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Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

kasperbergholt
 
Posts: 13

Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Sat May 20, 2023 5:30 pm


Clever people,

In my continued adventures in macro photography , born out of both curiosity & boredoom, I think, I came across an interesting industrial scanner lens from Rodenstock - the Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9.

Specs can be found here: "Scitex S-3 67mm f/4.9 Scanner Lens — Close-up Photography"
closeuphotography.com.

Can someone point me in the right direction as to which adaptor it would require to get it to work on a Nikon D3?


Thanks in advance,

Kasper
Last edited by kasperbergholt on Sun Jun 11, 2023 6:46 pm, edited 3 times in total.

dw_thomas
 
Posts: 481

Re: Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Sat May 27, 2023 11:53 pm


Hi Kasper,
I have no familiarity with that lens, or the Nikon D3, but in a quick look I'm not sure why you want to do this (other than intellectual curiosity -- which of course is a legitimate reason :wink: ).

The lens appears to have an M39 thread, as do many enlarging lenses, as well as some early cameras, so that could lead to something useful. But the lens does not appear to be in a focusing mount nor does it have an adjustable aperture. Traditionally the lack of a focusing mount is dealt with by using a bellows, or messing around with combinations of extension tubes and having the camera on a rack-and-pinion adjustable slide. The other problem is whether the register distance of the lens allows any room to insert tubes or bellows between it and the camera and still be able to focus. For high magnification (1:1 and beyond) it might not matter that much as the lens to film/sensor distance starts to increase substantially.

In a brief look, it appears FotoDiox makes an adapter that will attach an M39/LTM lens to a Nikon body; but that only addresses part of the problem. Since the lens is not for a standard sort of camera, we can only guess whether using the adapter will provide the desired focus. It may work but I see no hints. The closeup site seems to prefer reverse mounting the lens which adds another wrinkle.

So-o-o, even if you can attach the lens solidly to a Nikon, you can't reduce the aperture to get better depth of field and focusing will be a tedious process at best. The website guy did not sound impressed with the chromatic aberration either. To me it all seems like a lot of trouble, and some bit of expense, to avoid buying a compatible macro lens. But that's me ... 8)

kasperbergholt
 
Posts: 13

Re: Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Mon May 29, 2023 1:48 pm


dw_thomas wrote:Hi Kasper,
I have no familiarity with that lens, or the Nikon D3, but in a quick look I'm not sure why you want to do this (other than intellectual curiosity -- which of course is a legitimate reason :wink: ).

The lens appears to have an M39 thread, as do many enlarging lenses, as well as some early cameras, so that could lead to something useful. But the lens does not appear to be in a focusing mount nor does it have an adjustable aperture. Traditionally the lack of a focusing mount is dealt with by using a bellows, or messing around with combinations of extension tubes and having the camera on a rack-and-pinion adjustable slide. The other problem is whether the register distance of the lens allows any room to insert tubes or bellows between it and the camera and still be able to focus. For high magnification (1:1 and beyond) it might not matter that much as the lens to film/sensor distance starts to increase substantially.

In a brief look, it appears FotoDiox makes an adapter that will attach an M39/LTM lens to a Nikon body; but that only addresses part of the problem. Since the lens is not for a standard sort of camera, we can only guess whether using the adapter will provide the desired focus. It may work but I see no hints. The closeup site seems to prefer reverse mounting the lens which adds another wrinkle.

So-o-o, even if you can attach the lens solidly to a Nikon, you can't reduce the aperture to get better depth of field and focusing will be a tedious process at best. The website guy did not sound impressed with the chromatic aberration either. To me it all seems like a lot of trouble, and some bit of expense, to avoid buying a compatible macro lens. But that's me ... 8)


Thank you very much for your reply, thoughts & analysis. Greatly appreciated!

I had thought it was a lot easier. And I also got carried away, I think, by the original price tag of the $30,000 of the Scitex Smart 340 it was made for.

I've bought a vintage Nikkon Micro 55mm 2.8 from around 1986 with an early implementation of auto-focus. It's quite plastic-y, but I think I can squeeze some good images out of it once I get more used to using it in manual focus mode.

First take of a macro photo with it of a vintage 6X5GT tube:
Image

Technically far from perfect, but I like its 'ambience' feel.
Last edited by kasperbergholt on Sun Jun 11, 2023 6:47 pm, edited 3 times in total.

dw_thomas
 
Posts: 481

Re: Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Wed May 31, 2023 4:38 am


Ah, looks like you are on your way!
I was going to mention and show a lens I picked up fairly recently, but just discovered I have fallen behind in my PBase gallery maintenance. :shock:

Can't say I do a lot of macro work, but I had become interested in doing DSLR scanning of negatives. Some of the silly things I own and have tried are shown in this gallery: https://pbase.com/dw_thomas/macrogear

But fairly recently I acquired a 7Artisans 60mm F/2.8 II totally manual macro lens for my Canon EOS M5 which is a fairly capable chunk of glass. One has to tinker with some configurations of the controls to get past the camera thinking there is no lens or communications. Alas, the last negatives I digitized were 8x10 from my big pinhole camera, so macro wasn't necessary.

Anyway, have fun with your lens. I was tinkering with vacuum tubes as a bratty nerd in the 1950s myself.
DaveT

kasperbergholt
 
Posts: 13

Re: Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Thu Jun 08, 2023 4:08 pm


dw_thomas wrote:Ah, looks like you are on your way!
I was going to mention and show a lens I picked up fairly recently, but just discovered I have fallen behind in my PBase gallery maintenance. :shock:

Can't say I do a lot of macro work, but I had become interested in doing DSLR scanning of negatives. Some of the silly things I own and have tried are shown in this gallery: https://pbase.com/dw_thomas/macrogear

But fairly recently I acquired a 7Artisans 60mm F/2.8 II totally manual macro lens for my Canon EOS M5 which is a fairly capable chunk of glass. One has to tinker with some configurations of the controls to get past the camera thinking there is no lens or communications. Alas, the last negatives I digitized were 8x10 from my big pinhole camera, so macro wasn't necessary.

Anyway, have fun with your lens. I was tinkering with vacuum tubes as a bratty nerd in the 1950s myself.
DaveT


Thank you for the link - great descriptions of the project & your thoughts behind it. I checked the Konica Hexanon 52mm f/1.4 - a lot of beautifully images shot with it. The 7Artisans 60mm F/2.8 II looks nice and minimalistic.

Thanks again for your inputs & thoughts :)

kasperbergholt
 
Posts: 13

Re: Nikon Adaptor for Rodenstock Scitex S-3 67 mm F4.9

Post Thu Jun 08, 2023 4:13 pm


And another non-macro shot with the Nikon Micro 55 2.8 AF:

Image


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