Big Buttery Bokeh; Ultra Fast Portrait Lenses for Phase One Bodies - Part 2

[Doug Peterson]

Just posted the next part in my article series Big Buttery Bokeh; Ultra Fast Portrait Lenses for Phase One Bodies which briefly covers the Mamiya 80mm f/1.9 and Schneider 80mm f/2.8 LS.

A few of the images featured:





Also recently posted:
- IQ380 vs IQ350 Long Exposure Test
- Schneider 35LS Lens Test

[Bo Dez]

I really appreciate the effort involved in this series, well done and thanks Doug. The 135 f2 is very interesting. But IMO, Medium format companies need to offer fast f2 native lenses, at least one 80mm f2 to test the water for commercial viability (I think it will sell very well). Fiddling about with old adapted lenses, with no auto stop down aperture and other potential issues does not bode well in professional situations.

[BernardLanguillier]

I love the 4th image of the little girl, thanks for sharing.

Cheers,
Bernard

[Doug Peterson]

I really appreciate the effort involved in this series, well done and thanks Doug. The 135 f2 is very interesting. But IMO, Medium format companies need to offer fast f2 native lenses, at least one 80mm f2 to test the water for commercial viability (I think it will sell very well). Fiddling about with old adapted lenses, with no auto stop down aperture and other potential issues does not bode well in professional situations.

I agree!

I'd love to see a native-modern-autofocus-leaf-shutter'd Full-frame 645 lens with a maximum aperture of at least f/2 and a nice look. Our clients often under estimate how shallow the DOF will be for an f/2.8 lens on a high res FF645 sensor (since they are usually coming from FF35 where f/2.8 isn't anything special), but there are times where you want to crank the amps to 11, and an modern 150mm f/2 or 80 f/2 would be a great way to crank the DOF to 11.

Hassy's HC100/2.2 comes closest in my opinion. But having played with some of these older or non-photo-purposed lenses lately leaves me feeling there is room for something more.

Using these older lenses has been a lot of fun, but I don't see much application for them in higher pressure faster paced professional commercial shooting. They are definitely fiddly! Maybe as a "bonus" supplement to the shoot after you've already gotten safety shots.

One note, the ability to shoot from within live view on the XF really does open some (narrow) applications up for these lenses that otherwise wouldn't be viable. You can open live view, tap wherever in the frame you want to focus, adjust the focus in real time, and capture the shot without leaving live view. Not stellar for hand holding (because the act of zooming in makes it easy to focus but hard to frame) but on a tripod or monopod it's very doable.

[Doug Peterson]

I love the 4th image of the little girl, thanks for sharing.

Cheers,
Bernard

Coming from a great photographer like you that means a lot to me!

I don't see myself as in any way on par with some of the extremely talented world class photographers that we have as clients or that grace this forum. I see myself more as Q from the James Bond franchise. The guy that helps the hero by providing the gadgets and technical knowledge.

But I like to imagine Q went out and blew shit up for fun every once in a while.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q_(James_Bond)

[Bo Dez]

I agree!

I'd love to see a native-modern-autofocus-leaf-shutter'd Full-frame 645 lens with a maximum aperture of at least f/2 and a nice look. Our clients often under estimate how shallow the DOF will be for an f/2.8 lens on a high res FF645 sensor (since they are usually coming from FF35 where f/2.8 isn't anything special), but there are times where you want to crank the amps to 11, and an modern 150mm f/2 or 80 f/2 would be a great way to crank the DOF to 11.

Hassy's HC100/2.2 comes closest in my opinion. But having played with some of these older or non-photo-purposed lenses lately leaves me feeling there is room for something more.

Using these older lenses has been a lot of fun, but I don't see much application for them in higher pressure faster paced professional commercial shooting. They are definitely fiddly! Maybe as a "bonus" supplement to the shoot after you've already gotten safety shots.

One note, the ability to shoot from within live view on the XF really does open some (narrow) applications up for these lenses that otherwise wouldn't be viable. You can open live view, tap wherever in the frame you want to focus, adjust the focus in real time, and capture the shot without leaving live view. Not stellar for hand holding (because the act of zooming in makes it easy to focus but hard to frame) but on a tripod or monopod it's very doable.

Thanks, yes I agree live view really shakes things up in this regard and it will be interesting to see how the Phase develops over it's life. I like F2 because it gives a similar look to my Noctilux, being close to f1 in FF terms. Something I am trying to replicate in in 645 MF. I love the Zeiss Blad planar 110 f2 too, stunning lens but of corse getting old now and it's so much better on 6x6, with a lot of the magic happening in the edges of the frame. I still think it's a shame the Contax 645 died off because that 80mm is really special. I've used the Hasselbads for a while and while in certain applications the lens are great, I'm not so enamoured by their rendering compared to the Zeiss lenses. The 100 f2.2 is nice enough but the bokeh looks somewhat reminiscent of a Gaussian blur job in photoshop.

again, thanks for the very interesting article, I can see there is a lot of work involved in it!

[Doug Peterson]

Some of the lenses from this series are now listed in the For Sale section.

Need to raise some funds for an engagement ring.

http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=105553.0
http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=105552.0

[eronald]

$200 110mmF2 Planar for Hassy is reasonably sharp and has a lot of bokeh. There are some more recent and expensive versions, and clean samples of those are expensive, but I bought two knocked-around copies in shop windows in Europe, and a $20 cheap chinese Mamiya adapter.  Of course I am not in the Doug Peterson ligue of bokeh, but even flying coach you do get there ... The thing to know if you get this lens is that it is much better if you manage to find the corresponding hood in the trash section of the same shop, and you need to do some sort of Hassy V lens trick to cock the aperture and make it work properly.

Edmund

[BernardLanguillier]

Need to raise some funds for an engagement ring.

Assuming you aren't buying the ring for a friend, congratulations in advance.

Cheers,
Bernard

[eronald]

Assuming you aren't buying the ring for a friend, congratulations in advance.

Cheers,
Bernard

Bernard - I can see you are volunteering to photograph this marriage which Doug cannot cover because of a prior engagement

Edmund

[BernardLanguillier]

Bernard - I can see you are volunteering to photograph this marriage which Doug cannot cover because of a prior engagement

Well, if all expenses are paid and if Doug doesn't mind me photographying him and his future wife the way I do photograph montains (think stitching and DoF stacking), it would be my pleasure.

But I'd be surprised if Doug were OK to have such an important day captured with a mere Nikon camera. If an XF+IQ350 is part of the deal, then I'll consider it seriously.

Cheers,
Bernard

[eronald]

Well, if all expenses are paid and if Doug doesn't mind me photographying him and his future wife the way I do photograph montains (think stitching and DoF stacking), it would be my pleasure.

Cheers,
Bernard

Bernard,

 I am sure you could make a nice 44 sharp inch print of a portrait closeup that shows all the crags and flora

Edmund

[KevinA]

Would it be possible to use the old Kodak portrait lenses on the Phase? I have the 405mm which was for 5x7, I know they did a 5x4 version as well. Wide open background buttery takes on a new meaning, much nicer than the Imogon portrait lens.

[Doug Peterson]

Would it be possible to use the old Kodak portrait lenses on the Phase? I have the 405mm which was for 5x7, I know they did a 5x4 version as well. Wide open background buttery takes on a new meaning, much nicer than the Imogon portrait lens.

Since the Phase bodies have focal plane shutters (in addition to the option of their own Leaf Shutter lens line) you can use just about any piece of glass you want. Obviously you'll need to find or make a physical light-tight adapter.

Bear in mind that most ultra-fast lenses made for 4x5 and 5x7 will have apertures that, when used with a 645 sized sensor, are not that fast. For instance an f/2.8 lens on 4x5 was "ultra fast", but on 645 is just "normal fast". That's one reason I sought out the https://digitaltransitions.com/blog/dt-blog/fast-portrait-lens-phase-one which was designed for medium format rather than large format.