Kyoei Optical Co. LTD. Acall 105mm f3.5

[Guest]

I am requesting a spectral plot of the following lens or it's clones. I am also requesting side by side real world photos in UVA around 365nm of flowers to other workhorse UV lenses such as the Ultra Achromatic Takumar, Quartz Takumar or UV-Nikkor. 

 

Name of lens: Kyoei Optical Co. LTD. Acall 105mm f3.5 

 

Formula: Triplet

 

Mount: M39, M42

 

Clones

• Soligor
• Sankyo Koki Komura

 

Derivatives

• Kyoei Super-Acall
• Petri Orikkor

 

Source:

 

https://photographyoftheinvisibleworld.blogspot.com/2013/02/soligor-kyoei-105mm-lens-for-reflected.html

 

Samples take with this lens: 

 

https://www.ultravioletphotography.com/content/index.php?/topic/4868-liriope-muscari-variegated-lilyturf/

 

Photo of the lens:

 

 

 

[dabateman]

Message Cadmium, 

He has a UV Nikon 105mm and Dr. Schmitt says he discovered it.

Cadmium also discovered a 400mm f6.3 lens that I actually own but still haven't tested yet, even though I have had it for 10 years now. 

[Cadmium]

David, you mean the 500mm (not 400mm), which are rare, but not particularly good for UV or for sharpness, especially with the rear glass filter installed which cuts UV.
 

The best I have for you is the full comparisons of Kuri lenses with the Sparticle.

You can make some kind of assessment of UV performance between those lenses with that perhaps.
I never use any of them except the 35mm. The 35 and the 80 are particularly good for UV. The 80 is a little hard to find also, and it is not made in the Kuri brand, only as Kyoei.

The Kuri 50mm will often be seen on eBay, but it is worthless for UV.

Here you go:

 

 

[Guest]

Cadmium, let me know if you are okay with this alteration to your image.

 

I took the well known 35mm f/3.5 and set it below the 105mm f/3.5 for easier comparison.

 

Thanks!

 

[Bill De Jager]

I have some preliminary results in monochrome.  The good news is that the Kyoei 105mm f/3.5 and 135mm f/3.5 both work in UV and show the characteristic floral signature of many Asteraceae.

 

[EDIT: I made basic photographic errors in taking the photos originally posted here.  The results were misleading regarding the quality of the two lenses I tested in comparison to the UV-Nikkor.  Feedback was very helpful in correcting these problems.  Replacement photos have been posted in a new post below. ]

 

The bad news is that contrast leaves a lot to be desired, especially with the 105mm lens.  Sharpness is not as good as with the UV-Nikkor though that's to be expected. I'm only posting photos from the Kyoei lenses taken at f/11 (for now at least) because at f/4 they are not at all sharp in UV.  I did not test intermediate apertures.

 

Materials and methods:

 

Photos taken 2021 October 09

Light source: Sunlight, early afternoon (taking into account Daylight Savings Time).  Latitude ~38 degrees, clear skies, no aerial smoke thanks to a recent frontal passage from the Pacific Ocean (wildfire smoke has been a large concern in recent years in California)

Subject: Ornamental cut sunflowers purchased the same day as the photos were taken.  The flowers were in a vase of water.

Background: White garage door

Camera: Sony A6000, wide-spectrum converted at Lifepixel

Lenses: Nikon 105mm f/4.5 UV-Nikkor, Kyoei 105mm f/3.5 Super-Acall, Kyoei 135mm f/3.5 Super-Acall

Filter: Baader-U filter, remounted to a 52mm ring

Lens adapters: LTM to Sony E-mount, Nikon F to E-mount

Exposures: ISO 1600, f/11

 

Monochrome results:

 

These have had their exposures adjusted in Adobe Camera Raw.  The two Kyoei lenses have low contrast in UV, and in an effort to match the background I may have slightly overbrightened them.   Contrast, highlights, and shadows were not adjusted, to give a better idea of lens performance in UV.

 

First, the UV-Nikkor:

 

[Deleted]

 

Next, the Kyoei 105/3.5

 

[Deleted]

 

Finally, the Kyoei 135/3.5:

 

[Deleted]

 

I'm going to speculate that the lens coatings on the Super-Acalls may be hampering UV performance.  It's possible that earlier versions of these lenses may perform somewhat better in UV.

 

I apologize for the dust on the sensor!

 

[Guest]

I think everyone expected the favorite to win but something is fishy with that Acall 105mm photo.

 

I was blasting 560watts into my copy and the contrast was excellent at f11 and f16. I do wonder about the coatings. Maybe there is light leak within the lens barrel. 
 

What does a visible light photo look like with your copy of the 105mm Acall? Can not having a shade cause contrast loss like that in reflected UV?

 

Thanks for the test photos.

[Guest]

This flower is from an upcoming series. I went ahead and took a quick photo with the Acall 105mm f3.5 in M39 mount before it withered.

 

Sony a6000 hot mirror removed, f/11, Baader U-Filter, 50mm focus helical extension tube, 2 strobes with beauty dish reflectors and plastic diffusers at full power (560 Watts). Working distance half a meter. Standard picture profile, white balance in post, no color adjust, no EV push, no contrast adjust, no shadows or highlights or blacks adjusted. Basically straight out of the camera.

 

Strobes at that close of a distance are enough to over power the sun. Now they weren't overhead or pointing back at the lens. I also didn't have a shade. Glare probably wasn't much of a factor here. The backdrop was a piece of paper painted with Krylon flat black.

 

 

 

Crop

 

[colinbm]

Excellent

[Guest]

Just for posterity a flower that reports in the 350-360nm range of yellow as seen by Cadmiums sparticle test. Same setup as before.

 

 

Kyoei Acall 105mm f3.5 Baader U-Filter Venus

 

 

 

Crop

 

 

Crop

 

 

 

 

[Guest]

33 minutes ago, colinbm said:

Excellent

 

Maybe Bill will perform a bench test with controlled lighting to compare the UV Nikkor. Nevertheless, the Nikkor wins by default given it worked the first time without any special handling.

[Cadmium]

1 hour ago, Blazer0ne said:

Cadmium, let me know if you are okay with this alteration to your image.

 

I took the well known 35mm f/3.5 and set it below the 105mm f/3.5 for easier comparison.

 

Thanks!

 

BlazerOne, No problem.

[colinbm]

Nice set-up BlazerOne

[dabateman]

BlazerOne,

Stop while your ahead.  You look to have a great sharp lens copy or version. It might be the only one or others may perform similarly. 

But at least for UVA, you look to have a great lens. 

 

Cadmium,

I was referring to the Lentar 400mm f6.3 lens that you casually tested once and had excellent results.  I still haven't tested mine. I know there is huge variation in them. Depending on the color of paint, Tamron, Soligor, Tokina or someone else made them.

[Doug A]

@Blazer0neimpressive results. Now I am going to have to track down one of these lenses. 

The Kyoei look to be more prone to flare. @Bill De Jager used a white background that is very difficult on any lens. So the Kyoei require more care...I can live with that. 

 

So the Kyoei 105 vs the El-Nikkor 80 or 105? 

 

Thanks to @Bill De Jager and @Blazer0ne,

Doug A

[Guest]

There is a set of two and a single for sale on buyee.jp but you will have to pay a little more for shipping and fees than eBay. It’s a proxy service for Yahoo auctions Japan. 

[Bill De Jager]

I have a few thoughts after sleeping a bit.  First, I messed up by not exposing to the right.  Nevertheless, with the same amount of exposure lift (not posted here) the Kyoei lenses, especially the 105mm, still look to have much lower contrast.

 

I also failed to use a lens hood with any of the lenses; perhaps the Kyoei lenses are much more sensitive to flare than the Nikkor. Seems like I always forget something important!  While I was shooting away from the sun, the large white background undoubtedly sent a lot of off-axis light towards the lenses.  I do have 52mm screw-in hoods I can use next time.

 

Regarding the background, this time of the year I have limited options for shooting with sunlight, thanks to nearby tall trees that still have their leaves, coupled with the lower sun angle and a nearby building. However, there is a window of time in the morning in the back yard where I might be able to catch sunlight, with the advantage of a darker background and less glare from the house.  Alternately, I may be able to set up some sort of background in the front yard and shoot in a different direction.

 

I have to admit I've done almost no UV flower photography previously, focusing on landscapes instead. So there's an initial learning curve for me.

[Bill De Jager]

Thank you to to BlazerOne and Doug A for your feedback on the photos I originally posted above.  The two main errors I made were:

 

1. Forgetting to use a lens hood, something I still sometimes forget. (I never used them for decades, have gotten in the habit over the last 10 years or so, but if the lens doesn't come with one then sometimes I forget.  I'm still working on better habits!)

2.  Using a bright white background with the sun shining strongly on it.  This created a difficult lighting situation and compounded the first error.

 

I redid yesterday's work today, with corrections and more thoroughly.  I did not expose to the right with the UV photos but relied on auto-exposure.  It's just as well due to wind that created blurring in at least a few cases. 

 

Photos taken 2021 October 10

Light source: Sunlight, mid-afternoon (taking into account Daylight Savings Time).  Latitude ~38 degrees, clear skies, no aerial smoke thanks to a recent frontal passage from the Pacific Ocean (wildfire smoke has been a large concern in recent years in California)

Subject: Ornamental cut sunflowers purchased the day before the photos were taken.  The flowers had been in a vase of water since they arrived home.

Background: Grassy park with lawns, trees, a little bit of hardscape

Camera: Two Sony A6000s, stock and wide-spectrum converted at Lifepixel

Lenses: Nikon 105mm f/4.5 UV-Nikkor, Kyoei 105mm f/3.5 Super-Acall, Kyoei 135mm f/3.5 Super-Acall.  Lens hood used at all times.

Filter: Baader-U filter, remounted to a 52mm ring

Lens adapters: LTM to Sony E-mount, Nikon F to E-mount

Support: RRS TVC-34L plus Arca-Swiss Cube.

Focusing aid: Monitor (cheap) in enlarged view.

Types of photos: Normal color in visible light on the stock A6000, Monochrome converted from UV photos taken on the converted A6000.

Exposures: ISO 1600, f/5.6 to f/11 (UV-Nikkor), f/4 to f/11 (Kyoei lenses).  Only the f/8 photos were used in this post except for f/5.6 with the Kyoei 135mm lens.  All exposures in UV were with a timed release.

Wind was a bit of an issue.  I also erred in not focusing on the center of the flower, instead focusing as best I could on one petal in each case (technically a ray flower if you're a botanist).

 

UV-Nikkor 105mm f/4.5

 

 

_DSC2563f8 by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

 

_DSC2445f8M by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

Kyoei 105mm f/3.5 at f/8:

 

 

_DSC2571f8 by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

 

_DSC2459f8 by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

Kyoei 135mm f/3.5 at f/8 (f/5.6 for the UV photo):

 

 

_DSC2579f8 by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

 

_DSC2468f5,6 by Bill de Jager, on Flickr

 

At a later time I will attempt color conversions of the UV photos.

[colinbm]

Excellent Bill
The UV Nikkor eats it in UV.

 

[Guest]

All of the visible color photos look good except the Nikkor looses some shadow detail from higher contrast. As far as UV, I wonder why your Super-Acall 135mm performs so much better than the Super-Acall 105mm. I assume the 135mm is also a triplet. Do they have the same color coating reflections?

[Guest]

7 minutes ago, colinbm said:

Excellent Bill
The UV Nikkor eats it in UV.

 

In all fairness we are comparing a $7,000 (used prices) quartz cfl flagship UV lens to a $30-120 Triplet that was sold through 3rd party vendors back in the early 1960s when even color film was a new thing. 

[Doug A]

@Bill De JagerJust noticed you added these tests. Thanks for all the work you put into this. Testing is difficult . 

 

 Not surprising the UV Nikkor out performs the other lenses. Hard to beat a specialized, cost no object product, with a 50 year old "accident". The Kyoei are still a great way Into UV photography. 

 

I'm still unsure about how the Nikon's greater UV reach looks in false color. Most "accidental" UV lenses can give us yellow and blue/purple. Does the Nikon reproduce false colors the other lenses can't, in landscapes or flowers?

 

Thanks for all the work,

Doug A

[Andy Perrin]

Doug, I have not noticed any other false colors in actual flower photos on this board using the UV Nikkor with ordinary processing. I think this is a limitation of the Bayer array mainly. Possibly doing a tricolor with three bandpass filters or LEDs, like Bernard and Stefano have done (among others), would give more false color. 

[Doug A]

@Andy Perrinso going lower in the UV scale is only going to be B&W.  Makes sense. Obviously, the special UV lenses have higher performance in the range accidental lenses cover. Including contrast, sharpness, less focus shift, etc.

 

Thanks,

Doug A

[Andy Perrin]

Doug, I am not sure what you meant by “going lower in the UV is only going to be black and white.” Bill is making these images black and white himself, not the lens. I just meant you won’t see any new colors besides the usual blue and yellow and possibly greens. 

[Bill De Jager]

Thanks, Doug.  It did take much more time and effort than I expected.

 

Regarding color, I had set this project aside thanks to other priorities, but I'd still like to try  color processing.  I've never completed that process properly so there will be a learning curve.