G690 250mm lens

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G690 250mm lens

Postby Fernando » Fri Jul 08, 2005 1:17 am

Hi, I am an amateur photographer who started his first steps in medium format three years ago with an old Fujica G690BL. Before that I read a lot about the matter, and at first felt a little frustrated thinking (wrongly) that to get into medium format I had to deal with very heavy equipment, spend a fortune, or both. Until I found the old Fujica. I liked the results so much that slowly I made up a kit of body and three lenses: 100mm, 50mm and 180mm. Now I am interested in the 250mm lens, but I find it is extremely rare. I would like to learn something about this lens, preferably from some first-hand user, and perhaps get some clue on where to find one.
Thanks in advance.

Fernando
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Re: G690 250mm lens

Postby Abbazz » Sat Jul 09, 2005 2:23 am

Fernando wrote:Now I am interested in the 250mm lens, but I find it is extremely rare. I would like to learn something about this lens, preferably from some first-hand user, and perhaps get some clue on where to find one.


Hi Fernando,

You are quite right, the Fujica G690 BL is a very nice camera with sharp lenses. The big problem is that it is very difficult to find lenses for these cameras now. When they appear on eBay, prices are usually high, even for worn items with specs. I don't know if the 250mm was actually released, because I have never seen it, even in picture, and it never appears in auctions, even on Yahoo Japan.

My guess is that this lens might have been planned by Fuji, but was never released probably due to the very narrow depth of field, making it almost impossible to focus with a rangefinder at short range. Anyway, on the existing Fuji tele lenses, the minimum focusing distance is 2m or 2,5m, making them more suitable for landscape than portrait. Users of telephoto lenses for Mamiya 7 experience the same limitation.

Abbas
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g690 250mm lens

Postby Fernando » Sat Jul 09, 2005 3:02 pm

Hi, Abbas

Well yes, of course the 250mm lens has a narrow depth of field, but that should not be a problem (as any large format user knows) as long as you can focus precisely. Do you know if the lens is coupled with the rangefinder? A comparable lens would be the Mamiya 7's 210mm lens, which isn't. I wonder what acceptance has this lens had among Mamiya users. Maybe these long lenses are more suitable to other more modular systems, such as 2x3 view cameras.

Fernando
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Postby Abbazz » Sun Jul 10, 2005 3:11 am

Telephoto lenses are seldom used on rangefinder cameras, due to focusing problems. I don't know whether the 250mm would have been rangefinder coupled, but I suppose not. Even if it were, it wouldn't be very useful, because the G690 has a rangefinder effective base of 50mm (same as a Leica with 0.85 magnification) which doesn't offer sufficient focus accuracy with long telephoto lenses (see this page for details).

As you say, a 250mm lens seems more suitable for a view camera than for a rangefinder. Maybe you could use ground glass to help you focus on your G690, but then you would be condemned to 6x9 sheet film (with the darkroom loading burden).
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I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Peter Evans » Sat Dec 16, 2006 8:49 am

I've never seen any evidence for the existence of this lens. It goes unmentioned in two places that I'd expect to mention if if it did exist. If I may steal the references from the Camerapedia article, the two are:

Koyasu Yoshinobu (子安栄信). "Fuji Shashin Firumu no kamera no subete" (富士写真フィルムのカメラのすべて All the cameras of Fuji Photo Film). In "Fuji Shashin Firumu no kamera" (富士写真フィルムのカメラ The cameras of Fuji Photo Film), no. 44 of Kamera Rebyū: Kurashikku Kamera no Senka. Tokyo: Asahi Sonorama, 1997. ISBN 4-257-13013-X

Nawa Hidetaka (那和秀峻). Meiki o tazunete: Sengo kokusan-kamera hiwa (名機を訪ねて:戦後国産カメラ秘話) / Revisiting renowned cameras. Tokyo: Nippon-kamera-sha, 2003. ISBN 4-8179-0011-3

(Garbage in the above is most likely Japanese characters rendered by a font that doesn't include such characters.)
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Re: I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Abbazz » Sat Dec 16, 2006 11:40 am

Peter,

Since my original reply to this thread in July 2005, I have come to the conclusion that this lens is an "internet legend", which never existed, even as a prototype. It might be interesting to find out where does this info originates, as it appears on a number of different websites.

Cheers,

Sebastien
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Re: I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Peter Evans » Sun Dec 17, 2006 4:32 am

I guessed that you no longer believed that it existed; I thought it better to clarify the mythical status of this lens for the benefit of anyone who might later come across this thread.

A lot of myths get recycled as alleged fact. Luckily those about particular cameras seldom if ever hurt anyone: I hate to think of the results of lazily recycled myths about people or institutions.

While I'm in a sceptical mood ( and because it's hardly worth a new thread), how about:

"After ten years, Fuji decided that this line of cameras was too expensive to manufacture. As a consequence, production eventually ceased in November 1978, allegedly because of reliability problems."

First, I don't follow the internal logic of that: Did production end because it was too expensive, because of reliability problems, or because of both? (And if both, how was one the consequence of the other?) Actually I find both stories a bit odd: Nawa's story (the fruit of discussions with Fuji employees of the time) of how sales of the lenses were disappointing, combined with a desire to avoid features that might go wrong (hardly "reliability problems") seems more convincing. But it's very likely that I've missed something.
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Re: I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Abbazz » Sun Dec 17, 2006 12:52 pm

Peter Evans wrote:"After ten years, Fuji decided that this line of cameras was too expensive to manufacture. As a consequence, production eventually ceased in November 1978, allegedly because of reliability problems."

First, I don't follow the internal logic of that: Did production end because it was too expensive, because of reliability problems, or because of both? (And if both, how was one the consequence of the other?) Actually I find both stories a bit odd: Nawa's story (the fruit of discussions with Fuji employees of the time) of how sales of the lenses were disappointing, combined with a desire to avoid features that might go wrong (hardly "reliability problems") seems more convincing. But it's very likely that I've missed something.


You are very right, my wording is quite obscure on this one. What I meant with "too expensive" was that Fuji management was quite disappointed with the relative lack of success of the whole GL690/GM670 line, considering the cost of manufacturing such a complex system (6 different lenses were made at the time). As a consequence, they decided to switch to a fixed-lens camera to cut on production costs. As they didn't want to admit publicly that it was a cost saving decision, they announced that the new GW690 was launched because it was a better and more reliable camera. I guess it was a hasty conclusion from my part to assert that Fuji accused the G690 to suffer from "reliability problems". I will amend the web page as soon as I get back to my computer at home in a few days, coz I am presently trekking the slopes of mighty Mount Kinabalu.

Thank you for your remarks, which are always warmly welcomed.

Sebastien
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Re: I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Peter Evans » Thu Dec 28, 2006 1:07 pm

Sebastien, the GL690/GM690 may have had disappointing sales overall, but I think that here in Japan they (or anyway the bodies, regular 100mm lens, and perhaps also AE 100mm lens) sold pretty well. And once Fuji had done all the tooling for the interchangeable-lens models, I find it hard to believe that the mount had a great impact on production costs. I don't know any more about the sales than what I read in the two Japanese-language sources specified above, but I'd guess that the other lenses sold very disappointingly outside Japan and dismally inside Japan, and to retain the interchangable lens mount would have meant a continuation of the expenses needed for marketing the 50mm and other lenses.

Irrelevant: (i) Buy a copy of Elliott Erwitt's Personal Best. 2. Look at the self-portrait at the end!
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Re: I don't believe that any such lens exists.

Postby Abbazz » Fri Jan 26, 2007 1:29 am

Peter Evans wrote:(i) Buy a copy of Elliott Erwitt's Personal Best. 2. Look at the self-portrait at the end!


Peter, I just got my copy of the book yesterday. That's a heavy piece of literature! The self-portrait on the last page was indeed taken with a 6x9 Fuji. Too bad it's a GW690 Mk1 :lol:

Cheers,

Sebastien
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Postby Peter Evans » Wed Jan 31, 2007 4:11 pm

Wow, I tell people to buy books, and they go out (or visit fnac.com or wherever) and buy books. Even with no "please" or similar, they follow my every command. My hypnotic power is awesome!

Aw, why not. . . . ? [Deep breath; turns on italics for mesmeric purposes:]

Give me your spare 50mm lens.

No, just a joke! Keep it! I don't want it! (Or anyway not as much as some others do.) Hmm, but I think I might recommend some more books some days from now. Even though you don't have to buy them.

Still, that book by Erwitt really is excellent, isn't it?
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Postby Abbazz » Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:28 am

Hey Peter, why don't you create one of these blogs with lots of book recommendations and subsidized links to buy the books direct from Amazon? :wink:

[Subliminal mode] My 50mm is not for sale! [/Subliminal mode]

As I live quite far away from the nearest bookstore with decent stock, I buy photo books online based on reviews and recommendations. My last order featured Elliott Erwitt's book, Cartier Bresson's Photographer and Josef Koudelka's Chaos. Lots of nice pictures, but I must say that Erwitt's is my least favorite of the lot. To me, Erwitt's work is quite uneven: some really great shots side by side with some cheap humorous snapshots that I don't find much appealing. But I would be glad if I could take pictures like the worst of Erwitt's snapshots :mrgreen:

Cheers,

Sebastien
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Postby Peter Evans » Thu Feb 01, 2007 2:36 pm

Amazon schmamazon: let's smash US hegemony, and here are three great books that Amazon.com won't sell you:

I. K. Inha: Unelma maisemasta. Helsinki: Musta Taide, 2006. ISBN 952-9851-72-3 (Text in Finnish and to some extent also in English.)

Ragnar Axelsson. Faces of the North: Iceland, Faeroe Islands, Greenland. Reykjavik: Mál og menning, 2005. ISBN 9979-3-2592-5 (Text in English.)

Kikai Hiroh. Persona. Tokyo: Sōshisha, 2005. ISBN 4-7942-1450-2 (Captions in Japanese and English, other text in Japanese only.)

All unrelated to any big Fujica, I'm sorry to say, but all guaranteed to be in glorious black and white.
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