Enlarging Lens

[johnrt]

Hello,

I have been enjoying wet printing some of my 35mm negs taken with an M2 recently, and I've even been authorised to frame and hang a couple!

My enlarger is a very sturdy Axomat 5a and I have been using a 50mm E Rokkor f4.5 lens for printing mostly 5x7 and some 10x8's.

I was thinking of upgrading my lens to a CE Rokkor f2.8 which seems much better quality, but as those print sizes will there really be any noticeable difference?

Grateful for any insight you might have.

John.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

I have no experience with those two, but I have tried three diffrent lenses on same sizes and no diffrence. I'm finding f2.8 to be useful.

 

[johnrt]

I have no experience with those two, but I have tried three different lenses on same sizes and no difference. I'm finding f2.8 to be useful.

Are you finding the extra stop of light mainly useful for focus and composition?

 

[randy stewart]

Lens upgrade

Lens upgrade

The CE line of Minolta enlarging lenses are about as good as they get - on a par with my preferred Fuji and Nikon lenses. At the smaller print sizes you note, it is unlikely that you will see an obvious improvement in sharpness. At 8x10 you might see a slight improvement in resolution, more so in contrast. What you will get is greater ease in focus. I think you would have to go to 11x14 to see a big overall improvement in your prints. Considering the low prices on enlarging lenses, I do the upgrade just to get an illuminated aperture selector and for the occasional larger print.

 

[Steve M.]

The corners will probably be sharper. Your main improvement will be that the 2.8 will be much easier to focus than the lens you're currently using.