The Apo Grandagons were discontinued earlier this year.Originally Posted by Arne Croell
And to answer an earlier question. Rodenstock makes 3 Apo Sironar-S lenses and 19 digital lenses from 23 to 180mm plus a bunch of enlarging lenses.
The Apo Grandagons were discontinued earlier this year.
And to answer an earlier question. Rodenstock makes 3 Apo Sironar-S lenses and 19 digital lenses from 23 to 180mm plus a bunch of enlarging lenses.
It's not surprising, especially since Copal stoped making shutters. It seems like it was just a matter of time.
Rodenstock know the market very well. They see the future is with digital.
Us film users have a huge bounty of excellent Rodensock lenses on the used market.
We are good for as long as film shall live.
.
Ever since I joined this forum, I have encouraged anyone who came asking about lenses to buy new if they had the money. Others pile onto the threads saying it's stupid to buy new lenses when you can buy excellent condition used lenses for a fraction of the price. Well, if no one buys new lenses, Rodenstock will stop making them, along with Schneider, Fuji, Nikon..... and the dozens of other manufacturers who have already quit. It's not that I personally mind buying used, because personally I never had the money to buy the lenses new. But someone has to, and LF photographers in general are not as poor as I am. I see people spending thousands of $$ on tripods, backpacks, accessories, JOBO gear, but trawling eBay for a bargain on a lens.
I have not seen any marketing for Rodenstock lenses for a long time. If you don't invest in marketing, you aren't going to sell many lenses. Actually, now that I think about it, I don't know that any of the existing manufacturers are doing any advertising.
I bought my Schneider 350mm F11 brand new.
Part of the blame needs to be put on the lens manufactures for producing overly similar products. Look at their offerings of very much the same lens designs from Nikon, Fuji, Schneider, Rodenstock.. They all produced very much the same six element air spaced variation of a Dagor...
It was Schneider who broke the mold when they introduced the first LF lens using an Aspherical element and went on to improve their other wide angle offerings.
I have done my part by order both these new Schneider Aspherical LF lenses un-seen pre-paid and waited for almost a year for delivery.
What the big four lens makers could have done is to produce many of the classic lens designs that were quite valuable even back in the days when film was it. Instead, they followed each other and produced much the same lens offerings all trying to get the same share of that market.. This marketing ideology was bound for failure in time. What broke the market viability was the death of sheet film for commercial work. This also caused the death of many E6 labs and many other related services and companies.
There is no question that optics for LF photography is and always be a small market, what should have been done by the lens manufactures is to continue production of great classic lens designs like the Dagor, Tessar, Heliar and the many, many others including soft focus specialty lenses.. Instead, they spent their resources producing much the same LF optics..
Non photographic optics have become the more significant and profitable market for these optics companies..
Bernice
I bought my Nikkor SW 65 mm and my Schneider Apo-Symmar-L 120 mm brand new.
All my other lenses are bought used, and the Zeiss Oberkochen Tessar 150 mm was only on the market as new until the mid sixties.
So what companies are now left in the world manufacturing LF lenses?
Did I read that Fuji still makes them but does not export them? If so, maybe they could corner what is left of the market.
I think lens makers never adapted to the change in the LF market from studio-type photography to outdoor landscape photography.
They should have read Kerry's LF lens reviews on lighter, sharp lenses and adapted all of their products. Ron Wisner tried to produce a lens cell set, with the help of an LF lens manufacturer, but why couldn't an LF lens maker come up with a superior lens cell set in different focal length ranges and for different formats maybe enhanced with modern special glasses which might decrease the number of elements, weight and size. LF photographers were trying to make that old Schneider 90mm f6.8 angulon work because the lens makers thought if you were an outdoor photographer you were trying to photograph a building and needed a 90mm lens that weighed as much as your woodfield.
Why is it that camera makers could adapt to the change in the market but not lens makers? How many new non-digital monorails have been made in the last twenty years as opposed to all the new, wonderful field cameras that are coming in to the market even today.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks