Wildest Petzval Swirl Ever

[goamules]

As some of you petzval fan's know, we have a petzval flickr group with many examples of shots taken with these lenses.

But when I saw this one I just suspect it's a photoshop attempt to make a swirl. I asked the photog but no answer yet.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28713901@N04/3951456368

I mean, has anyone seen it go from sharp, to swirl, then back to NOT swirled before the coverage even drops off? The only thing I've seen close is when the rear assy is misassembled. I told the owner that he might want to check. But it just looks seriously fake, all items at all ranges are swirling mightily, even the tree trunk which has no highlights....

[vinny]

he posted this on apug.org as well. quite cool

[BarryS]

Yes, the same photographer posted a bunch of shots on APUG. His b+w work looked authentic enough. I agree--that's one crazy Petzval signature. I say real because photoshopping and doing all that masking would be more work than using a Petzval. Maybe there's some bad separation in the lens?

[Pete Watkins]

There seems to be too much of the twigs and berries part ofthe image in sharp focus for it to be a real straight from the camera image. Some of these digi-freaks will spend weeks trying to get special effects, probably 'cos they leave very shallow lives.
Pete

[Jim Galli]

There seems to be too much of the twigs and berries part ofthe image in sharp focus for it to be a real straight from the camera image. Some of these digi-freaks will spend weeks trying to get special effects, probably 'cos they leave very shallow lives.
Pete

True enough, but to do all that work and then post it in APUG, that's adventurous.

[Daniel_Buck]

the photo looks like it was genuinely shot through a lens to me, that's a wild one for sure!

digi-freaks will spend weeks trying to get special effects, probably 'cos they leave very shallow lives.

[Jim collum]

sounds like a pretty closed minded and insecure comment to me.

i was pretty shallow when all i did was film.. i don't think digital has changed it

the enlarged version looks real.. there's a glow that's pretty hard to dup in photoshop around the 'in focus' areas.. but even if not.. it's still an interesting image

[benrains]

It reminds me of how the ground-glass image of my 8x10 Vesta looked before I figured out it had one of its rear elements installed backwards.

[Terence McDonagh]

As the background is far enough away to be out of focus, it makes sense to me that it would have the swirl back there as well. But maybe I'm not understanding all the optical issues of petzvals.

[Math]

Perhaps a strong anti-vignetting filter has been added, causing the strange effect at the edges? It would make more sense if there was a illumination fall-off after the bulge effect.