Canon XI lenses

Ray Parkhurst · Posted: Wed Nov 20, 2013 4:58 am Post subject: Canon XI lenses

I have a couple of Canon XI lenses on the way and am wondering what folks can tell me about them. What I know is there were at least 3 types:

50mm f/0.75
65mm f/1.0
82mm f/1.2

I bought copies of the 50mm and the 82mm along with a bunch of macro gear and am patiently waiting for it all to arrive. A little bit of research just has me confused about them, as the results have been inconsistent. Some refs say they are T-mount, but some pics I've seen show no mounting function whatsoever. I gather they have no aperture adjustment, and the pics I've seen taken with them vary from just big blurs to sharp over very narrow DOF. Does anyone have copies of any of these and can share some insight?

kds315* · Expire: 2021-03-09

Short conjugate Xray machine lenses from what I know... Picker Corp. was a famous manufacturer of those.

Read about Picker here: http://www.elcan.com/Experience/SuccessFiles/medicalPicker.php
"James Picker (1882-1963), a Russian Immigrant, established the Picker X-ray Corporation in 1921,
manufacturers of x-ray equipment. " (web source) and here is the amazing Picker company story:
[url]http://www.picker-röntgen.de/picker_history_apalermo.pdf[/url] (link cannot be embedded here...)
"In 1981, GEC acquired Picker Corporation, an American manufacturer of medical imaging equipment.
It merged Picker with Cambridge Instruments, GEC Medical, and American Optical to form Picker International."
see:[url] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric_Company_plc[/url]

The nicest lens is this one, hardly seen, as it has a built in aperture - the only one ever seen of those:
http://www.macrolenses.de/ml_detail_sl.php?ObjektiveNr=153

Usually they are very hard to adapt + use as they have a very short register (few millimeters only sometimes)
and very odd threads, certainly not T-mount ...

http://www.macrolenses.de/ml_detail_sl.php?ObjektiveNr=109

And here a pic shot with it, has massive CA...

which can easily be seen by decomposing the image and finding sharp focus:

Btw. many manufacturers worked for Picker corp seemingly, based on identical
requirements, as I have such lenses (often nearly identical) from Canon, Leitz, ELCAN
(Ernst Leitz CaNada, now Raytheon), DOI, JML, KOWA, De Oude Delft and others.

Here for instance a 0.75/65mm lens made by LEITZ, labeled also PICKER X-RAY CORP.:
http://www.macrolenses.de/ml_detail_sl.php?ObjektiveNr=156

Ray Parkhurst · Posted: Wed Nov 20, 2013 2:53 pm Post subject:

Thanks Klaus, I figured you would have info on them but wasn't expecting so much! I did not check your "special" lens section in macrolens database pages as I usually hang out there in the macro section...

The short register distance reminds me of the 85mm f1 Repro-Nikkor I once owned. It was pretty much impossible to adapt to a camera as the register distance was very small and the lens very large. It was optimized at 1:1 magnification but even pushed against a camera its mag was beyond 1:1 already.

Nevertheless I'm anxious to test these beasts and see what they can do. Hopefully not too much of a waste of time...Ray

kds315* · Expire: 2021-03-09

Great you found that useful Ray! Since I collect (and use, well at times...) such strange lenses since years,
the chances are there that I have such or at least know about them.

The Repro Nikkor seems to be I nice one, but I never really made it to buy one. A friend, Michael Erlewine
uses it with good success on his D800E.

kds315* · Expire: 2021-03-09

Was digging for files when I came across some test shots using the Canon XI 75mm.... shot at f5.6