Bokeh of "space lens": I bought an intriguing lens on eBay the other day. It's an Elgeet STL Navitar, 86mm f1.2, designed for TRW Space Technology Laboratories. Elgeet was mainly known...

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Bokeh of "space lens"

Mar 4, 2017 08:30:10 #

kymarto Loc: Portland OR and Milan Italy

I bought an intriguing lens on eBay the other day. It's an Elgeet STL Navitar, 86mm f1.2, designed for TRW Space Technology Laboratories. Elgeet was mainly known for making cine lenses, especially for 8 and 16mm cameras. Though never as big as Wollensak, they still exist--though now called Navitar--mostly making industrial lenses.

This particular lens was made for 1:1 shooting, though of what I do not know. It certainly looks like some sort of oscilloscope lens, and the rendering does seem to indicate that it is not for flat field reproduction.

In addition to that, it seems to be rather radioactive, so I won't be keeping it next to my pillow. On Monday I'll take it to work and check it out with our large-window contamination probe. Someone else tested one and got 1000 cpm, which is not dangerous in small doses. Many older lenses where fairly radioactive, being made with thorium or lanthanum glass for their special indices of refraction.

I do like what it manages to do. Here are a couple of photos of the Japanese spring taken with this baby.

at f1.2