[rollei_list] Re: Scanner advice needed, please

  • From: "Richard Knoppow" <dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Sun, 30 Jul 2006 15:05:37 -0700


----- Original Message ----- From: "Jerry Lehrer" <jerryleh@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <rollei_list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, July 30, 2006 2:54 PM
Subject: [rollei_list] Re: Scanner advice needed, please



Richard,

A number of years ago, a photographer friend of mine obtained
several dozen of Hurrel's LF negatives of "unknown starlets".
They were extensively retouched. Prints made from them were
beautiful.

I believe that the Imagon lens is the type of lens currently use
for controllable soft focus with a sharp basis.

Jerry

Its interesting to have actual evidence. I don't know what type of lens Hurrel used, perhaps more than one kind. The Imagon is an interesting design which combines control of spherical aberration with some diffusion. The large aperture at the center of each plate produces the main image, which can be quite sharp. The small holes on the periphery of the plate allow light to enter at the periphery of the lens where there is a lot of spherical, they also act like an array of pin-hole lenses, generating a sort of diffusion that is hard to obtain any other way.
Most soft focus lenses were simple doublets (to correct for chromatic aberration, with a lot of spherical. As they are stopped down they become sharper. Both the Kodak Portrait lens and the Wollensak soft focus lenses are of this type. Another form of soft focus lens is a Triplet with movable center element. The correction for spherical varies with the position of the element _and_ with f/stop, so a variety of effects can be gotten. The famous Cooke portrait lens, now back in production, is an example of this type.
Playboy is also reputed to have relied on retouching of 8x10 negatives rather than makeup for their centerfolds.

---
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx 

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