Bessa R's first photos with Industar 50

[paulfish4570]

bessa r, f16sunshine's industar 50, walgreens house brand 200 asa color film, walgreens processing, scanning:

some lessons learned:
1) flare is not the industar 50's friend; see the scooter's tote shelf and the visitors parking sign lying on the ground where the sun was reflected.
2) lens may need a tad of shimming. IIRC, i focused on one line or other in some of the closer subjects, and the next item slightly to the rear seems sharper.
3) great variety in light values is not the friend of the walgreens house brand asa 200 film. see the white bucket, the visitors parking sign and the sky, for example.
4) i am having a little trouble framing/aligning properly with the viewfinder bright lines in some photos; must pay closer attention.
5) i am deliriously happy with the bessa. i'll post some b&w later this week shot with the jupiter 8, and compare images to some images shot with the indy 50 on the same roll.
6) your candid comments are most welcome.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

Precise framing is not the RF's forte, so I wouldn't worry to much about that. FSU lenses are all over the place, so having to shim one is not unusual. You'll really like that Jupiter 8. I think it is the best of the FSU lenses.

 

[paulfish4570]

it is mostly a tilt issue in some of the verticle shots. i'll get the hang of it. am eager to process the b&w film. will do so friday ...

 

[Heiko Krause]

What kind of Industar?

What kind of Industar?

What kind of Industar 50 did you use? I just bought a mint collapsible one at eBay. Do you have experiences with those lenses? I've read that it's not possible to collapse them into the body of the Bessa. Thanks for any kind of help. I'm a Bessa R newbie as well 😉

 

[Peter_Jones]

it is mostly a tilt issue in some of the verticle shots. i'll get the hang of it. am eager to process the b&w film. will do so friday ...

Hehe, I do that all the time with my Bessa R2

 

[paulfish4570]

mine's a rigid indy 50 50/3.5. it is my understanding that a lot (all?) of non-cv collapsible lense will hit something when backed all the way in.

 

[paulfish4570]

the indy 50's forte is b&w, i believe. here are some b&w shots with the bessa, bw400cn, walgreens processing, scanning:

i think this is a wonderful combination of lens, film, camera and processing for winter. what say you?

indy handled some side light well in this one:

scene with lots of different tones:

say what? (got to be careful of close focus)

this little lens performed very well with good film; thanks for the tip, andy ...

 

[paulfish4570]

i like the bokeh of this lens at f3.5 ...

 

[Steve M.]

Oooooh, a Weinermobile! I want one. Good lens on your Bessa R. Keep it. They are not all that sharp. FSU quality is all over the place, so if you get a good one don't sell it.

 

[Peter_Jones]

Those B&W shots look fantastic - keep that lens !

 

[Robin P]

When I had a Bessa R I tried the collapsible vsersion of the Industar and used a rubber o-ring to stop it going too far into the body.
Here are a couple of samples.

Cheers, Robin

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Backfocusing at close distances is common with russian lenses. My Industar 50 does a couple inches. I have a Jupiter-8 that did even worse. I had Brian Sweeny shim it for me; he's an RFF member and he did it fast and at a good price. I need to ask him about doing the Industar sometime. The Industar is a Tessar clone, like the Leica Elmar-50 lenses.

 

[-doomed-]

I loved the Rigid I-50 I had . The lense itself was fugly (the style of it was hideous, the lense was in good shape) but it did produce great results.
I loved it on BW400cn and your results on the same film show why. Good stuff.

 

[gb hill]

Before I scrolled down & read/saw the b&w photos taken with the rigid I 50 I was gonna say it's much better suited for b&w. I shot a few frames with it on my Bessa R & was stunned at the quality. Your photos look great, even liking the color ones. Glad you are enjoying the R. The build quality catches some flack but I love mine!

 

[-doomed-]

I liked it for color with fuji superia 400.
There are some in my gallery with it.

 

[rbiemer]

Nice results with the I-50!
You are right about flare, I think. The rigid I-50 uses a difficult to find thread size; 33mm, and screw in hoods are not easy to find but they are out there. The easier thing is to find an a36 sized slip-on or clamp-on hood. A bit "clunky" but a hood is a definite improvement for this lens.
Tilt and framing issues should sort them selves out as you use the camera more.
Good start!
Rob

 

[raid]

The results speak for themselves here. I have a rigid I50 that I find to be very sharp. It does not "look great", but it performs very well. I may be using a squarish Walz lens hood on this lens which is more like a slip-on hood.

 

[raid]

Hi Paul,
I hope that you don't mind my addition of a few old test shots for the I-50. I don't intend to side track your thread.

Here are some older results from a lens comparison.

I-50 rigid at 4.0:

Elmar 5cm 3.5at 4.0:

 

[paulfish4570]

it really is elmar-ish, isn't it?

 

[gb hill]

Paul I noticed that the shots taking with the BW400CN has a slight sepia tint to them. Sometimes I get it really bad. XP-2 is the same. It used to bother me but I found I can totally eliminate it by converting the image to 8 or 16 bit grayscale in my editing program. I thought I'd let you know because if you shoot a lot of this film it's bound to pop up sometime really bad!