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View Full Version : How to put a barrel lens in a shutter



angusparker
15-Feb-2017, 21:34
Just wrote up a blog post on "How to put a barrel lens in a shutter" (http://www.angusparkerphoto.com/blog/2017/2/how-to-put-a-barrel-lens-in-a-shutter). Any constructive criticism would be much appreciated so I can improve it with the knowledge accumulated in the forum. Hadn't seen anything like this in one place so I thought I'd write up what I've learned to date on the subject.

Dan Fromm
16-Feb-2017, 06:02
Gus, it is a start. I like your comments on the economics.

You missed the way I've hung a number of lenses in front of a shutter. They go into cup-shaped adapters that screw into the front of a standard shutter. Price of the adapter from SKGrimes depends on size. If sharing an adapter between several lenses isn't possible the economics are usually terrible.

About mounting a lens on a board and attaching a shutter in front of the lens. I did this with a Compound #5 and a 900/10 Apo-Saphir. The shutter isn't strong enough to support the lens and anyway if the shutter were in front of the lens the shutter controls would be inaccessible. Big fat lenses need special treatment.

Packards and the various Sinar shutters aren't the only behind-the-lens shutters around. There's a variety of roller blind shutters -- Thornton-Pickard is probably the best-known brand -- and there are also Mentor shutters. Last summer I saw a 16x20 camera with a shutter taken from, IIRC, a Mentor Studio. Its owner remarked that demand for shutters for ULF cameras was driving up the price of Mentor Studios. Surgery on a Speed Graphic is also possible.

And because you didn't go far into front-mounting you didn't mention vignetting. This can be a problem, should always be thought about.

See my lens diary http://www.galerie-photo.com/telechargement/dan-fromm-6x9-lenses-v2-2011-03-29.pdf and my account of my failed Baby Bertha http://www.galerie-photo.com/baby-bertha-6x9-en.html for better explanations and discussion. See especially what I had done to make a short lens usable.

Steven Tribe
16-Feb-2017, 08:03
Option 2

Most medium and smaller post WW2 lens cells were.......... In addition, many earlier lens cells were designed to fit the first generation of compur and similar shutters.

Apart from the t-p mentioned in the last post, there is a very large range of later front mounted European leaf shutters with limited speed variation and a development of the t-p in metal finish which is specifically desgned for front mounting with curtain adjustment.

The Sinar-copal can be installed behind any large format front standard, if the bellows is larger than the dimensions of the shutter. The bellows can be unscrewed/unglued and fixed to a plate. This plate can be connected to the front standard, or to a Copal-Sinar which is attached to the front standard.

angusparker
16-Feb-2017, 13:59
This is great info. I'd try and llearn more about the cups.
Best, Angus


Gus, it is a start. I like your comments on the economics.

You missed the way I've hung a number of lenses in front of a shutter. They go into cup-shaped adapters that screw into the front of a standard shutter. Price of the adapter from SKGrimes depends on size. If sharing an adapter between several lenses isn't possible the economics are usually terrible.

About mounting a lens on a board and attaching a shutter in front of the lens. I did this with a Compound #5 and a 900/10 Apo-Saphir. The shutter isn't strong enough to support the lens and anyway if the shutter were in front of the lens the shutter controls would be inaccessible. Big fat lenses need special treatment.

Packards and the various Sinar shutters aren't the only behind-the-lens shutters around. There's a variety of roller blind shutters -- Thornton-Pickard is probably the best-known brand -- and there are also Mentor shutters. Last summer I saw a 16x20 camera with a shutter taken from, IIRC, a Mentor Studio. Its owner remarked that demand for shutters for ULF cameras was driving up the price of Mentor Studios. Surgery on a Speed Graphic is also possible.

And because you didn't go far into front-mounting you didn't mention vignetting. This can be a problem, should always be thought about.

See my lens diary http://www.galerie-photo.com/telechargement/dan-fromm-6x9-lenses-v2-2011-03-29.pdf and my account of my failed Baby Bertha http://www.galerie-photo.com/baby-bertha-6x9-en.html for better explanations and discussion. See especially what I had done to make a short lens usable.

angusparker
16-Feb-2017, 14:00
Great, I'll make that clearer. Best, Angus


Option 2

Most medium and smaller post WW2 lens cells were.......... In addition, many earlier lens cells were designed to fit the first generation of compur and similar shutters.

Apart from the t-p mentioned in the last post, there is a very large range of later front mounted European leaf shutters with limited speed variation and a development of the t-p in metal finish which is specifically desgned for front mounting with curtain adjustment.

The Sinar-copal can be installed behind any large format front standard, if the bellows is larger than the dimensions of the shutter. The bellows can be unscrewed/unglued and fixed to a plate. This plate can be connected to the front standard, or to a Copal-Sinar which is attached to the front standard.

jp
16-Feb-2017, 16:56
I mostly use barrel lenses. My usual choice is to use a speed graphic so I can have a focal plane shutter. A graflex slr is also an option, but really limits the focal lengths and lens options due to less focusing range and some mirror clearance issues.

Flash sync is also a consideration for some users. In those cases, the sinar shutter is a good option and some packards have that too.

Luis-F-S
16-Feb-2017, 17:16
I send them to SKG and they come back beautifully mounted!!

angusparker
16-Feb-2017, 18:17
So true!

I send them to SKG and they come back beautifully mounted!!

Fr. Mark
16-Feb-2017, 21:21
Thornton Picard shutter? I don't think any were ever made big enough for lenses bigger than about 300mm f8. However, it might be possible to make one big enough using blackout cloth for draperies. If you aren't familiar with them, but have ever accidentally had a roller blind get away and rapidly go all the way to the top of a window, you know more/less how they work. In the camera application, the roller blind is opaque and has a hole in it allows light thru as it goes by. By changing the spring tension these had some variability in shutter speeds, but I doubt they were more than 1/30th. I could also imagine how with conductive paint and some phosphor bronze wipers you could even have flash synch.

Steven Tribe
17-Feb-2017, 03:59
The classic T-P design involved a thin, removable, lens board in front which was fixed to a particular lens. Later, the same curtain system with speeds of up to about 1/90 sec was mounted in a more secure box design with adjustable mounts for a range of lens hood diameters. Superb system for heavy Petzvals and big aplanats. A lot of these are of no-name manufacture.

Photos show the same front shutter on the first 3 Petzvals I fished out this morning!

External hood diameters are from 9-11.5 cm.

angusparker
17-Feb-2017, 10:37
How very clever but simple.


The classic T-P design involved a thin, removable, lens board in front which was fixed to a particular lens. Later, the same curtain system with speeds of up to about 1/90 sec was mounted in a more secure box design with adjustable mounts for a range of lens hood diameters. Superb system for heavy Petzvals and big aplanats. A lot of these are of no-name manufacture.

Photos show the same front shutter on the first 3 Petzvals I fished out this morning!

External hood diameters are from 9-11.5 cm.

IanG
17-Feb-2017, 10:50
This is what I use, I have one or two, well maybe 50 :D Large TP and similar shutters are less common and you usually need to fully restore them. Steven has shown a front mounting TP shutter others were Between lens, meaning between lens and lens board, they have inter changeable front plates so can be used with different lenses. Often the front mounted versions have damaged/split cases because they've later been used Between lens, their cases aren't strong enough. They were sold by B&J with their name on them in the US, often with the less common Aluminium casing

There's also the Norca shutters, LUC and similar, and also TP and other Focal plane shutters, I have a few of them.

Ian

pound
17-Feb-2017, 18:07
thanks for sharing, I was looking for exactly the same kind of information as I have a few barrel lens and other 2 old shutters that does not work anymore.

I also found this Youtube video on how someone mount a lens on a Speed Graphic focal plane shutter
https://youtu.be/pAjyYixKXm8

Fr. Mark
17-Feb-2017, 18:59
Thinking more about the TP shutters, if you were making or massively rebuilding a group of them, I imagine you could get faster speeds by making the slit in the curtain smaller/narrower. This is how my OM-1 works, we'll sort of, it has two curtains and variable speeds but the idea is similar, for the faster shutter speeds the second curtain filled more and more closely the first one. This can make for strange distortion of moving objects (cars with oval tires).

I've also wondered if you couldn't build a spring or rubber band powered linear shutter with interchangeable Souls plastic or metal sheets for the curtain.

Finally, aren't Neutral Density filters sometimes helpful when shutters are limited?

IanG
18-Feb-2017, 04:49
Thinking more about the TP shutters, if you were making or massively rebuilding a group of them, I imagine you could get faster speeds by making the slit in the curtain smaller/narrower. This is how my OM-1 works, we'll sort of, it has two curtains and variable speeds but the idea is similar, for the faster shutter speeds the second curtain filled more and more closely the first one. This can make for strange distortion of moving objects (cars with oval tires).

That's how some of the "High Speed" TP roller blind shutter work, I bought a box of Graflex and other parts from Frnce (Paris) off this forum a few years ago and have a High Speed TP half plate shutter, It's not practical because you can't focus with it's narrow slit so I will change the curtain so I get 1/10 to 1/90 rather than the 1/150 to 1/1000 and will adjust to fit one of my half plate cameras. However a high speed TP shutter to fit the front of a lens is practical and I've made a couple, they were once sold commercially.

The cloth shutters in modern SLRs are essentially miniature versions of the Unit shutters used in Thornton Pickard Ruby Reflex cameras which have two separate curtains each with their own rollers and you adjust the slit width. Earlier versions used two curtains joined by adjustable strings to set the slit width, these are the least practical and few seem to have survived - I have one to restore.

Ian