Waves on the Beach (Multi-Focal)

[Whir-Click]

Mock was George Eastman's favorite photographer. Here is a portraitAttachment 257195 by Mock

I am very glad to know that!

[Whir-Click]

All cleaned up.
- Barrel and aperture diaphragm (selector ring, slot ring, retaining ring, and 20 iris leaves) fully disassembled, degreased, freshly lubricated and put back together.
- Glass removed, washed with mild dish soap, and blacking on the sides of the front crown and rear doublet renewed with India ink. I stripped the crown with acetone to remove all of its old blacking, but since the rear doublet already shows a little bit of balsam separation I didn’t want to chance it: I just put a new coat of ink on top of the old. Looks good.
- Front and rear brass cells cleaned with mild soap and a ring of nasty old tape residue patiently removed from the front cell.
- Period-appropriate Wollensak lens cap finally located (I knew I put it somewhere) and re-felted to fit like a glove.

I put the lens on my Eastman [all-metal] Commercial View to focus on a patient family member and also my outdoor view. I couldn’t be more pleased with the result: a generous rendering with smooth transitions. It really does appear to have more depth of focus (or perhaps it’s more accurate to say there’s less out of focus) than with a typical lens. But, that could just be wish-fulfillment after working on the lens all weekend. Nevertheless, I like what I see.

I’ve also been tuning up an Alphax #4: when I need a shutter or flash sync, the 9.5” Beach lens cells fit right in.

[djdister]

How about posting some photos taken with this lens?

[Whir-Click]

How about posting some photos taken with this lens?

That’s a reasonable question, and I always enjoy when others on the forum provide illustrative examples. If I can produce a result that that does the lens credit (and my portrait victim wouldn’t object), I will share it.

But, being honest with myself, I’m a far more competent repairer and researcher than portraitist and printer. It doesn’t diminish my enjoyment, but I’m aware of my limitations.

[cowanw]

A still life can be of interest.
I am skeptical about the representation of depth of field as regards the paired photographs of John Wollensak. The text says they are taken at like speed but does not actually say they are taken at same F-stop or printed the same for that matter. Having said that I think a common use of the word speed at the time was in reference to f-stop. And I may be putting a modern degree of skepticism on it. Nevertheless what is actually in focus with the Anastigmat lens is less sharp. Perhaps this suggest a very poor comparative example of an anastigmat chosen for the test.
Still the lens is so unique perhaps all bets are off.
Please persist with this: I am sure there is lots of interest.

[russyoung]

Beach Multi-Focal, Series B, 14 inch, Serial No. 363
[ATTACH=CONFIG]260543

[Whir-Click]

Russ, if you take a looong, close look at the name ring on your Beach Lens, did the “Series B” engraving originally read “Series A”? I’ll attach two examples of the phenomenon.

I recently noticed a phantom, underlying “A” on multiple Series B lenses up to and including number 294, but definitely not on my number 407 or higher. It’s as though Wollensak began by making exclusively Beach Series A lenses, then introduced a second series and re-labeled a number of Series A lenses as Series B after the fact. The original Beach lens brochure and Wollensak Catalog 29 only reference the Series A, but Catalog 30 includes both A and B.

My hypothesis is that at some point Wollensak stopped re-designating already produced A lenses as B lenses, and switched to simply labeling newly produced Series A lenses as As and B lenses as Bs. I’m curious where your number 363 falls in this timeline.

[Photomagica]

Whir-Click - Thanks for starting a great thread. Most interesting. Clearly this is a lens for connoisseurs; those who appreciate its very special qualities and have the patience to thoroughly qualify it and learn how to use it well.
Actually, having made lenses, I can see how Wollensak would go about fabrication. Yes - more difficult than conventional lenses and they would have to be hand finished one at a time, the wavy surface precluding much in the way of batch production. With the rather costly tooling, test plates and production steps worked out, producing reasonably consistent lenses would be quite possible and not exceptionally difficult, just really time consuming. It would take a lot of an experienced opticians time for each lens and this considerable extra time would significantly add to the cost.
I appreciate that Wollensak was willing to take on an innovation challenge and get a lens like this into production.
Bill

[russyoung]

Here you are, Whir-Click.
I certainl appreciate your encyclopedic web pages!