A few days ago I was discussing photography with a
local artist who is also interested in vintage cameras.
“Yes, a camera cannot take photos, but a lens does” he said. “There is nothing like walking
in a crowd carrying a 1940s Exakta Varex sporting a 58mm Carl Zeiss Biotar” he reminisced.
It was a common moment when two anachronistic
photographers talk about the “golden age” of cameras…
“I have a couple of Exaktas made in Dresden and a
few Carl Zeiss lenses” I replied. “In fact have a 75mm Biotar f1.5 in Exakta
mount. And a 58mm Biotar in M42 mount which I have not used for decades.”
He almost fell off his chair. “A 75mm f1.5?”
“Yes, and have used it recently.”
Of course he wanted to see the lens and photos I had
taken.
…For all those who have been in photography for a
while, Carl Zeiss lenses have a special place in their hearts. But the old
ones, many prewar models, still keep a mystique. There is something about the glass
of these lenses that modern designs cannot reproduce. And that is not
romanticism, there are millions of old photographs to prove it.
So, I went back to my “camera wall”, an entire wall of
my studio with shelves where my photographic gear is displayed, and looked for an
Exakta Varex and a few vintage Carl Zeiss lenses to make my friend happy.
Here is a photo of the Exakta Varex with the 75mm
Biotar, along with the lovely zebra 50mm Pancolar, and the 58mm Biotar. All are
from the 1950s.
In the recent years I used the Varex and the 75mm
Biotar for portraiture work because the lens at f1.5 almost separates the
subject from the background, and provides a distinctly “Biotar” blurring of the
background.
The picture at the outset was taken with this lens. The
subject seems to pop-out of the frame and the focusing on his eyes resulted in a
sharp even if eerie look. As for the soft background although taken
contre-jour, it still has a lot of texture, albeit wrapped in a dreamy veil.
As I was looking through my extensive collection of
cameras and lenses, I picked up a German Praktica, also waist level finder
design like the Exakta, but a much cheaper and simpler camera in M42 mount. Here is the Praktica with another cult-followers’
prewar Carl Zeiss lens, the 50mm Tessar f2.4.
I have often used the Biotar 58mm f2 with the
Praktica, but purely when I was in a nostalgic mood to play with vintage
photographic equipment. Indeed, I never enjoyed using the Biotar 58mm since it
is a pre-set model meaning that I had to rotate three rings (the focusing ring,
the aperture ring and the pre-set aperture ring) before I was ready to press
the shutter. Needless to say that is an impossible process during street
photography!
As a remedy to this archaic series of steps, I
switched the Biotar to a 1970s Japanese Fujica AZ-1 which also has an Aperture
Priority function regulated electronically and accepts all lenses in the M42
mount. Of course the Biotar being non-automatic lens, I can use it only in
stop-down aperture set, which is still much faster than turning two sets of
rings!
Here is the Fujica with the Biotar on it, and next
to it a 1980s Soviet Zenit camera that I used frequently then with a Soviet
copy of the Biotar 58mm called Helios-44-2.
A
historical background note: Soviet camera manufacturing relied on German products
before and after WWII. Indeed the first Soviet camera, a rangefinder copy of
the venerable German Leica II, was built in the late 1930s. And, many of the 35mm
camera lenses were either almost-exact copies of the German optical formulae,
or heavily influenced by them. Unfortunately the production quality assurance was
very lax in the Soviet manufacturing plants and the lenses quality was a
hit-or-miss. Exceptions do exist however, and the Helios (which came in four
different models with the same optical formula) produced images very comparable
to the German Biotar 58mm f2 lens.
And that is why I include the Zenit camera and its
Helios 58mm (model 44-2) in this discussion as I have used the Helios with good
success in the past 3 decades not only because of its reliability and output,
but because it is much easier to use than the Biotar even with the same 3 rings
the Soviets maintained in the design of their copy. Why? Because the pre-set aperture
ring is much more fluid than the older Biotar, so I can rotate the focusing
ring with my left hand’s middle and “ring” fingers (!) while my index finger
rotates the pre-set ring easily. Thus even with the 3 steps needed to take a
photo, I can complete them as fast as if I were using a camera having an
automatic lens during street photography.
While the construction of all German lenses in the
1940s and 1950s is a piece of art one would enjoy holding to appreciate, the
Biotar line was also famous for the swirl it produced in the background when the
lens was wide open say at f2 for the 58mm and f1,5 for the 75mm. The swirl gave
the blurring (or bokeh) a unique and
much loved effect to portraiture photography.
Well, the Helios Soviet lens does have that swirl as
well, perhaps not as dreamy-smooth as the Biotar though. So, instead of the
Biotar, I used the Helios on my Zenit camera to take photos of my kids in the
1990s – it was much easier to complete the 3-step process on the Soviet lens
while kids were constantly in motion…
Here is an example – my daughter Ani making a funny
face. The shot was taken in contre-jour but the background was still nicely
blurred with that famous swirl! Given that the Zenith has a top speed of 1/500th sec and that this photo was taken in bright sunshine, I assume that I set the aperture to around f5.6. One can appreciate how much more of a swirl there would be expected if I had taken it with the lens full open (f 2)with the Fujica AZ-1 that has a top speed of 1/1000th sec and an exposure compensation dial.
… My artist friend was in his own blurred and
swirling state of being when he played with the cameras and looked at the
photos.
“And these are only a few of the Carl Zeiss lenses
you have!” he exclaimed while looking on the shelves of my camera wall.
“The others are purely for historical testimonial –
some, I have never even used once to take photos” I explained.
“Ah, there is a whole new phase to your life as a
photographer” he said after a pregnant pause, “you should spend the next decade
doing portraiture work with these 80 year old German lenses.”
Hmm. That would require people with much patience
waiting for the multiple steps to take place before I press the trigger and a
cloth or bronze curtain travels horizontally or folds vertically in an old
camera to expose the film pellicule in the hope of starting the long darkroom work
hours of developing a photo!
August 6, 2022
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2022
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