It's French . The marking says landscapes and plates. What's the diameter of the glass? What's the composition of the glass - count the bright and dim reflections off an overhead light. bright is an air/glass surface, dim is a cemented glass/glass.
Something very similar (perhaps this one?) was sold on e**y recently. For much more than a usual projection lens!
It has some features from a typical projection lens and some from an early "washer stop" photographic lens. The small aperture suggests it may be a simple periscope design ( 2 simple meniscii lenses).
@Fotoguy20d: diameter of rear lens is 1 3/4 inch and front is 1 1/2 inch. I don't know design of this lens but just take one with one light.
@Steven stribe: Yes, it's me But i don't think is a projecton lens. Here is a camera in Eastman Kodak muuseum with verry similar lens
http://www.geh.org/fm/toronto/htmlsr...00002_ful.html
And other lens of Leica shop
http://www.flickr.com/photos/leicash...2703/lightbox/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/leicash...2941/lightbox/
My brass lens made by Chevalier maker?
Chevalier was very uptight about his "brand" as he was well known for optics before photography. So it is not made by him!
We forget that opticians in the early days had all the tools and workshops to make lenses from a block of glass. Many opticians attempted to enter this new market - especialy in Paris!
I don't think it is projection lens either. But I have enough periscopes to keep me happy for a few years.
A false (incomplete) Landscape menicus lens was sold to-day, by the way. It had the usual washer "pilbox" stop, a central lens (present) and place for a rear lens (missing). Another early periscope, perhaps?
Steven l don't think it's a periskop. If you look at reflections of rear element, it have two strong and one weak reflection. It looks like french ladscape objective. As far as a maker goes, l would live that to the folks with cnowledge
On another look, it have two weak reflections. Like there is a cemented triplet there. Was there someone besid Dallmeyer who made ladscape objectives with three lenses? On the other hand l don't think Dallmeyer would sell his objective unengraved and they would use waterhouse stops.
Marko
Didn't look at the reflections. These don't make sense to me and seem very strong for a cement reflection.
There are some 3 - lens landscapes - Grubb made the first - Aplanatic.
I found this page: http://www.niepce-daguerre.com/chevalier.html. And i just checked two elecments in the lens is very similar Chevalier designed "Photographe a Verres Combine."He combined two cemented achromats that brought speeds down to about f/5.6 for portrait work, and, as a bonus, the lens could be converted for use as a landscape lens. (http://antiquecameras.net/petzvallens.html)
I belive this lens made by Chevalier but why they don't engraved maker on this lens? Maybe is a prototype lens?
A prototype would have made in 1840, when Charles Chevalier submitted the Verres combinés to a competition organised by the French Société de l'Industrie Nationale. I don't think this is it.
Chevalier did make small "VC" lenses early on that do look like this (that is, not conical). If the lenses are not concave/convex + convex/convex, then there is no chance of it being a "VC" - or a competitor's copy.
The "VC" was one of the great fiasco stories in lens design!
I haven't researched it much, but I'd say it's a very early lens, by one of the few that made them in the early Daguerreotype era.
Garrett
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