Lens damage: what the hell is that?

[alec4444]

Had a rough day at Coney Island today. Was windy & cold. Was joined by Arthur, a pinhole guy from the city. Had a great time right up until he left...he must have been good luck.

First, I slipped on a rock and fell onto a bunch more on the jetty. That hurt. Dunno what I was thinking trying to get 65 pounds of delicate equipment on top of a bunch of large, non-level slimy rocks....but they were really cool looking. Thankfully I didn't break the camera. So I decided to get off the hazardous rocks and shoot them from the safety of the beach instead. In the midst of focusing, my lens (Schneider Symmar 360mm f5.6) actually fell off the camera. I think it happened when my lens did a sudden axis tilt while I was trying to adjust another movement. I was under the darkcloth at the time, and I think it hit only the sand. A quick glance at it revealed a peculiar wispy, smoky line running down the center of the glass like the pupil of a cat in daylight. It was nothing I could touch or feel...it seems to be in the center of the glass. Any ideas what this is? Looks to me like the lens is probably shot. Bummer because I really liked (not this particular lens, but...) the Symmar 360mm f5.6 convertible.

Cold, tired, and troubled by the lens problem I picked up my stuff and headed home. No sooner than I reached the subway I had a sharp pain in my arm...I think I may have torn something. The roller bag was giving me some problems today...it wasn't happy on ice or snow.

Hopefully the six pictures I took came out, I'm saving that for tomorrow so as not to push my luck!

Any advice on the lens is appreciated. Thanks!
--A

[domenico Foschi]

I have had some of those days, I sympatize with you.
Alec, I can think of this:
In the case you hit the camera somewhere(on the rocks) when you fell, then the lens also was affected.
If the lens fell with that sudden axis tilt, that tells me that the mechanism that Holds the lensboard was a bit loose due to the prior fall.
The line to me looks like the inner element has cracked.
That must hurt.
But most important, take care of your harm.

[Alan Davenport]

Darn. I hope your arm isn't hurt badly, because it looks like the lens is now fit to serve as an example. I agree with domenico's assessment; it looks like an inner element is cracked. The milky haze to the sides of the crack is probably due to stress in the cement.

Good luck with the photos!

[Capocheny]

Hi Alec,

Sorry to hear about the way your day went... happens to the best of us!

Shoot some pictures with the damaged lens anyway and see how the images turn out. Let us know, ok?

Cheers

[Armin Seeholzer]

Very bad day for you!
Now you have a new paperwight, and really a special one!
Hope your arm is okay so far.
I know there are some days which I should just have sleeping in the beed the whole day, it would have been better for me!
Good luck for the future, Armin Seeholzer

[Greg Lockrey]

For historical purposes, we need to see the last image made with that 300mm. Mend well.

[GPS]

Indeed, the inner element is cracked, the "haze" is just the cracked glass new surface.

[eddie]

check with jim galli. he has a lens mine and he may be able to find you an element or a lens. all is not lost cause you have a convertible lens. you should be able to screw off the bad element no?

take care of the arm. one good thing is now you can concentrate on a pinhole board and keep shooting!

eddie

[David A. Goldfarb]

Ouch. Yeah, that's a crack. Make a test shot with it. You might be surprised. I get very sharp images even shooting medium format with a rollfilm back from a 360mm/5.5 Tele-Xenar that has lines of bubbles running through the cement.

[erie patsellis]

alec, is this in a shutter? and more importantly, should you decide you can live without it, let me know, as I'd be interested, shuttered or not.


erie