Interest in a new Hypergon?

[Nodda Duma]

Hey folks, I was approached by a fellow large format enthusiast about bringing a new Hypergon lens to market in 4x5 and 8x10 format. If you don't know what a Hypergon is, you really should. It is one of the widest if not *the* widest Field of View large format lens ever made, with no distortion due to the symmetric design.

I've done quite a bit of homework already, and have the prescription and lens drawings done and my mechanical engineering partner has a conceptual design.

The 8x10 format replicates the original lens design exactly. Interestingly, there is really only one design solution for "as wide a FOV as physically possible in a two-lens anastigmat" and the Hypergon is it. 4x5 was not originally offered, as the lens was marketed to landscape and architectural photographers who used 5x7 and up so there wasn't really the demand at the time. However, I designed a prescription for 4x5 format and that would be made available as well.

There have been recent attempts to bring the Hypergon to market. However, the real challenge is finding a shop to fabricate the lenses at any reasonable price point, and I believe this is what prevented those attempts from being successful. You really have to know the industry well to find the shops who can make them. I was successful in finding a shop who could fabricate the lenses at reasonable cost, and they are currently shipping 8x10 "alpha prototype lenses " lenses to me. I will mount them in a 3D printed test barrel to evaluate.

The mechanical barrel would be similar to original, an iris that can be set to f/22 for focusing and f/32 - f/45 for exposure. I'll ditch the whirlygig filter used in the original to compensate for illumination roll-off. If Goerz were making the Hypergon today, they would have used an apodizing filter. A custom apodizing filter corrects for illlumination roll-off in a single exposure, vs. the original needing two exposures to create a negative. Additionally, the apodizing filter will be much less expensive than the delicate mechanical components necessary for the whirly-gig.

So my question is whether there's interest in a 4x5 and 8x10 Hypergon. I think there is, as it is a really interesting lens with beautiful results, but there are so few that prices for originals in good condition are astronomical. Speaking of pricing, my gut tells me the 4x5 would be somewhere in the $1000-$1250 price range, and the 8x10 would be in the $1500-$1750 price range. We'd try to push that down further, but the components are not cheap to manufacture in the numbers I'd expect us to produce.

Here are some modeling graphics out of Zemax and Solidworks.