Fuji 240-A f9 for 8x10

[Sal Santamaura]

Once again I'm extremely doubtful of the objectivity of your assessment of Fuji A series lenses, having used a variety of them for decades with consistently more than outstanding results, exceeding any general purpose plasmat I've gotten ahold of, even with demanding high magnification roll-film applications and not just sheet film. Maybe you're seeing lack of film flatness issues instead...

We've been through this nonsense before. You've questioned my film holders before. I've refuted that red herring before. The extent of arm waving and everything-knowing was astounding:

https://www.largeformatphotography.i...=1#post1321449

...I dunno...

In this case, no, you most certainly don't know.

...you can stick to your lens religion; I'll stick to mine..

I'll stick to my objective testing. Religion, one would hope including your lens religion, is officially prohibited on this forum.

...I don't get nitpicky over such things...

Or, apparently, over things like the phrase "my samples" when discussing test reports.

...your ridiculous, routinely-disproven "Fiat" slander of the Fuji A series...

It's impossible to disprove something I've never said. My tests showed my 360A to be sharper than my 360 Apo Sironar N as well as my 355 Kern Dagor. The other A-series test results are what they are. I have no "belief" (acceptance in the absence of credible evidence) in the superiority of any lens series. I test, report and use.

...I am getting ready to use a 240 Apo Nikkor tomorrow (rainy day forecast) for a very demanding application in the darkroom, making a precise enlarged color internegative.

Once again, utterly irrelevant arm waving. Reinforcing that everything you post must be questioned and, when appropriate, ignored.

[Drew Wiley]

Predictable hyper-defensive response. At least you are consistent in that. It would be nice to accept your experience and input without having to wiggle through the habitual minefield of you always trying to discount or undermine what I say, for, who gosh knows, what kind of reason - certainly not evidential. Back to my Ignore list for awhile, until you realize a lens discussion isn't like someone announcing a Russian nuke had just been launched at California.

[Sal Santamaura]

...Back to my Ignore list for awhile...

Excellent. That makes refuting nonsense a lot easier. Much less keyboarding required.

[schafphoto]

I know this is an 8x10 titled thread and I made a 5x7 comment that I thought would be relevant.
I probably shouldn't make a habit of sharing my outtakes, but I would reiterate that the center of my copy of the 240A is plenty sharp in the center. Given the size/weight /price. I'm sure I could have made my photo with a bigger, heavier, expensiver lens. But after packing light for a flight to New York. I should have just payed more attention to the maximum rise and not pushed it. I'm attaching the image so you can see just how the very sharp tower becomes an acceptably sharp clock and then continues to be a not so sharp steeple. (under a 10X loupe anyway) Perfectly OK for contact prints but as a self diagnosed pixel peeper I was disappointed.


Just be careful if you walk on the edge... If you need to deliver unretouched negatives without cropping or retouching in post like I do for HABS, I cringe when I get negatives like this. Luckily the other 29 views of this building I took do not exhibit similar user error/equipment limitations. A 96% on any test is still OK, but I have learned my lesson for next time and that's all I can hope for.


HABS-NY-6402-23
by Stephen Schafer, on Flickr

[Eric Leppanen]

I'm attaching the image so you can see just how the very sharp tower becomes an acceptably sharp clock and then continues to be a not so sharp steeple.

I also shot exterior architecture during my 8x10 shooting days, and similar results to this prompted my replacing my Fuji 240A with a 240 Germinar W for 8x10 use. About a year after I originally posted in this thread I documented over at APUG (now Photrio) my own test results with the Germinar, including the use of a center filter with extreme movements (https://www.photrio.com/forum/thread...-w-lens.17653/). Here is an excerpt:

"I recently purchased from Kerry Thalmann here at APUG a 240mm Germinar W lens for use on my 8x10 camera. As has been already reported, this lens achieves a usable image circle in the neighborhood of 400mm when stopped down to f/64 and focused at infinity. This image circle gets larger if the lens is focused closer (I find that at roughly a 15 foot focus distance I get at least 400mm of useful image circle at f/22). However, when using chrome film in bright outdoor lighting, I have found that the lens exhibits considerable light falloff when used near the edge of its usable image circle (e.g., applying roughly 2.5 inches of front rise in portrait orientation when shooting close architectural subjects). The amount of falloff is comparable to that of my SS210XL, for which I use a center filter when shooting chrome film in such circumstances. Being in an ambitious mood, and liking the option of using such a small, lightweight lens in this application, I purchased a Schneider #2 (older version) 1.5 stop center filter (49mm inner thread, 67mm outer thread, Schneider part number 08039286) in the hope of reducing this falloff to an acceptable level. This center filter was designed for a very different lens (47mm Super Angulon), but it was the only center filter I could find which fits directly to the Germinar’s front filter thread, so I decided it was worth a shot.

The filter works beautifully! Light falloff is now well controlled, and what little falloff remains progresses in a linear fashion from the center to the edge of the image circle. The only restriction is that, at maximum front rise (2.5 inches) in portrait orientation, the center filter starts to slightly mechanically vignette at the corners, but for my work this has not proven a problem since these areas are usually open sky, and can be easily fixed in Photoshop."

With negative film the light falloff may not be much of a problem at all.

[Drew Wiley]

There are pros and cons in architectural applications. The 240 Fuji A is not a wide-angle design. It is, stopped down, a highly corrected plasmat with about 80 deg coverage. The falloff and distortion is therefore minimal. With true wide-angle designs, often needed for architectural shooting, especially tight interiors, a center filter is a wise accessory to have on hand, unless you want deliberate corner darkening. They aren't going to give you as great acuity either, especially quite close-up, where the Fuji A's and G-Claron designs especially stand out. In an already heavy backpack hiking around steep hills and so forth all day with an 8x10 system, it's nice to have multi-purpose optics which are also compact, yet at the same time, do especially excel at certain functions. In my own case, a kit for personal use and one for a commercial architectural shoot get configured with different lens choices. I rarely use a big super-wide anymore; but there are times one distinctly needs them. I boil down the problem a bit more - or did, back when I still took on architectural projects - by sticking with 4x5 cameras in those instances. With 8x10 I have more creative liberty in lens choice because it's for personal work instead.

[Vaughn]

...Perfectly OK for contact prints but as a self diagnosed pixel peeper I was disappointed.....

Looks to be the clock tower of Cornell. I listened to performances up there.

Now back to our regular program...

[Drew Wiley]

I've done 30x40 Cibachromes from 240A 8x10's - a far more demanding application than any kind of pixel-peeping or inket or magazine repro. The secret is to use as much back tilt as possible instead of front tilt on receding planes; keep rise within about an inch for 8x10, and stop down to at least f/45. But clock towers up close, wrong lens. Here the problem is more often tall redwoods up close, which can challenge even the huge image circle of the 360A.