Chasing "softness" in small formats ~ troisieme part ~ Showing My Homework

I recently wrote a blog entry where I talked about lenses that seem to fill the gap between Full Blown Soft Focus for 35mm format and "normal" sharp/clinical lenses.  What I shared were mainly Lens Porn, er, sorry, Portraits illustrations because I find these cheap lenses beautiful to take photos of.  I did not share my homework, even though I wrote at length about differences between the optics.  This blog entry corrects this omission.

Keep in mind that the trick to these first element focusing lenses is that the greatest optical imperfection effect is generally found in subjects closer/closest to the camera.  Of course it depends on lens design, but this is the tendency I've seen thus far.

Often these first element focusing lenses for 35mm format that are easily adaptable to digital derive from or are implementations of the early Cooke Triplet.  The design is two positive elements on each end with one negative element in the middle.  This is pretty simple, easy to manufacture, and can be very low cost.  Lenses on the used market can be nearly Give Away cheap.  I recently picked up a digital adaptable first element focusing Cooke triplet design lens for less than 9Euro.

Homework ~

 

Steinheil Auto-Cassaron
50mm f/2.8 at f/4
processed using a film sim
that I like just to see how
the low contrast of the lens
might play out against a
contrast-inducing LUT

 

Comments ~ (borrowed in large part from an earlier blog post)

In reverse order, from bottom to top... 

Ricoh 55mm f/2.2 Riconar - Optical imperfections galore - the kinds of imperfections vary depending on subject distance.  While I don't show this here, it's easily seems comparing close to distance focused subject at f/2.2 and f/4.  It delivers rather decent contrast, actually.  

Interesting highlight "glow" effects.  Controllable by aperture and subject distance, which is potentially useful.  One would have to map out distance/aperture to know which settings to use.  

f/11 can make a pretty sharp image of distant subjects.  Regarding the effects I'm going after, between f/2.2 and f/5.6 the optical imperfections at all distances can play well toward generating a decent "Pictorialist" style enlarged to "normal" viewing size/distance.

ISOC Iscotar 50mm f/2.8 - Optical imperfects somewhere between the Ricoh and Steinheil.  Good contrast.  

Interesting highlight "glow" effects.  Controllable, as with the Ricoh, by aperture and subject distance.  f/8 and f/11 can make a decently sharp image at greater subject distances if desired.  

Between f/2.8 and f/5.6 the optical imperfections can play well toward generating a decent "Pictorialist" style enlarged to "normal" viewing size/distance.  I think of the ISCO as a slightly more rational German Riconar.

Steinheil Auto-Cassaron 50mm f/2.8 - Subtle optical imperfections, spherical aberration at all apertures and all subject distances. Low contrast.    Using the "haze" removal control during processing cleans up a scene, but why use it if I'm looking for "soft focus?"  Have I mentioned this is a low contrast lens?  There must be an echo in here.  Either that or it's strongly evident from looking at the results.

To me this lens is like using a Heliar large format lens from Voigtlander.  Back in the day I owned two of these, a 15cm and 21cm f/4.5, both in Compound shutter.  These lenses had similar underlying detail to what I see with the 50mm.  Missing the rendering of those old lenses I'm happy to discover the Steinheil.  The more I stare at Steinheil images the more I wonder if this isn't a basic trait to how Steinheil designed their optics?  As with the Heliars I find this a really interesting way to make an image.  There seems to me to be a lot of potential for processing unique small format digital images.  I have at least one more Steinheil optic coming to try to confirm/deny this line of thinking.

As the lens is stopped down the underlying detail begins to extend from the center toward the edges of the field.  The effect is common to how triplets behave and I saw this most particularly in a Meyer Domiplan 50mm I once had.  It was sharper from wide open than any Zeiss Tessar I ever saw (and I had more than a few of these over the years).  The ISCO behaves this way too.  That is, wide open the center of the field can be surprisingly sharp and the mid to edge of the field showing subtle/not-so-subtle optical defects of various kinds.  These clean up as the aperture is stopped down and the sharpness spreads out.

With my Auto-Cassaron it's as if the lens designers kept/allowed the spherical aberration to gain consistency in other areas of optical design.  Resolution, field distortion, chromatic aberration and coma are better controlled than in the Ricoh and ISCO.  While more subtle than many large format soft focus lenses from Back in the Day, the Steinheil for small format might make for a decent "Pictorialist" style lens where image viewing sizes can vary depending on the electronic display system. 

 

Images made with a Steinheil
Auto-Cassaron 50mm f/2.8 at f/2.8 or f/4 

Chasing "softness" in small formats ~ deuxieme part

I'm chasing pixies again.  Or still.  Or some little "corner case" like that.

The topic of soft focus photography on small formats is interesting to me.  I'd like to reliably replicate the "look" and "feel" of Photo Secessionist/Pictorialist era prints in digital.  This means looking for a way to get "just the right amount of softness" in an image using digital sensors.

 

Sony A7RII
Ricoh Riconar 55mm f/2.2 @f/2.8 

All of the made for purpose adaptable to digital 35mm SLR Soft Focus lenses I've looked give results that are too "strong."  That is, the level of veiling "softness" (spherical aberration) does not stand up to looking at an image at "normal" viewing distances.

I'm convinced that soft focus lenses from the late 1800's/early 1900's "work" because they were made by contact printing and lens designers could allow "just the right amount" of optical imperfections to be pleasing to viewers.  4x5 inch.  5x7 inch.  Whole plate.  8x10 inch.  Any attempt to enlarge a negative made with a special purpose soft focus lens meets with disaster.  So contact printing it was.  Period.

Adaptable 35mm/Full Frame Soft Focus lenses to my way of thinking fail where large format film lenses could succeed.  Fujifilm 85mm f/4 SF.  Pentax 85mm f/2.2 and f/2.8.  Minolta 85mm f/4 Varisoft.  Canon 135mm SF.  These lenses are nearly impossible to work with if trying to come close to what the original Pictorialists were able to create. 

Though, it must be said, I have it on good PhD thesis-level on this topic authority that Pictorialists in the 1970's and 1980's were able to successfully use the Minolta Varisoft with the softness ring set between "0" and "1" (ie: very very gentle application of spherical aberration).  The photographer had to know what they were doing.

Looking at pixies, odd pieces of fluff, and photographic lens histories I found that something potentially useful.   Wollensak's Velostigmat Series II tessar formula is a normally sharp lens that came with soft focus capability.  The soft focus effect is achieved by unscrewing the first element moving it away from the two optical groups placed on either side of the aperture.  By extending the distance between the first and second element a pleasing soft focus effect is achievable.

This got me to thinking. Perhaps pixies do exist, in spite of the lack of empirical evidence.

What if I took a cheap Soviet tessar and extended the distance between the first and second elements?  Would the soft focus effect seen in large format film photography be achievable in smaller formats?  Perhaps even in some controllable or easily understood manner?

Being occupied with the Rigors of Retirement, time passed and I casually let the subject rest.

One day I was thumbing through a Pentax on-line forum and discovered that the Ricoh 55mm f/2.2 Riconar is a first element focuser.  It's not a tessar, nor a Cooke triplet.  It's a four element air space design of some kind, of which I've never seen the likes of before.  So I thought I'd give it a try as they are nicely inexpensive.  What a strange and interesting lens the Ricoh turned out to be. 

I then learned the Germans made a LOT of Cooke triplet first element focusing lenses... because they were cheap... because they are easy to manufacture... and because they were (barely?) sufficient to the task.  The first element has, in concept, enough power to control but not contain many of the optical imperfections down stream.  

Enter a Steinheil Auto-Cassaron 50mm f/2.8 Cooke triplet.  Such a beautiful lens.  Oh my. My many thanks to Bonzo Din or turning me onto this one.

Enter an ISCO Iscotar 50mm f/2.8 Cooke triplet. Such a gorgeous lens.  Oh boy.

Avoiding the Meyer Domiplan 50mm f/2.8.  Been there.  Done that.  Soap bubble ain't my thang.  

Making a habit of avoiding cheap lenses all my life colored my sense of what is possible.  Cheap lenses are bad lenses, right?  The trick question is in which ways is a lens "bad?"  Mike Johnson from Darkroom Magazine/The Online Photographer said something to the effect that all lenses have their gifts.  And so it is with first element focusing triplets and quadruplets.  I've found they can provide a controllable sense of softness, particularly for subjects nearer to the camera than not.   There live the pixies I've been searching for.

 

Status: Here's what I've experienced using these lenses thus far.

Ricoh 55mm f/2.2 Riconar - Optical imperfections galore - the kinds of imperfections vary depending on subject distance. Decent contrast.  Interesting highlight "glow" effects.  Controllable by aperture and subject distance.  f/11 can make a fairly sharp image of distant subjects.  Between f/2.2 and f/5.6 the optical imperfections at all distances can play well toward generating a decent "Pictorialist" style enlarged to "normal" viewing size/distance.

 

Steinheil Auto-Cassaron 50mm f/2.8 - Subtle optical imperfections, spherical aberration at all apertures and all subject distances. Low contrast.    Using the "haze" removal control during processing cleans up a scene, but why use it if I'm looking for "soft focus?"  

This lens is like using a Heliar large format lens from Voigtlander.  Back in the day I owned two of these, a 15cm and 21cm f/4.5, both in Compound shutter.  These lenses had similar underlying detail to what I see with the 50mm.  Missing the rendering of those old lenses I'm happy to discover the Steinheil.

As the Auto-Cassaron is stopped down the underlying detail begins to extend toward the edges of the field.  The effect is really interesting to see.  It's as if the lens designers kept the spherical aberration to gain consistency in other areas of optical design, such as resolution, field distortion, chromatic aberration and coma.  The Steinheil obviously makes for a decent "Pictorialist" style lens for small formats, though of a different characteristics compared to the Ricoh. 

 

ISOC Iscotar 50mm f/2.8 - Optical imperfects somewhere between the Ricoh and Steinheil.  Good contrast.  Interesting highlight "glow" effects.  Controllable, as with the Ricoh, by aperture and subject distance.  f/8 and f/11 can make a decently sharp image at greater subject distances if needed.  Between f/2.8 and f/4.5 the optical imperfections can play well toward generating a decent "Pictorialist" style enlarged to "normal" viewing size/distance.  I think of the ISCO as a slightly more rational German Riconar.

 

 

Are there more German first element focusing triplets in my future?  Stay tuned.  

Digital Zone System ~ Sony A6300 in-camera jpg generation

I continue to pick at a question about where Sony places tone values for its in-camera jpg generated images.  My question this time is how manufacturer default settings record luminance.

In the Sony BIONZ and BIONZ X universe I've noted that Creative Style Black and White jpgs at its out of the box manufacturer default setting clips the shadow areas hard compared to sensor RAW.  The Creative Style BW range of tone expression is compressed into a narrow range.  It's a very steep curve into darkness.

It's this tonal compression that sent me in search of ways of expanding the in-camera generated Black and White jpg tonal range and found using DRO at specific values useful.  DRO2 or DRO3 raise the shadow values in a controlled way, though the bottom of the tonal range is still -5EV/Zone 0.  By comparison, RAW files using very early NEX reach pure black at -7EV and later sensors from A6000 onward reach pure black at -8EV or -9EV.

That's on the stills Creative Style side of the Sony systems I have.  

On the video side in the BIONZ X systems I have there are additional imaging functions under the heading of Picture Profile.  I originally thought these were an extension of Creative Style.  Only recently did it occur to me to confirm/deny this.

Et voila! here I am with ever more words and illustrations of what I've found. 

For this post I share the Sister of the Mother of All Digital Zone System Charts for a Sony A6300 that I have.  Illustrating the effects of parameter changes (contrast, knee, etc.) are not covered here.  That would be the Mother of All Digital Zone System Charts had I taken the time to do all that.  However, I feel a pretty clear understanding of Sony is doing can be developed.  Additional details and refinements are left to the reader to pursue.

As I leap off into the deep end of things I should note that the process used in all my Digital Zone System work is easily implemented on all non-Sony systems.  All this is simply noting how cameras place luminance values given the various imaging functions a manufacturer offers.  In fact, I've spot checked this entire approach against Panasonic Lumix S9 and Fuji GFX100RF systems and found the basis of understanding holds true across at least three manufacturers cameras.

Setup ~

• RAW processed 1EV separation values as reference
• In-camera generated 1EV separation jpgs for...
• Creative Style Black and White with settings at manufacturer default
• Picture Profiles selecting...
• Gamma
• Color Mode Black and White
• All other settings at manufacturer default for each Profile

Results ~

 

Comments ~

Looking at the result in columns from left to right...

RAW 0EV -  This is my tone value reference.  Though not shown here, -8EV is pure black.  1EV tone separation is achieved from -8EV to +2EV.  From +2EV to +4EV is the "shoulder" of the curve (ala film).  Film stopped being 1EV separated at -2EV, which explains why digital imaging systems offer a TON more shadow detail than film when 0EV (the standard) is set at Zone 5.

Creative Style Black and White - Pure black is -4EV Zone 1.  Pure white is +4EV.  Zones 4 through 1 show a steep drop in tone compared to the RAW reference.  Visually, images made using this setting are contrasty with what I would call "inky" blacks.

Sills - The first Picture Profile "style" I come to shows what appears to me to be a very similar result to Creative Style Black and White.

Movie - This Picture Profile is the first illustration I come to of Sony moving tonal values compared with Creative Style Black and White and Picture Profile Stills.  Notably, the shadow values are "opening up" with Zone 0 being properly pure black.  This setting behaves similarly to what Creative Style with DRO enabled can do.  If there was nothing further, at its default setting I feel Picture Profile Movie could be a satisfactory in-camera jpg imager. 

Cine 1 - Now we're cooking with gas.  Tonal values are expressed through EV -6 Zone -1, though the highlights are a little "hot" with how close +3EV is to pure white.  To correct for the highlights being "hot", under-exposing by -0.3EV moves the entire curve appropriately (to more closely match the Zone System definition).  For the way I was trained to "see" BW images from all the way back into the Film Days I could stop right here.  

A very useful BW Sony recipe:

• Picture Profile Gamma Cine 1
• Color Mode Black and White
• -0.3EV
• All other Picture Profile Cine 1 settings factory defaults

Cine 2 - Wackiness ensues.  Highlights are strongly compressed.  Perhaps if someone is "color grading" video, having tone value in the highlights could be interesting.  For BW stills work?  I'm not so sure.  YMWV.

Cine 3 - Hah!  Another potentially useful manufacture default Picture Profile.  This is very similar to Cine 1, except for the exposure as the tones are expressed.  There's no need to -0.3EV with this setting.  It seems usable straight out of the box: 

• Picture Profile Gamma Cine 3
• Color Mode Black and White
• All other Picture Profile Cine 1 settings factory defaults

Cine 4 - This Picture Profile setting sets -5EV as pure black, where Cine 1 and Cine 3 set pure black at -6EV.  Said another way, Cine 4 appears to be using less of the native dynamic range of the sensor that Cine 1 and 3.  Depending on the environment a person shoots in, this could be sufficient as an out of the box Color Mode BW setting.

SLog 2 - All Holy Hell breaks loose and the FULL dynamic range of the sensor is expressed. +4EV down through -8EV have tone.  Images using SLog 2 "look" flat.  Referencing back to how my eyes were trained on film prints, SLog 2 "feels un-natural."  It's a strange sensation.

Of course SLog 2 is meant for video work and the output of this setting is expected to be color graded after the fact.  That's where the Cool Kids get to apply their oh so special color LUTs to achieve certain "cinematic effects."

For BW stills work I envision this setting being useful in extremely high contrast situations, then off-loading a jpg from the camera to a mobile device for processing where an 8bit color space is all that's available.  Otherwise we'd just shot RAW and process it in a 16 or 32 bit color space, right? 

SLog 3 - Ack!  Here we go again with crushed highlights.  I see zero value in this setting for BW stills work. 

Chasing "softness" in small formats...

I was rather excited when stumbling upon the Ricoh Riconar 55mm f/2.2.  It's a soft focus lens in cheap kit lens drag and I thought I'd skinned a Fat Calf.  

I've been looking for a lens with gentle optical incorrections.  The made to purpose "soft focus" lenses for Minolta, Pentax, Canon, Leica, etc, etc, etc, are all way too soft for me.  The effect doesn't whisper it's presence, it hits me over the head with a hammer and announces "I am a Soft Fekk'n Focus Lens, fer Gawds! sake!!"  The Ricoh, on the other hand, appears to offer a controllable level of softness, much like early large format portrait and pictorialist lenses.

 

 

 

Having struck gold once, the experience motivated me to look for other old first optical element/group focusing lenses for 35mm format cameras.

Bonzo Din shared the fact the a German made Steinheil comes with a front element focusing lens.  It's called the Steinheil 50mm f/2.8 Auto-Cassaron.  Oh boy! quick as a bunny I found and purchased one.  The aperture and focusing ring were sticky, so I disassembled the simple lens as far as I could, applied denatured ETOH to everything trying to unbind the bound bits (kinky! you say).  Cleaned and lubed the focusing threads.  The Steinheil became usable.

 

 

 

What I found is The lens is an implementation of the classic Cooke triplet.  This Steinheil is indeed first element focusing.  The second and third elements are fixed, one on each side of the aperture.  The Steinheil's aperture control mechanism is as simple as can be.  Lens coatings are applied only to the outer surfaces front and back.  Surfaces on the inside of the lens are uncoated.   The lens is obviously designed for lowest cost manufacturing, just like the Ricoh 55mm f/2.2 Riconar.  Cheap, cheap, cheap.

Once my aging mind was coming unstuck, I remembered that Saint Ansel used a Turner Reich 12-1/4" triple convertible as well as a Cooke 12-1/4" series XV triple convertible early on.  I've inspected prints made from negatives exposed using those lenses and the results are quite good. 

 

 

 

In use I've found the softness generated to by the Steinheil to be "gentler" than the Ricoh's.  The German lens is very well behaved across the field.  The extreme edges can be a little soft until stopped way down, but nothing compared with the Ricoh.  The field is as flat as can be.

My tail was wagging like one on a medium sized dog.

Trying to better understand what I was looking at, I found I've forgotten more than a fair bit of triple element three group history.  Wikipedia to the rescue.  Cooke designed the earliest examples of the triplet. See - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooke_triplet

Now I was really happy.  I felt I'd stumbled upon something.  Something secret.  Something delicious.  Something...

 

Except.  Except.  Except.  I didn't.  All too often late to the party, I find everyone who's anyone already knows about three element three group Cooke design lenses for small formats.   

It turns out the Germans, French, English, and Americans were cranking out Cooke triplets by the boats load! for smaller format 620, 120, and 35mm cameras.  The Germans continued this well and deep into the 35mm SLR times (1950's through 1980's).

Ricoh's 55mm that I was first smitten with is actually a four element four group lens.  So I'll not count it in the list that follows.  Simply remember it's cheap, widely available, and can be fun for use in soft focus work.

From Germany, I see the following Pentax M42 thread mount Cooke lenses - 

• E. Ludwig Meritar 50mm f/2.9 - East Germany
• ISCO Göttingen Iscotar 50 mm f/2.8 - Edixa M42 spec
• ISCO Göttingen Iscovitar 50 mm f/2.8 - Pracktica/Pentax M42 spec
• Meyer-Optik Görlitz Domiplan 50mm f/2.8 <- Soap Bubble Bokeh!!!  Ick.  Ack.
• Steinheil 50mm f/2.8 Auto-Cassaron

Browsing old catalogs shows these lenses were available under different model namings and different mounts.  Some lenses outside the M42 list above are more easily adaptable than others and I'm sure anyone with a keen interest in such things can quickly sort out what to do and which lenses merit attention.

I may post more on the topic after an ISCO arrives.