Scarlet meets a Soviet legacy :)

[Mick van Rossum, NSC]

Nick, you might be right, but this lens tech had 40+ years experience before he retired a couple years back. He told me mechanically it is so weak that you should not transport this lens top down. The focus is very uneven over a flat image. Most of the time you have to rotate one of the optical parts to get it right. He could not apparrantly. I migth bring it to Truelens services from the UK when they are in Amsterdam at IBCT. They might have a look at it, maybe it is worth to spend a couple of hundreds more on it.

[Mike Garrick]

Everyone seems to agree when mounted they look good ...... BUT are the Lomo zoom lenses worth it ?

From what Mick is implying, optically no they are not...... but that's the 25 to 250. Is it just this Lens group?

Nick, Lomo guru ; ) have you got good results out of the other Lomo zooms or are we just better sticking with the primes? Less mechanics, fixed glass , less stuff to go wrong...?

[Vadim Bobkovsky]

With Epic it's often "all glass no ass", ha ha! Good stuff.

[Mike 'Fireman' Ross]

Is it my imagination or are those rods actually bending...?

[Nick Gardner]

have you got good results out of the other Lomo zooms or are we just better sticking with the primes?

I have limited experience with the zooms. I own two Ekran 25-80s, both from 1991. They are excellent. The mechanics once cleaned and adjusted by Duclos are fine. No issues. I have seen a lot of footage from the 20-120 and it has looked very good. I owned two of those briefly. One I sold before I ever shot anything on it, the other one I took apart. The one I took apart was well made with the soviet equivalent of teflon bearings, and it was a fairly modern design. The original lens was designed and built very well, but there were several places where you could tell that someone repaired it with not factory parts, and didn't do the best job. I suspect that the biggest factor affecting the lomo zooms is who serviced them and how they did it. For example, on the lens I took apart there were very nice little roller bearing assemblies that rode in machined tracks to support the zoom elements. One of them was missing and had been replaced by a poorly fitted brass bushing. That's the kind of thing that will fuck them up. I have never seen the 25-250 in the flesh, but the general impression I get is that it was not as nice as the 20-120. But all that being said, I have seen really lovely footage from the old Foton 37-140 lenses as well. I have one of those with the ananmorphic front, but I am waiting for my PL mount in the mail.

Nick

[Martin Beek]

Can you tell us (and/or show us) something re. sharpness/resolution?

Thanks,

Martin

[Nick Gardner]

Here's a link to some frames #4 is the 25-80 zoom. right click to view larger -

http://reduser.net/forum/showthread....nce&highlight=

[Jesper Sichlau]

The essence of beauty.