The shot I used, above, was already processed from a jpeg, having been taken on my Sony compact camera, so perhaps a RAW-TIFF file without any sharpening at all might be a better starting point.

I've got a lot of old family snapshots from the '30s through to the '60s taken with either a Box Brownie or a basic Ensign folding camera and the 6x9(ish) contact prints look fine but as soon as you get them enlarged the limitations are there to see!

OK I am struggling a bit now. Image looks a bit like a contact print.

Grain used is HP5 courtesy of Duncan.

Attatched pic was taken with the camera lens combo in post #4 and is full frame - a smidge cropped as the grain did not quite fit on the long side. Lens to subject distance 10ft. Flash was used that will have increased the contrast a bit. I did apply usm at Amount 65%, Radius 0.1 to try and sharpen the grain for that condenser enlarger look.

To confirm my amazement at the lens performance I attatch a 100% crop that has had NO sharpening. The grain structure is very obvious in that.

I will post this in the ' Anyone want to reverse engineer an image? ' thread to see how Mark and Foxy get on ;) , and then post the behind the scenes shot in that thread.

Don

No Don not ISO boost. Its only adding Noise in PS plus some blur and vignette effect. I did a quick on your picture. Most olden 6x9 cameras of those days had a vignette effect due to light fall off at the corner of field. I added some dust that is usually gathered over time.

Here is one more with the tone of sepia that seems a more correct approach.

Well it makes you play in pp. This version has been through NX, CS and Paintshop.

Duncans 3200 grain used plus additional noise in photoshop then softened a bit.

Sassan even my pre war Kodak 620 did not vignett as far as I can recall. Its decoration now but I will see if I can find a pic from it. Certainly none of my 1950's folders do so this must be a very early trait. :)

Don

Seeing Adey's image made me think of an image from a Holga camera and that I had seen someone selling Holga lenses 'glued' to SLR camera body caps. A quick dig through my 'DIY to do' bookmarks found this:

http://www.holgamods.com/

I notice he does pre-made pinhole caps too...

Don't sell old lenses short
 

Hi to all - as one who has in the past made his own plates, here is one I made earlier of my late father in law. What you see today as "old photos" in pubs etc are often scans of old pics that have then been played with. This is a part scan of an actual 6" by 4" glass plate I made over thirty years ago when playing around and yes- the flash was magnesium powder. I have converted the negative and added a sepia tone. Its not as clean as it was but it's quite sharp.

Looking at the size of pinholes I guess this either from a Giant land Pins or these are nailholes :)

Andy M:
Very sharp and nice indeed.
The main advantage those days cameras had was the huge film size. Cant think of how much a digital sensor at that size can cost us!

Andy,

Great image.

I have never done that sort of thing, but I have seen incredibly detailed images, traction engines and other parts of the industrial heritage, taken on glass plates.

I like your post title - Don't sell old lenses short. This will set me on a hunt that will be a bit at odds IQ wise with Marks ' Holga ' link. :) Might just revisit the pinhole though as I have found some very thin shim material.


Don