Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1997/03/13

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Subject: Re: OFF TOPIC--Englarging lens questions
From: Dan Cardish <dcardish@microtec.net>
Date: Thu, 13 Mar 1997 20:52:41 -0500

At 05:13 PM 13-03-97 -0600, you wrote:
>Alan Bearden wrote:
>> 
>> At 06:55 AM 3/13/97 -0400, you wrote:
>> >What, if any, practical effect does the aperture setting of a enlarging
>> >lens have?

[snip]

>again, i'm no lens guru, but having taken the advise of many greats over 
>the years and plain old trials, most lenses are at their sharpest 2 -3 
>stops from OPEN.  yes, logically the depth of field would seem a 
>benefit,...[snip]

My experience has been that the wider the aperture, the better the results,
especially with fine grain films.  In fact, with films such as TMAX-100, it
is possible to start loosing the grain if you stop down too much.  You can
see it happening through a grain magnifier.  My 50/2.8 APO-Rodagon gives me
good results wide open.  The only problems are the too short exposure times
(solvable with an ND filter attached to the lens) and the above mentioned
problem of making sure that the film is flat.

Dan C.