Maximilian5930
Hello,
I still have an old but very good black-and-white enlarger and would now like to use multigrade paper.
The enlarger doesn’t have a filter drawer. There are now multigrade filters available with a special filter holder mounted beneath the lens.
However, I can’t imagine that this would work without some loss of optical quality.
Who can give me an objective, expert answer on this?
Maximilian
Gast
Maximilian,
Admittedly, the Ilford filters that are attached beneath the lens may ultimately result in a slight loss of brilliance and sharpness, but this should be considered in context.
If you don’t have a high-performance lens, you won’t notice this difference either.
Incidentally, on many older models, you can open the lamp housing at the top (...to change the bulb...) and then, in theory, you could simply place the filters on top of the condenser.
This is both better quality and cheaper (the 9x9 cm filters cost around 9 euros for the Ilford set of 45).
Best regards,
Mirko
mcbastian
Hi!
I have a Meopta Opemus II.
I’ve got the plastic filters from FOTOIMPEX – about 8 of them.
Gast
Sebastian,
You’d better do a test shot without a negative at f/11 to check whether your filters are protruding too far into the plane of focus. Otherwise, you’ll eventually start to see fingerprints, scratches and so on that have accumulated on your filters appearing in your photos.
Actually, the filters should be placed above the condenser lenses – that is, between the lamp and the upper condenser lens.
With Beseler, they are even positioned optimally between the condenser lenses.
Best regards,
Mirko
cfb_de
Hi Mirko,
And actually, they should also be placed under the heat shield. Otherwise, the filters sitting on top of the condenser will get scorched :-)
Best regards,
Franz
BTW: The Anaret-S from the other day is better than the one I smashed!
MirkoBoeddecker
Hi Franz,
Heat protection: that’s certainly ideal, but at 75 watts you can have several minutes of exposure without anything happening.
We’ve also got diffuser discs and heat protection filters, but then it really gets a bit fiddly.
AnaretS: Of course the new ones are better than the old ones. If only because of the better coating quality. Meopta isn’t investing in the enlargers anymore, of course, but the binoculars and rifle scopes seem to be doing quite well. The magnification lenses also benefit from the technical advances made there...
Best regards,
Mirko
