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View Full Version : Post some Cooke PS 945 Portraits



Dave Wooten
8-Aug-2010, 07:36
It could be that this lens is elusive, so top shelf that is cannot be found or does not exist in Apugville? Are there any comparison portraits of the unique qualities of this lens and the legion of available vintage "softies". Just lookin around can t find much. Examples are probably right under my nose and I can' t find them. :confused: :)

BradS
8-Aug-2010, 08:32
There were some examples posted a while ago (maybe as much as a couple of years now....time flies!). I do not remember if it was here or on APUG...nor, do I remember who it was that posted...but I do remember the photos. Lovely.

Is the lens even available anymore?

eddie
8-Aug-2010, 08:37
Is the lens even available anymore?

yup. one more run i heard. i was planning on buying one then i blew my wad on a different lens....

ljsegil
8-Aug-2010, 09:18
Darr has some lovely work with the 945 on her website (or did a while back anyway).
Larry

Frank Petronio
8-Aug-2010, 09:29
Poke around Clive's site, he is the man responsible for it and a very fine photographer. If you can afford one, buy from him, he is a good man.

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/purchase%20PS945/index.html

Examples -- by Clive -- note the lack of flare and smooth transitions from out-of-focus to in-focus to out-of-focus

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/ckeprtrts/marioprtrt.jpg

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/ckeprtrts/bissy.jpg

Diane Maher
8-Aug-2010, 09:32
There are some examples on the Cooke website. I've only tried mine a couple of times on the landscape. I'm not sure if I've done very well yet. I'm still learning.

http://www.cookeoptics.com/cooke.nsf/products/largeformat.html

You can also scroll down to the bottom of that page for several other examples.

Diane

Dave Wooten
8-Aug-2010, 09:49
Thanks Diane and Frank. There doesn't seem to be a wealth of outstanding portraits that I have found..maybe there is a learning curve with this lens, sort of like playing the oboe, for quite a while it could be mistaken for a bagpipe in distress. I am interested in the lens, and if it truly is a class apart should be worth the investment, Cooke cine products are certainly ahead of the game. Thanks.

Frank Petronio
8-Aug-2010, 10:15
I don't think the people using them care about posting. I know that if you include tech info with your photos or on your website it leads to a stream of nuisance emails from geeks wanting to know about your "XYZ lens". The first couple are OK but when you get several a week and they expect you to reply in a considered fashion, it becomes a PITA.

Suffice to say that the portraits I've seen have been convincing. Not that I am going to sell my eggs for it or anything, but if I had an extra $3500....

Jim Galli
8-Aug-2010, 15:49
I've never had one to play with. All I can afford are the legion of available vintage "softies". So no comparisons.

I agree, there's not much out there to look at.

Steve M Hostetter
8-Aug-2010, 15:57
I don't see 3300. for a 5x7 lens anyway

Dave Wooten
8-Aug-2010, 16:58
Poke around Clive's site, he is the man responsible for it and a very fine photographer. If you can afford one, buy from him, he is a good man.

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/purchase%20PS945/index.html

Examples -- by Clive -- note the lack of flare and smooth transitions from out-of-focus to in-focus to out-of-focus

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/ckeprtrts/marioprtrt.jpg

http://www.cliveruss.com/cooke/cookeps945/ckeprtrts/bissy.jpg

The second portrait, the lady, is not done with a Cook but another lens at 1.2.

What I am having a hard time finding is Portraits-full face/ head and shoulders with the Cook. In studio the background is often painted or muslin drape or clear white etc., bokeh is nice of course, but how the lens puts that "glow" and smoothes the facial contour is what we are looking for here....Hurrell penciled it in.

Frank Petronio
8-Aug-2010, 17:21
Well Hell's Bells, just buy the 50/1.2 and save yourself a bundle!

George Kara
8-Aug-2010, 17:32
It is my very favorite LF lens. Here are a couple and I will rustle up some more. These are a couple of my daughter I found on my local drive. Not the best shots but a start.

George Kara
8-Aug-2010, 17:33
Oh I forgot black and white was pola instant and color was fuji fp 100 (or whatever its called - I forget right now.

Dave Wooten
8-Aug-2010, 21:04
Well Hell's Bells, just buy the 50/1.2 and save yourself a bundle!


Well Frank, you are right, and that is the point. I've read the literature now I need a modicum of convincing. I think some portraits will soon come out of the closet. Images like the one of Clive's (and a nice image it is) of the gentleman standing by the desk with the fine smooth out of focus areas would certainly not be enough for me to sell my old BMW bike to get a new lens....but of course a series of portraits displaying the fine qualities that have been attributed to the lens formula, setting it apart, in a class by itself, and I'd be thinking a geezer like me has no business getting back on that bike.

Frank Petronio
8-Aug-2010, 23:00
Haha well they all kind of look similar, from a 35mm w 50/1.2 (Noctilux, etc.) to the 110/2 Zeiss on the Hasselblad to a 150/2.8 Xenotar on 4x5... if you only looked at online resolution then you might not tell them apart.

Isn't a big factor pride of ownership and bragging rights? I mean shooting portraits with a 85/1.4 on a DSLR is pretty darn effective.

I'd still love that Cooke. No other modern lens maker is making anything close.

eddie
9-Aug-2010, 02:28
they copied the P&S and made it better, coated it, made it faster and put it in a modern shutter.

i bet it is awesome....i am saving my pennies. i had a look though one at the jamboree but never got around to shooting with it.

the way o see it is the price will never go down. buy it. try it. and if you do not like it sell it.

when they stop making them the price will jump $1000 i bet.

eddie

Petzval Paul
9-Aug-2010, 15:59
Eddie, you know how I feel about this lens...

How exactly did they make it better? Did they have the elements hand-ground as P&S did? How is it faster as both are f/4.5? It has coatings, but the value of them on a soft focus lens is questionable. Maybe, if you like to shoot in color, that could be a help - maybe not, depending on what you are after. Sure, a modern shutter is a big plus if one likes to shoot on film (shutters, of course, are of no use to me).

What I would really like to see is a side-by-side comparison of the Cooke with the P&S. For that matter, with the other copies (Eidoscope, Nicola Perscheid, Gundlach Hyperion...), too!

Sorry... just ranting. There's no doubt that Cooke makes terrific products, but I don't think that they made a "better" portrait lens than P&S.

George Kara
9-Aug-2010, 16:18
I happen to have the cooke ps 945 and a P & S Series II semi - achromat. Other than being "soft focus" these lenses are completely different. The P&S is an absolute beast to use correctly. The chemical focus thing takes alot of mastery. It is totally unique and one of a kind.

The 945 is very very easy to use, has a wide range of softness to dial and just a wonderful predictable flexible modern portrait lens. The old P&S is a one trick horse - but what a magnificent horse it is.

Phong
9-Aug-2010, 16:25
What I would really like to see is a side-by-side comparison of the Cooke with the P&S. For that matter, with the other copies (Eidoscope, Nicola Perscheid, Gundlach Hyperion...), too!


I believe the late Ted Harris did just that and published the results in an article in View Camera magazine about 5 years ago. I remember visiting Ted when he was working on that article, as he showed me a portrait he did of Amy with one the lenses. I remember he was testing the Cooke, the Rodenstock Imagon and the P&S, among others (Fuji soft focus ?)

You can search for Ted's various posts on this forum on this topic.
I remember reading comparisons from other people also (Per Volquartz maybe ?)

- Phong

Petzval Paul
9-Aug-2010, 16:55
Thanks, I'd like to see the article and comparisons mentioned!

Jim Galli
9-Aug-2010, 17:41
I happen to have the cooke ps 945 and a P & S Series II semi - achromat. Other than being "soft focus" these lenses are completely different. The P&S is an absolute beast to use correctly. The chemical focus thing takes alot of mastery. It is totally unique and one of a kind.

The 945 is very very easy to use, has a wide range of softness to dial and just a wonderful predictable flexible modern portrait lens. The old P&S is a one trick horse - but what a magnificent horse it is.

Exactly right, but the Cooke is a copy of the Series IV P&S visual quality, not the Series 1 or 2. The Series IV #2 that sold here for $2,000 last week is a thousand times more attractive than the Cooke to me. To each his own though.

If someone wants to send me their Cooke, I have 9" Hyperion and 9-ish inch Eidoscop that we could shoot side by side. My nearest Series IV is 12" though.

Toyon
11-Aug-2010, 06:18
95% of the people with great glass are incapable of making photographs that justify the expenditure. Even Cooke cannot find a great photograph to post as an example of the best use of their lens. If you like the look of the lens, find a high quality rapid rectilinear (Darlot, Voigtlander, Suter, Wollensak (Versar, Voltas)) and work with that instead. Note: there are many, many RR's out there made by other companies that will never sharply focus, so buy carefully.

Jim Galli
11-Aug-2010, 07:10
95% of the people with great glass are incapable of making photographs that justify the expenditure. Even Cooke cannot find a great photograph to post as an example of the best use of their lens. If you like the look of the lens, find a high quality rapid rectilinear (Darlot, Voigtlander, Suter, Wollensak (Versar, Voltas)) and work with that instead. Note: there are many, many RR's out there made by other companies that will never sharply focus, so buy carefully.

Comparing the Series IV P&S (or the Cooke PS945) to a RR, even a fast one (http://tonopahpictures.0catch.com/Versar/Versar.html) is more than a stretch. I have the f4 Euryscop and it is simply a very sharp very fast rapid rectilinear. Versar's and other extra repid f6 aplanats are simply less fast very sharp lenses. I do love the look they give and the nice bokeh of the ultra simple design, but I class them very differently than a P&S IV or an Eidoscop. The Nicola Perscheid and it's family members had some math that gave them the glow. They may be a modified RR, but the magic is in the mod. Eve was a modification of Adam, but Oh my!

Toyon
12-Aug-2010, 08:52
Comparing the Series IV P&S (or the Cooke PS945) to a RR, even a fast one (http://tonopahpictures.0catch.com/Versar/Versar.html) is more than a stretch. I have the f4 Euryscop and it is simply a very sharp very fast rapid rectilinear. Versar's and other extra repid f6 aplanats are simply less fast very sharp lenses. I do love the look they give and the nice bokeh of the ultra simple design, but I class them very differently than a P&S IV or an Eidoscop. The Nicola Perscheid and it's family members had some math that gave them the glow. They may be a modified RR, but the magic is in the mod. Eve was a modification of Adam, but Oh my!

That may be largely true, but a good RR will provide some important features, a wonderful transition from focus to out of focus, a concentration of forces in the center 20 degrees of the lens, and other less effable qualities to the light bending. I would say, become a master of humbler lenses before buying a Cooke. Otherwise it is like giving egg tempera to a finger painterteen. Its just going to be mud. Interesting mud perhaps, showing a trace of the brilliant capability of the medium, but a waste of money. Collectors are selfish, unless they loan out their "instruments" in the way that owners of Guarneri's loan out their violins.

Richard K.
12-Aug-2010, 09:21
.......Eve was a modification of Adam, but Oh my!

Definitely a feature enhanced model!

Richard K.
12-Aug-2010, 09:22
Definitely a feature enhanced model!

And I'm not just ribbing you...

Dave Wooten
12-Aug-2010, 13:39
I ve searched pretty good, and examples of head portraits are few and far between. The photo on the Cooke site-the male portrait on the left of the page is nice...don t know if it is a contemporary photo or not. Many have suggested a side by side comparison of the effects of different portrait lenses including the PS 945. This comparison doesn't seem to exist. The argument that one needs to learn the lens...it should not be rocket science to product a full aperture portrait with this lens...one purchases the lens for how it renders light in respect to other lenses. If there is no difference in the rendering or if it is to subtle to readily identify, then there is not much to sell here, in my not so humble opinion.

Jim Galli
12-Aug-2010, 13:46
Dave, FWIW I think you should get one and produce brilliant work on full plate with it.

Just when ya thought you had yourself talked out of it.

ASRafferty
15-Aug-2010, 05:20
Thanks, I'd like to see the article and comparisons mentioned!

Paul, if you'll PM me your email address, I'll send you Ted's article...otherwise, my recollection is that it was the Nov/Dec 2005 VCMag (I'd post it here but don't want to incur "the wrath from high atop the thing" in New Mexico).

Dave Wooten
15-Aug-2010, 05:43
Ian pointed out to me today, that Baxter Bradford has the lens. I found some images (mainly landscape-and they are lovely) over on the APUG gallery.

Frank Petronio
15-Aug-2010, 05:51
Of course you could argue that anyone with the resources to spend that much on a lens is going to be a serious, decent photographer, so a guy like Baxter would be able to make great images with a Coke bottle.

(Well, we can hope so. I am sure there are quite a few lousy togs who spend a lot on their gear.)

Dave Wooten
15-Aug-2010, 05:55
That is true Frank, for many years I worked as a musician-trumpet player-there are players who can make a hose pipe sound heavenly!