New lens to me :)

[Paul Ewins]

Thank you very much for this Paul. I continue to hope to get Thiele's three books on Schneider production. It does look like the two on Carl Zeiss Jena and the one on Carl Zeiss Oberkochen were re-printed a couple of years ago. These I have.

David

While they are very useful books to quickly investigate a lens via its serial number, trying to get any sort of overview of production is quite tedious and prone to error as your eyes glaze over looking at page after page of identical looking print. There was a new book released in 2020 that concentrates on the lenses sold to other manufacturers, so he does still seem to be active. What I really need is the whole lot sorted by lens name, focal length, aperture and then date or serial number which would tend to make any prototypes and oddities really stand out and make tabulating production numbers much easier. I wrote an article for my local camera collector's group and it took days of going backwards and forwards to make sure I had found every batch of Symmars made and even now I wouldn't be surprised to come across one I missed.

[peter brooks]

I once used a convertible Symmar with the front element removed (converted)...the subject was a building facade, and was shot on color transparency film.
The result was not 'soft' ...the colors were distinctly out of register with each other.

I guess that's the chromatic aberration? I should have said implicitly that I was referring to shooting B&W images (the OP doesn't state what use it will be put to).

bummer
Might have been a QC issue? I have a chrome barreled one too documented a factory building for a client (stopped to 16 ) with it all chrome and c41 came out as nice as my unconverted lenses. shot a lot with 5x7 too covered to 370 stopped down 2 f16 .. can't complain.

I wonder could the amount of chromatic aberration when coverted vary from model to model (210/370, 300/500 etc.)? So some could perform better converted than others? Maybe one of the lens design experts here would know... The film size used would be a factor also (worse aberration further off-axis).

The '62 lens I have is in a Compound shutter, whereas the OP's seems to be in something newer (although it is older). Were they all available in a choice of shutters, or is it just because the Compound has a larger opening?

[Dan Fromm]

Peter, chromatic aberration affects sharpness in b/w too.

For the same prescription, aberrations scale with focal length. The greater the focal length, the larger the aberrations at the same aperture.

Use "the list" to learn about shutters' maximum openings by make and model. As far as I know the generally available cock-and-shoot shutter with the largest maximum opening is the Compound #5, followed by the Ilex #5. But there were tiny Compounds too.

If you don't know what "the list" is, ask.

[jnantz]

I wonder could the amount of chromatic aberration when coverted vary from model to model (210/370, 300/500 etc.)? So some could perform better converted than others? Maybe one of the lens design experts here would know... The film size used would be a factor also (worse aberration further off-axis).

not sure Peter .. just know my converted specimens ( I have a hand full of convertible and triple convertible and a casket set ) seemed to be OK. maybe im blind and the chromes / negatives I alluded to were terrible (I've been called worst things than blind) ... I know the client didn't complain, they actually seemed to like the work enough to steal it, not pay me and publish it. LOL. I'll let the people who know about physics and optics and lens specs &c do their thing, ... I know nothing about these things other than point lens move I back and forth and something behind it will be in focus &c. as you can see with my posts in the recent thread about scanners, I should probably care about these things, I don't and probably never will.

[peter brooks]

Peter, chromatic aberration affects sharpness in b/w too.

Thanks Dan, yes, I'm aware of that - chromatic and/or spherical aberration being utilised in soft focus lens design.

The effect in B&W would be somewhat less distressing though I would hope!

[peter brooks]

not sure Peter .. just know my converted specimens ( I have a hand full of convertible and triple convertible and a casket set ) seemed to be OK. maybe im blind and the chromes / negatives I alluded to were terrible (I've been called worst things than blind) ... I know the client didn't complain, they actually seemed to like the work enough to steal it, not pay me and publish it. LOL. I'll let the people who know about physics and optics and lens specs &c do their thing, ... I know nothing about these things other than point lens move I back and forth and something behind it will be in focus &c. as you can see with my posts in the recent thread about scanners, I should probably care about these things, I don't and probably never will.

I'm just glad to (potentially) have a 500mm lens in a shutter - beats trying to rig up the 480mm Apo-Ronar and a Sinar shutter to the front of a wood camera...

[jnantz]

I'm just glad to (potentially) have a 500mm lens in a shutter - beats trying to rig up the 480mm Apo-Ronar and a Sinar shutter to the front of a wood camera...