This week at the Photokina - World of Imaging Fair 2008, Linos/Rodenstock announced a news series of 35mm, Tilt/Shift SLR lenses aimed at today's high-resolution, DSLR camera systems. The new Rodenstock Digaron S+T lenses incorporate a total of three focal lengths, including one macro - 40mm f/4, 80mm f/2.8 and 120mm f/4 Macro. These new, fully manual lenses provided tremendous mechanical control, and significant movements thanks to a very generous optical design, allowing for up to 80mm image circle. These new Rodenstock lenses fill a much needed void in the market, as today's high-resolution DSLR cameras require much better optical designs, and more precise mechanical control.
Below is text from the original press release by Rodenstock, and a photo of these new lenses.
Thursday, September 25 2008 - Cologne, Germany
Professional product and architectural photography from an oblique perspective is characterized by correctly rectified "converging verticals" with or without a remaining perspective. For this kind of images usually an adjustable technical cameras is used. A vertical shift of its lens allows an oblique taking direction downwards for product shots or upwards for building shots without tilting the camera (more than necessary for a remaining perspective), and consequently also its image plane (film or sensor plane). In this way the vertical lines of the photographed products or buildings remain parallel or almost parallel with a remaining perspective. Furthermore, the lens of these cameras can be swung (horizontally) or tilted (vertically) for customizing the wedge-shaped depth of field to the form and position of the subject matter. Therefore the depth of field becomes apparently larger whithout stopping down further. Nowadays full-format sensors of digital 35 mm cameras offer sufficient resolution, low image noise, high dynamic and vivid color saturation even for many professional applications.
For this reason also the lenses of these cameras should be provided with a shift and tilt function in order to avoid converging lines and achieving depth of field without stopping down too much and without losing contrast due to diffraction. So digital 35mm cameras equipped with those lenes, could be used also for product and building photography. The Digaron S+T makes the SLR camera a movable camera.
Now three new Rodenstock "Digaron S+T" lenses (S = Shift,T = Tilt) with the focal lengths of 40mm, 80mm and 120mm let this wish come true without making any compromise: These lenses are designed for the highest demands in optical performance and provided with a shift and tilt mechanism. Thanks to an image circle diameter of 80 mm these lenses allow a parallel lens shift up to 10 mm and a tilt up to 8° simultaneously (thanks to its double 360° rotating mount, one each for the shift and tilt direction) independently of each other and in any direction, for both portrait and landscape format.
The image circle, which is about 20 mm larger than the image circle of conventional shift or shift-and-tilt lenses, allows not only the application of a maximum diagonal shift, but also a maximum shift and tilt in any direction at the same time.
Regards,
Jordan Miller
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