Gold-Standard Enlarger Lenses

[16:9]

From 165 enlarger lenses graded so far (as taking lenses), I thought it might be useful to publish a quick 'hall of fame'. If you think a lens is conspicuously absent, please shout - but those shown below have now earned permanent hall of fame residence.

Metric 1: The Best 50-60mm
Superlative excellence in all categories – including chromatic and geometric aberration, drawing style, and ability to perform at longer working distances. Currently only six lenses have reached this level, but the club is open for more members (looking at you elusive Computar 55/1.9). In alphabetical order:

A. Fujinon EX 50/2.8
B. Minolta CE 50/2.8
C. Nikon EL 50/2.8 N
D. Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon-N 50/2.8
E. Schneider Apo-Componon Makro-Iris 60/4
F. Schneider Componon-S 50/2.8 [16828]

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Metric 2: Best 70-105mm
Superlative excellence in all categories – including chromatic and geometric aberration, drawing style, and ability to perform at longer working distances. Nine lenses currently qualify. In alphabetical order:

A. Agfa Color-Solagon DI 70/4.5
B. Fujinon EX 75/4.5
C. Fujinon EX 90/5.6
D. Meopta Meogon 80/2.8
E. Meopta Meogon 80/4
F. Nikon 80/5.6 N
G. Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon-N 80/4
H. Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon-N 105/4
I. Schneider Apo-Componon HM 90/4.5

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Metric 3: Gold-standard at working apertures, near distance.
This metric most closely approximates performance as an enlarger lens, and requires a lens to score an average of better than 9.0% from f5.6-8, across the frame at a working distance of under 1m. Note the presence of a 'standard' modern prime for reference.

In descending order of image quality:

Meopta Meogon 80/2.8: 92.3%
Nikon EL-Nikkor N 50/2.8: 91.6%
Sigma 50mm f1.4 Art DG 50/1.4: 91.5%
Fujinon EX 50/2.8: 91.4%
Schneider Componon-S HM 50/2.8: 91.4%
Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon-N 105/4: 91.6%
Minolta C.E. Rokkor 50/2.8: 91.1%
Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon-N 50/2.8: 90.9%
Schneider Apo Componon HM 60/4: 90.8%
Schneider Apo Componon Makro Iris 60/4: 90.8%
Nikon EL-Nikkor N 80/5.6: 90.8%
Schneider Componon-S 50/2.8 [16828]: 90.4%
Agfa Color-Solagon DI 70/4.5: 90.1%
Meopta Meogon-S 80/4: 90.1%
Schneider Apo Componon HM 90/4.5: 90%
Schneider Apo Componon HM Makro Iris 90/4.5: 90%
Fujinon EX 75/4: 90%
Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon 45/2.8: 89.9%
Schneider Componon-S 50/2.8 [10146]: 89.9%
Schneider Componon-S 50/2.8 [14849]: 89.9%
Agfa Color-Solagon DII 80/4.5: 89.8%
Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon 50/2.8 [V1]: 89.6%
Rodenstock Apo-Rodagon 50/2.8 [V2]: 89.6%
Leitz Wetzlar Focotar 50/4.5: 89.5%
Nikon EL-Nikkor N 63/2.8: 89.5%
Beseler HD 50/2.8: 89.5%
Rodenstock Rodagon [V3] 50/2.8: 89.5%
Fujinon EX 90/5.6: 89.5%
Minolta C.E. Rokkor 80/5.6: 89.5%

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The list will be updated. Comments and suggestions welcome . . .

[Paulius]

The list is impressive!

For the last four years I have switched to enlarger lenses on my Sony cameras, also using a long lenses from a view systems. Since that I forgot about distortion and aberration of any kind. Also my photo bag became significantly smaller, containing 4-5 lenses.
In my opinion, the Schneider Componon-S 50/2,8 is better than El-Nikkor, but, may be it is just a subjective judgment, or defective El-Nikkor I have.

[kds315*]

ehemm, not happy to critisize your certainly enormous effort to do all those "testings", but it makes not much sense, well more precisely it disqualifies the test results, if first it is not well defined what a "100% lens" is , so any such rating without a reference is useless IMHO

The "winner" being the MEOGON immediately triggered my suspicion as it does not correlate with my own experiences as well as many similar published tests over the years. For sure the Apo EL Nikkor will blow it out of the water easily....

PS: since when is a "Sigma 50mm f1.4 Art DG 50/1.4" an ENLARGER lens??

[16:9]

All critique welcome. There's quite a lengthy page elsewhere on Delta explaining the test methodology and biases.

It became clear, reviewing the 60-year history of enlarger lens reviews, that a grading scheme cannot be empirically perfect. Like the news, you're always absorbing someone's unspoken weighting of priorities. I've tried to declare ours as transparently as possible.

A rating of 100% is - partly - defined as fully resolving a 5 micron 35mm sensor. I discuss the practical problems and implications of this on the site, and why I've then chosen to conflate resolution, contrast and aberrations into a single 'mark out of ten', which also reflects performance under the scrutiny of a 3.3 micron sensor.

There's inevitably an element of subjective judgment about it, and many ways the same data set could be summarised and communicated. As the mission objective is to evaluate them as taking lenses, it was natural to compare them to a well-known, commonly available, cross-platform benchmark: Sigma primes. The best are close enough to today's 'state of the Art': centre-frame performance of the 40 and 105 Art is a reference for 2022. However, the best lenses of 2032 will doubtless creep closer to 'perfection'.

My rating system for Delta is a log curve – 100% is an ideal, rather than a reality. The degree to which its notionally attainable is an arcane debate. What's rather easier to demonstrate is how old enlarger lenses compare to today's references - and even those it would unwise to rate 'perfect'.

As to the Hall of Fame - well, there are six categories: one for f2.8 performance averaged across the frame; one for f4-f8 performance averaged across three apertures and across the frame; one for f5.6-f8 performance, again averaged across the frame. And testing at 50cm and 10m doubles the number of categories.

A different set of rules would generate different rankings. For instance, insisting on these distance targets disadvantages lenses optimised for high magnification. We see Delta's bias toward general-purpose working distances: 'arm's length and above'. Several other sites cover high-mag well enough. This filter makes some very fine lenses look rather ordinary: ie, Printing Nikkors, Leitz Focotars, Makro-Symmars - perhaps, too, the Apo-EL Nikkor 105 - which I haven't yet tracked down or tested. Help there appreciated . . .

I've resisted the temptation to declare any lens 'the best', because 'horses for courses' applies: within the context of a typical working distances, at a specific range of apertures, at a certain focal length, and if Zone C performance is critical, a given lens may excel. The Meogon 80/2.8 is unmistakably exceptional at f5.6-8 at distances under 2m. However, it's not in the running for any accolade at any aperture at 10m, or at f2.8 - where it's outperformed by a good projector lens.

As I wrote elsewhere, the focal length of 75-90mm has obvious inherent advantages over 50mm with regard to full frame corner performance. It's a sweet spot.

Almost unrelated to the above, I'm also trying to communicate the 'wide angle' drawing style of each lens, quite apart from their 'zoomed-in' performance. Here there are fewer metrics.

[16:9]

The lists above are overdue an update - almost 200 lenses now have tested for basic resolution/contrast/aberration performance and awarded a percentage mark.

One caveat: listing them in order implies quite a gap in performance between 'the best' lens in position 1 and a lens way down the list in position 10. If the same data was plotted graphically, it would look more like an indistinguishable cluster: at 'normal' working distances – and especially at f5.6-f11 - most good enlarger lenses perform very similarly - very well. At longer distances, none are as sharp as a good modern taking lens. This becomes especially obvious when you compare them with good M43 lenses at 3.3 microns.

The 90% bar required to reach 'Gold' was carefully chosen to distinguish a usefully small group of the best enlarger lenses. I'm confident that if you look closely, you'll see that 0.5% difference between lens A and lens B, but it won't be drastically obvious. There's a distinct ceiling at around 92%: the best enlarger lenses almost reach it. At distance, the best taking lenses easily exceed it – especially with regard to corner performance. In fact, it would be true to say that enlarger lenses are limited to the low 90% range because none have critically sharp corners at distance.

Which raises something I want to double down on in my comment above: the higher the magnification range, the more specialised is the optimisation of the lens. Once upon a time taking lenses were poorly corrected for sub-1m working distances, and for many years a good enlarger lens was a better option for short-range work - better even than many 'macro' lenses. But modern lenses excel up close, too – and 1:1 is a different animal to 3:1 and 5:1. All too often, tests are contrived to make lenses like Printing Nikkors look good. Of course this is implicit in their use-case: such lenses weren't meant to be plucked from their native application: they excel at what they do, and if you want to do something very, very similar, they are wonderful.

The interesting thing about enlarger lenses is that they had to work in a relatively wide range of magnifications, and at distances that more closely corresponded to general photography - there have been a million 'cinematic close-ups', but only one Phase IV. They adapt more readily to this role than industrial lenses that are frequently 'one trick ponies', despite their legendary reputation and huge price tags.

These may be obvious points, but I don't feel these fundamentals - especially with regard to correct optimisation for working distance and magnification - are well-enough appreciated by the photographic community. It's felt somehow that a great lens is a great lens, and will therefore be great at everything. The practical reality is quite different.

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[Ray Parkhurst]

My reaction to your list was similar to that of Klaus, that it seemed opposite of my experience. Almost exactly opposite in fact, such that I am wondering why it is the case. I realized that my work has been in using these lenses as macro lenses rather than actual enlarging lenses printing film. Given that my results were similar to those of other macro photographers, I did not question my results, and others have used my reviews as references, though not so much as those of Klaus and others before me. Could there be a complete disconnect between the use of enlarging lenses for macro versus printing? Why would this be the case?

[16:9]

A few points seem worth clarifying:

1. The 'Gold Standard' lens list I posted here in May only (necessarily) relates to lenses tested so far. Many more have now been tested, so I owe the thread an update.

2. The order in which they are (necessarily) written may create a sense that Lens 1 strongly outperforms Lens 10. However lenses on the Gold shortlist perform very, very similarly. For instance, recent acquisition of slightly cleaner Fujinon EX75 nudged its rating from high Silver to a low Gold. One of my objectives was to reliably differentiate a Gold-rated lens as a clear notch above those rated Silver, in turn above Bronze and 'Soft'. Debate over where they rank within that category (especially Gold) is an exercise in hair-splitting about which it's difficult to make an unambiguously definitive statement. I'm presenting what I've found, along with many (inevitable) caveats. The ten samples you test may well rank slightly differently; the more samples are tested the more accurate the picture will be. I would encourage all forum members and experienced testers to run the same experiment with the same conditions and different serials - let's compare notes.

3. The DELTA (originally Digital Enlarging Lens Test Archive) ranking is a specific criterion with its own set of (broadly consistent) metrics and standards.
It averages rendition across the frame at combinations of (usually small) apertures at working distances of 1-10m. The performance delta of different magnification ranges is so great that, in an ideal world, discussion about lens excellence would be compartmentalised into increasingly narrow niches as magnification increases.
DELTA's 'Near Distance f.6-8' metric (deliberately) corresponds (roughly) to use as an enlarger lens, but working in the macro/micro range, - typically with the lens reversed - moves the conversation into an entirely different arena about which I don't wish to comment beyond noting (again) that Printing Nikkors are wonderful at 1:1, but make mediocre portrait lenses.

Ray - when you say the above list is 'opposite of your experience', can you give specific examples? In advance, I would say:

A. if you found a particular Bronze-rated lens was better than a Gold-rated one, I'd revisit the 'under-rated' one with a different sample. Perhaps that copy, or that test, that day, is in error. As you know, it can happen.

B. If you're quibbling over the running order within the top ten, I would have no problem with that - this group, in this context, are hard to tell apart at best. Given sample variation, practically, impossible.

C. If you feel a Gold-rated lens doesn't deserve its rating, well - I would comment that resolution can't be faked. If I'm getting results at that level, there's only one explanation - within the context of f5.6-f8 performance at 1-10m distance, oriented rear-thread first.

D. If you feel an unlisted lens deserves Gold-rating, it's either because I've assigned it a lower rating (see A) or because I've not yet tested it. DELTA knows 1,300 more enlarger lenses than I've yet had the chance to acquire - bear with . . .

[Ray Parkhurst]

[blotafton]

My go to site for macro lenses is https://www.closeuphotography.com/schneider-componon-35mm-f4-lens-test

If I remember correctly the Apo Rodagon preformed well there among the 50's.

[Ray Parkhurst]

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[Ray Parkhurst]

[16:9]

If you're doing it right, the outcome is often surprising!

This exercise has certainly smacked me about the face with the importance of optimisation for magnification - in light of which I realised that testing enlarger lenses as high-magnification macro lenses was as 'unfair' as testing them as portrait and landscape lenses.

The Near-Distance f5.6-f8 metric was chosen to evaluate 'arm's length' performance (ie, food and product photography, cinematic close-up, etc) and to comment on how enlarger lenses behave as enlarger lenses. You'll see from this article that I was interested in all previous attempts to do this, and I hope DELTA does offer the definitive assessment – it's certainly the largest undertaking of its type.
https://deltalenses.com/index.php/2022/02/24/enlarger-lenses-reviewing-the-reviews/

I would like to think that film photographers of the present and future could rely 100% on a healthy Gold-rated lens to give the highest standard of enlargement.

There is also an agenda to exploit the potential of enlarger and projector lenses for creative cinema and stills work and to place all these 'off-piste' optics on the demanding, but level, playing field offered by mirrorless digital cameras.

For macro work, I would refer - and defer - to Ray and Robert's testing. I don't even go there. But there's more to industrial, projection and enlargement lenses than the domain of the tiny, and that's where I hope DELTA will be useful - as well as being the largest and most detailed catalogue so far compiled.

[16:9]

Incidentally, I would like to think that one day we could combine all our work into a larger tome.

In the meantime, I'm adding links to DELTA wherever possible that connect a catalogued lens to your and Robert's reviews, to offer a fuller perspective on their behaviour at different magnifications. Putting all that together, with pictures, would really be definitive.

[kymarto]

You missed the best of the best of the best, the Apo El Nikkor 105 5.6

[D1N0]

Does anybody know about the Komuranon-s 50mm/3.5?

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[D1N0]

[simple.joy]

[D1N0]

It really comes down to the optics I guess. Komura produced their own lenses so maybe they just acquired/licensed the optical scheme. Or they just kind of copied the El-Nikkor.