Los Tres Amigos = ISCO Vario Lenses Part 1

[JohnBar]

I have been collecting ISCO Vario lenses and I thought I would introduce you to them.

The lenses are

1 ISCO Ultra AV F3.5 200-300mm purchased in England for £20
2 ISCO Cinelux AV F3.5 110-200mm purchased in Germany for €14
3 ISCO AV F3.5 60-110mm purchased in US for $11

So why should I throw my hard earned cash at three obsolete Projection lenses that no one wants anymore?

In this series of three parts you are about to find out why.

Part 1 ISCO Ultra AV F3.5 200-300mm

The lens is shown below followed by more than a few 300mm (possibly one or two 200mm) shots

[iangreenhalgh1]

No aperture, so no depth of field, so not very useful.

IQ looks good enough but not enough dof so not appealing to my eyes.

[luisalegria]

Hey, isolating the subject, its what the homeboys do !
Those subject dudes gotta be lonely, vato !
Well, thats the way I think about tele technique and tele requirements, so there we are.

Interesting light plus subject isolation, plus accurate focus, and catch whatever the subject is at just the right moment and you've got a picture. To go the rest of the way, you add the element of fascinating bokeh, which is one dimension too much for me, I have a simple mind - moment, light, isolation, focus, thats four dimensions, bokeh makes five and I cant get there. With some digital help in taking a few dozen shots where one would have done in the old days.

But still, four elements of a tele picture is almost foolproof, if you can shoot enough frames and get the technical stuff down, and John seems to be there. This looks like a fine lens for that too. The bokeh is not in your face, quite unobtrusive.

I would have cropped #9 the picture of the girl on the riverbank, or looked for an unobstructed angle to get a clean run of the fencing. Also probably tried for a lower angle. And though its a nice enough shot, she's bound to have done something more photogenic at some point. More shots mean more moments that could have been the right one.


Thats a NEX right ?

[RSalles]

Impressive quality glasses, it remains unknown if this quality can be used/converted in final images. I would love if it could, but more than wide open apertures,

Cheers,

Renato

[JohnBar]

Thanks Luis,

Yeah, its a NEX 5N, I wanted a low profile to counteract that 4 inch diameter front optic.

I got lucky with that shot, I saw the cyclists coming up so I hit the squirt button and managed to find an opening between them and also the shot after they had passed. The NEX is quite noisy in burst mode so I figured the 'Liver Birds' would be distracted by the cyclists and wouldnt notice me. I find women have an extra sense and they know when they are being photographed.

Thanks Renato, I have no plans to fit these with iris

[luisalegria]

There I was thinking that I wanted one of these EVIL cameras because they are quiet. I guess not so much.
I coulda woulda shoulda had a pile of great shots recently if it werent for the noise thing.

[JohnBar]

Ah Ha

You be needin the Canon EOS M, which is very very quiet and has the extra reach 1.6x. Its in close out and you should pick one up with lens for well under $200.

I am waiting for my EOSM-M42 adapter from China, thats why I didn't use it today.

[mo]

I like the results,may not understand the technical skills to acheive them, but I think the results are more than acceptable.
My favorite is the bench shot (wish you could have managed to fit the whole seat in but I know there may be reasons you couldn't)...I really like the OOf area where there life ring is.

I am looking forward to your other images and lenses.

[calvin83]

The lens looks impressive. Will you consider adding an aperture to this giant lens?

[JohnBar]

@Mo thanks,

Yeah, I was using the obelisk to mask out street lamp and sign posts, waste bins etc


@Calvin83 thanks,

I have the TX 5.5/360mm if I need more DOF with classic look, I also have AF lenses in this range.
The ISCOs will be used in places where I would not risk an expensive lens dust, sand, rain etc.

I have no intention of modding them for iris, they will be used exclusively for practicing the Oriental



Talking about bargains someone stateside picked up a crazy deal and bought three - yes 3 of these for less than $10.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lot-of-3-Isco-Optic-Ultra-AV-Projector-Lens-200-300mm-7-75-11-75-034-f-3-5-MC-/291158435773?pt=Camera_Lenses&hash=item43ca6527bd&nma=true&si=Q9JYV3%252B3jzKeBQM8Kx%252F0t9Pa53o%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

[Pancolart]

I know this one: ISCO Ultra AV F3.5 200-300mm and it is a mad lens design for sure. You proved that big front glass is able to deliver.

[iangreenhalgh1]

Has anyone ever tried putting an aperture in one of these?

[JohnBar]

OK, a few more from yesterday's session.

Please bear in mind that the quality of distance shots are largely dependent on atmos conditions

[luisalegria]

Would be interesting to see 1:1 crops to judge resolution/CA, etc.

[JohnBar]

[iangreenhalgh1]

IQ looks nothing special before processing, shame we can't see stopped down performance.

[luisalegria]

Well, we have to consider that this thing is a 300mm f/3.5, which isn't a usual sort of lens.
Not a lot of 300mm's at f/4 give perfect results.

[iangreenhalgh1]

[luisalegria]

Yeah, but if you have a 300mm f/3.5, its because you want to use it at f/3.5
Or I think that way anyway.
If I wanted to shoot at f/8-f/11 any old 300mm would do. Well, it would do for me.

[JohnBar]

Personally, I am not a pixel peeper, I am more concerned with its transfer function and ability to represent the dynamic range of a scene and of course a little PP is easy these days. Considering the price paid its a no brainer for me.

Having just printed off a 18x12 inch of the Pirate shot at close to 300 dpi, it looks very acceptable to me.

[iangreenhalgh1]