a Linhof MT3000.

2- Does image quality suffer as one goes from 1:1 to a greater magnification of 2:1?

Thanks,
David

[Bob Salomon]

120 has a FFL of 235.6 so 2:1 is 942mm of extension (37.1")
180mm is 356.5 so 2:1 is 1426mm of extension. (56.1")

[aduncanson]

I get 475mm for the 120 and 717mm for the 180.

2:1 implies 3x FL + (FFL-FL).

Bob seems to have used 4x FFL

[Henry Ambrose]

Think about lighting.
That's gonna be tough.

Might try it first with whatever lens you have now.

[Bob Salomon]

I get 475mm for the 120 and 717mm for the 180.

2:1 implies 3x FL + (FFL-FL).

Bob seems to have used 4x FFL

Thanks,

I should answer this type of question later in the day.

[sully75]

awesome Nick Nixon picture of his eye was up at the MFA in Boston and maybe still is. There's skin in the picture but mostly I think it's just his eye. The guy has his sh1t down. I believe it's an 8x10 contact print.

[Oren Grad]

awesome Nick Nixon picture of his eye was up at the MFA in Boston and maybe still is. There's skin in the picture but mostly I think it's just his eye. The guy has his sh1t down. I believe it's an 8x10 contact print.

The show closed the other day, after a run of many months.

I think it was an 11x14. The eye was nowhere near filling the picture, but even so it was a tour de force. I couldn't look at it without wondering how he pulled it off - or how many sheets he needed to pull it off.

[Joshua Dunn]

Keep in mind that 717mm is almost 29 inches and 475mm is 19 inches. Thats a lot of bellows extension. I have a Nikkor AM ED 120mm Macro and one of the reasons I like the lens is the shorter bellows draw it requires. I shoot on a Sinar so it's always easy to add more bellows but does make shooting a little more complicated when you are working around a camera rig that is almost 3 feet long.

Don't forget to calculate for bellows extension.

-Joshua

[David Solow]

Thanks, everyone for all the great information.

David

[sully75]

The show closed the other day, after a run of many months.

I think it was an 11x14. The eye was nowhere near filling the picture, but even so it was a tour de force. I couldn't look at it without wondering how he pulled it off - or how many sheets he needed to pull it off.

From what I remember, it looked like there was one softbox, from above. How he nailed the focus I don't know. Maybe just a ton of light so he could stop down enough to get a bit more DOF?