[Leica] Visoflex on MP (II or III, bellows or....)

[marcsmall at comcast.net (Marc James Small)]

At 03:45 PM 10/17/2006, Walt Johnson wrote:
>Ralph
>Leicas are great for some things but close-ups 
>aren't it  I guess it depends on what you really 
>pursue but for getting serious about getting 
>close Nikon wets all over the Leitz guys. Why 
>not just throw an F3/ Micro Nikkor  in your bag 
>for those times when $$$ talks and nostalgia is for afterward?
>
>Just curious

Walt

With respect, I must dissent.  The Visoflex 
system, from the first PLOOT of 1936 to the final 
Visoflex III of 1984, represented an elegant 
extension of the basic RF principle to allow it 
to conduct close-up and really long-focus 
applications:  it was originally intended as a 
scientific apparatus and as an item for 
photo-journalists.  The Visoflex system first 
came out when there just were not any SLR's on 
the market with such capabilities, and it only 
faded when quality SLR's became available which 
offered similar technical utility -- the Contarex 
was probably the best of these, but even a Canon 
F1 had a slew of the sort of doodads necessary to 
make a camera of use in a laboratory.

The number of adapters and accessories available 
over the half-century life of the system is 
simply stunning:  I have been slowly compiling a 
master list of these for the past decade and am 
only part-way through it -- I have to pick up a 
bunch of Leitz microscope catalogues as many of 
the adapters were only sold through Leitz 
scientific outlets and were not listed in the 
camera-store pricelists.  (The same is true of 
Zeiss and Zeiss Ikon, incidentally, and some of 
the most useful items for macrophotography, such 
as the Luminar lenses, were not sold through 
Zeiss Ikon dealers but were only available from Carl Zeiss scientific 
outlets.)

The Visoflex is useful if you are not into 
SLR's.  I have some SLR's but almost never use 
them, as the Leica RF is my basic camera.  Thus, 
a Visoflex makes sense for me.  It would make far 
less sense for someone who already has an 
extensive Nikon or Canon or the like SLR system at hand.

Macro lenses are really neat and eBay has brought 
a LOT of these onto the market at really 
reasonable prices:  the days when the mystic name 
"Luminar" demanded $500 or more of freight are 
days of the past -- I paid $35 for one Luminar on 
eBay, and $75 for another.  I have a complete set 
of Luminars, most of the Leitz Photars and Carl 
Zeiss Jena Mikrotars, and some of the Leitz 
Micro-Summars and Milars, the B&L Micro-Tessars, 
and the Staeble Katagons.  These guys are a LOT 
of fun to use, as they are microscope objectives 
converted to photographic uses and are optically 
superb, albeit they have no appreciable depth of field.

Thus, I can go from a 16mm Luminar which allows 
me a 10:1 or so reproduction ratio with the 
Bellows II up to a 2600mm telephoto with my 
Questar or even longer on my Celestar, albeit the 
latter is a bit clumsy for field use!  (My 
personal choice is that wonderful 5/40cm Telyt-V 
for most purposes, as this is a really grand 
lens.)  I generally use my M6 as, yes, inbuilt 
metering makes macro and long-focus photography a LOT easier!

To be honest, I generally do macro work with a 
Hasselblad 2000 FCM on chrome films.  There is 
nothing quite as dramatic as projecting a 
medium-format slide of, say, the engraving on a lens ring or the like.

For BASIC close-up work, I would recommend a 
Bellows II, a Viso IIa M or Viso III, and a 4/9cm 
lenshead.  That allows decent close-ups but is not a bank-buster.

Marc





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