Re: [Leica] 28mm PC thoughts?

[Henning Wulff <henningw@archiphoto.com>]

>I was wondering if anyone has ever used the 28mm Super-Angulon PC 
>lens and what you might think about it. As a side note, any thoughts 
>on PC lenses and their effectiveness vs quality would be appreciated 
>too.
>
>Cheers,
>
>Dave

I've tried the 28 S-A PC, and it was excellent. I never got it as at 
the time, I needed to use a variety of filters, and that was a bit 
complicated with that lens and I already had the Nikon 28.

Over the years I've used the Nikon 35 and 28 PC's (all of them; I 
still have the two current ones), the Olympus 35 and 24, the 35 
Curtagon for Leica R, the Pentax 28, the Minolta 35 and the Canon 35 
for the FD mount and the current 24 EOS. I also have a MF one.

Some were excellent and some had various problems that either made 
them less useful or downright useless. Optically the 35 Canon in FD 
mount was probably the 'best', as it was excellent w.r.t. resolution, 
contrast, lack of distortion and eveness of performance across an 
exceptionally large image circle. Downside - poor handling. (If you 
want one, I still have one in Konica mount :-)). The poorest one was 
probably the Pentax, as it had noticeable distortion, and that is 
unacceptable in a lens of this type. The weirdest was the Minolta 
with its variable field curvature.

The most useful one is the 24 EOS, but its resolution and  contrast 
is not up to the best. The handiest, useful one to take on trips and 
carry around generally is the Nikon 28. Whether its the f/4 or 3.5 is 
not that important. It has generally good performance, overall the 
best handling, is compact and is very filter friendly. As with most 
of these except for the 24 EOS, the mount can be adapted by a good 
machinist very easily to a variety of other cameras.

With digital available right now, you should consider going that 
route instead of getting a PC lens. Using a wider focal length on a 
digiSLR and then adjusting the geometry of the picture in Photshop is 
a very easy  way of getting the same result instead of getting 
another lens. You lose some image information in this adjustment, and 
with a multiplication factor on the more affordable digiSLRs you have 
to use a wider lens, but it works. I can use a 16-35 zoom on my Canon 
D60, use appropriate software to correct the barrel distortion in the 
image and then use Photoshop to 'correct' the perspective. Doesn't 
take that long; hardly longer than setting up the tripod and getting 
a good shot with a PC lens.

BTW, I can now, after 35 years of use, get about a 75% success rate 
handholding shots with the best handling PC lenses, but a tripod is 
certainly necessary for the best and most consistent results. Most PC 
lenses are unuseable handheld when using their shift capabilities.

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    *            Henning J. Wulff
   /|\      Wulff Photography & Design
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