To photograph 8mm cine 4.5x3.3 frame, which Microscope lens?

[MartinS]

In a break from photographing little creatures, I am setting up to copy some family cine film dating from 1937 (including the 16mm, I have 20,000 ft!).

I am not paying professional prices, and filming a projected image is not of the quality that I want.

The rig that I have so far is a projector with the lens removed and an LED light source.

A Raspberry Pi controls a stepper motor that moves the cine film one frame at a time, and the triggering of the camera with appropriate dwells etc.

The camera is a Nikon D810 with bellows and a reversed 55mm Nikkor lens.

It works remarkably well considering the "Heath Robinson" appearance. I only need to put the folder of JPEG's on a Premiere timeline which treats it as a clip.....job done! I can steady it, colour correct it, edit it etc.

But.....

The Nikon lens is pushed off centre by the projector casting and stops me getting it perfectly aligned. I could machine away the casting but that breaks into the drive mechanism.

So, to provide the clearance needed, can I use a microscope objective on a tapered adapter to photograph the cine frame that is 4.5 x 3.3 mm (my camera is full frame at 36 x 24 mm or cropped at 24 x 16 mm)?


Please could someone point me in the right diection of lens and other needed equipment?


I have:

Nikon D810
55 mm lens
50 mm f1.4
105 mm f2.8
24-70 mm f2.8
70-200 mm f2.8
bellows
reversing ring, tubes etc

Thanks

Martin

[JKT]

It seems to me you'd need a magnification of just under 5 when using crop mode or just under 7.5 using full frame. Full frame would be difficult to get (cheaply) with microscope objectives, so the crop mode might be best.

You might try LOMO 3.7x with extra extension. It doesn't get much cheaper than that. However, you are likely to have problems with DoF. IIRC, LOMO is not exactly planar and your film may not be that either. It might be good enough ... or not.

I wonder if it would be possible to use LOMO with iris and tube lens in order to increase DoF at the expense of resolution. That would have been so much easier with camera lens.

I'm sure someone will give better (and likely more expensive) ideas.

[dickb]

So you require a narrow lens, right, not necessarily a microscope lens? Maybe the Tominon 17/4 is a good option for you. Have a look at Robert's tests here:

https://www.closeuphotography.com/5x-lens-test

There may be optically better options out there, but that lens hits a nice spot in price/performance. Also, there is a limit to the quality of the original film. And having an aperture should you need more DoF is nice.

[MartinS]

It seems to me you'd need a magnification of just under 5 when using crop mode or just under 7.5 using full frame. Full frame would be difficult to get (cheaply) with microscope objectives, so the crop mode might be best.

You might try LOMO 3.7x with extra extension. It doesn't get much cheaper than that. However, you are likely to have problems with DoF. IIRC, LOMO is not exactly planar and your film may not be that either. It might be good enough ... or not.

I wonder if it would be possible to use LOMO with iris and tube lens in order to increase DoF at the expense of resolution. That would have been so much easier with camera lens.

I'm sure someone will give better (and likely more expensive) ideas.

Thanks JKT, the LOMO is an option. Looks good from the info that I have found, although finding one seems problematic.

So you require a narrow lens, right, not necessarily a microscope lens? Maybe the Tominon 17/4 is a good option for you. Have a look at Robert's tests here:

https://www.closeuphotography.com/5x-lens-test

There may be optically better options out there, but that lens hits a nice spot in price/performance. Also, there is a limit to the quality of the original film. And having an aperture should you need more DoF is nice.

Thanks also dickb.

Yes, the Tominon 17mm looks as though it will do the trick but again I cannot find a seller

But, in the article that you linked to, there is a Canon macrophoto that has a diameter that will fit in the space available

https://www.closeuphotography.com/canon ... 20mm-lens/

As I have 8mm and 16mm cine to copy, at FF this is 7.3x and 3.2x mag, and cropped 5x and 2.1x mag, so the Canon 20mm MP or even the 35mm MP and a tapered adapter looks suitable.

Albeit a little more costly, the Macrophoto lenses seem to be available.

Am I barking up the right tree?

[Chris S.]

Martin,

Without seeing your assembly, it's hard to envision what might or might not fit. If a desired lens setup doesn't fit in your rig, could you use a front-surface mirror, set at a 45-degree angle, and shoot from ninety degrees off-axis?

As I have 8mm and 16mm cine to copy, at FF this is 7.3x and 3.2x mag, and cropped 5x and 2.1x mag. . . .

For your 8mm film, you are in a magnification range where the best choices are microscope objectives. I'd suggest a 10X Mitutoyo Plan Apo Infinity Corrected Long WD Objective mounted on a cheap, second-hand 135mm Nikkor, which would deliver 6.75x magnification. Or for somewhat more money, the 7.5X Mitutoyo Plan Apo Infinity Corrected Long WD Objective mounted on your 70-200mm. With this lens at 194mm (likely close to what the nominal "200" actually means for this zoom), you'd get just the magnification you need.

For your 16mm film, you are looking at the sort of magnification where bellows lenses, such as those already discussed, can excel. Or going the route of microscope objectives, consider a Mitutoyo 5x objective mounted on your 105mm Nikkor.

--Chris S.

[Lou Jost]

I strongly recommend NOT using a Lomo 3.7x because the field is not flat.

[rjlittlefield]

The Nikon lens is pushed off centre by the projector casting and stops me getting it perfectly aligned.

Some of the microscope objectives can be surprisingly large. For example an objective in the Mitutoyo M Plan Apo line has a maximum diameter of 34 mm (see https://www.edmundoptics.com/f/mitutoyo ... ves/12298/ , Technical Images tab), and it has to be screwed into a "tube lens" assembly that is usually even larger.

If this seems like a problem, please post images with a ruler in them, so that we can see the front of your projector mechanism.

--Rik

[ChrisR]

Another good 4x is the Nikon BE mentioned here https://www.photomacrography.net/forum/ ... hp?t=27205 and elsewhere.

That's an "inifite" objective so would need to be put on a 200mm for 4x. Your zoom * would work, but a £60 Raynox DCR close-up is a lot smaller and would work at least as well.


* Edit - I'm sure that would cover APS, but maybe not to the corners of full frame, whereas the Raynox should.

[Adalbert]

Hallo Martin,
The NIKON BE 4x proposed by Chris is corrected to the infinity.
So, you could use it with your 105 mm f2.8 and get the magn about 2x and with your 70-200 mm f2.8 and get the magn about 4x.
BE 4x is really small but Mitty 5x is much better for your FF-camera.
BR, ADi

[dickb]

But, in the article that you linked to, there is a Canon macrophoto that has a diameter that will fit in the space available

https://www.closeuphotography.com/canon ... 20mm-lens/

As I have 8mm and 16mm cine to copy, at FF this is 7.3x and 3.2x mag, and cropped 5x and 2.1x mag, so the Canon 20mm MP or even the 35mm MP and a tapered adapter looks suitable.

Albeit a little more costly, the Macrophoto lenses seem to be available.

Am I barking up the right tree?

I like my MP20 and MP35. The front ring of them can be removed, revealing a thread, making them even narrower. This was done to couple the lenses to 8 or 16mm film copying device as these were actually designed to do so. For some irritating reason you can't reverse mount the removable front cone, as that would make a tiny lens hood that would be useful in some circumstances (not this one though).

Tapered adapters as you envision to use are harder to flock properly than straight adapters. If you can allow for the width of M39 or M42 tubes I'd recommend using those, the rear of the MPs is fairly wide already, a tapered adapter wouldn't help much as far as I can see.

[Chris S.]

I smile that Rik pointed out tabs at which to find Mitutoyo objective specs, in URLs close to ones already linked; noted the large potential size of these objectives and their converging lenses; and the usefulness of Martin's posting a picture of his rig with a ruler included. I'd chosen to leave out each of these items as exercises for the questioner--particularly after saying that I couldn't envision his hardware, and asking if he could use a front-surface mirror to move his camera outside the optical axis. Different teaching styles from two crusty teachers, curmudgeons both.

To my mind, when a questioner writes something like the following, it's fair to assume that he is highly capable, and may benefit best from faint scents he can follow, gaining knowledge from the chase:

The rig that I have so far is a projector with the lens removed and an LED light source.

A Raspberry Pi controls a stepper motor that moves the cine film one frame at a time, and the triggering of the camera with appropriate dwells etc.

The quote above sounds very capable. But two different curmudgeons answered, each with a different style of encouragement.

--Chris S.

[MartinS]

I smile that Rik pointed out tabs at which to find Mitutoyo objective specs, in URLs close to ones already linked; noted the large potential size of these objectives and their converging lenses; and the usefulness of Martin's posting a picture of his rig with a ruler included. I'd chosen to leave out each of these items as exercises for the questioner--particularly after saying that I couldn't envision his hardware, and asking if he could use a front-surface mirror to move his camera outside the optical axis. Different teaching styles from two crusty teachers, curmudgeons both.

To my mind, when a questioner writes something like the following, it's fair to assume that he is highly capable, and may benefit best from faint scents he can follow, gaining knowledge from the chase:

MartinS wrote:
The rig that I have so far is a projector with the lens removed and an LED light source.

A Raspberry Pi controls a stepper motor that moves the cine film one frame at a time, and the triggering of the camera with appropriate dwells etc.

The quote above sounds very capable. But two different curmudgeons answered, each with a different style of encouragement.

Hmmm, yes (scratching head and rubbing chin emoji).......but I do know what I dont know!.......and I feel as tough I fell through a door in the back of my wardrobe and down a rabbit hole into a "microscope world"

Seriously though.......thanks to you all in trying to lelp me and I completely understand that people will have their individual "favourites" or "opinions" etc. and I, at some stage, will have to decide what route to follow. (sigh)

Over Christmas I re-discovered the "PS" at the bottom of my bucket-list promising that I would transfer the 20-odd thousand feel of cine (if I don't, will our kids?) and fired off the post.

This morning I dug out the mothballed experimental rig and realised that I should have started by detailing the limiting parameters of this to you. For not doing that earlier, I apologise.

Tomorrow I will post some detailed pictures so that the various solutions can be better tailored.

Thanks.....

BTW my juices are flowing re. what mocroscope objectives can achieve with a DSLR....stunning...........my other passion is Video so I am wondering what happens if they meet........

[chris_ma]

Over Christmas I re-discovered the "PS" at the bottom of my bucket-list promising that I would transfer the 20-odd thousand feel of cine (if I don't, will our kids?) and fired off the post.

if you have large amount of film, you probably don't want to tackle that with a D810. first of all it will be slow and eventually you'll wear out the mirror/shutter.

the faster way to do it is to get a machine vision camera (like a point grey or IMI) connected through USB and trigger that with a magnet sensor in the projector. lots of info about that on filmshooting.com for example.
another upside is that the sensor on those is much smaller, you can usually use a lens around M 1x, or 2x. your micro nikkor 55mm reversed should do nicely for that.

btw, the sweet spot for 8mm film is around 1000pixels of true resolution, so a 1500 to 2000pixel sensor will capture pretty all the detail. your D810 will give a bit better results then a cheap machine vision camera but mainly due to the better dynamic range and colors.

just a thought
chris

[MartinS]

Soon after my last post I realised that I canibalised some parts of my "telecine" setup.
I have now re-assembled it and want to get on with copying the 100 or so reels of cine.

chri_ma
the faster way to do it is to get a machine vision camera (like a point grey or IMI) connected through USB and trigger that with a magnet sensor in the projector. lots of info about that on filmshooting.com for example.
another upside is that the sensor on those is much smaller, you can usually use a lens around M 1x, or 2x. your micro nikkor 55mm reversed should do nicely for that.

I have looked at and spoken to Filr about their machine vision cameras. The Blackfly S USB. It takes a C mount lens which is good as there is not much room where the projector lens should be.

This is my current lash-up - you can clearly see the limitation of my camera & lens.





Flir are quoting for camera, lens and software so I'll see what they say and report back.

Feel free to comment

[JKT]

One option for lenses could theoretically be Schneider-Kreuznach Componon-S 80mm f/4 reversed. It would be far enough from film for 8mm and has small enough diameter for 16mm. The shorter ones won't fit.

If you combine that with another 150 mm enlarger objective, you get magnification 1.875. With the FF camera (with the downsides already mentioned) you would have only a small portion of the frame exposed, but so what - you'd still have resolution of 1815x1325. Furthermore, the same setup would work with the 16mm with a resolution 3880x2835. Both would fit on a crop frame too.

If you then get a smaller sensor, you could use shorter second lens to adjust.

...or at least this should work. Those with more experience in lens stacking might know better?

P.S. BTW, there seems to be good supply of the 80mm f/4 Macro Iris on Ebay right now.