Slow Focus

One thing to learn from Saul Leiter is to not be afraid to experiment and to embrace imperfections in the resulting images. In this vein is playing around with vintage lenses which tend to be optically more interesting than their modern ilk. In my YouTube feed a couple days ago there popped up a video about the Helios 44-2 lens and I immediately thought oh! I have one of those. Time to take it out for a whirl.

The Helios 44-2 is a 58mm lens that was made in large numbers in the Soviet Union. It has a good reputation among vintage lens aficionados because as being a lens with character known for its “swirly bokeh”. I happen to have one; it was the lens that came with my first SLR, an all-manual Zenit. It is labelled “Made in U.S.S.R.” on the lens barrel. Sometime back, I picked up an adapter so that I could mount it on my micro four-thirds interchangeable lens camera (a Panasonic GX-85). For micro four-thirds lenses, their effective focal length (in full frame i.e. 35mm format terms) is twice that of their actual focal length. In other words, a 58mm lens, one with a normal focal length on a 35mm film camera, works out to be a moderate telephoto (effective focal length 116mm) on a micro four-thirds camera. The Helios 44-2 is also a fully manual lens: autofocus was many years in the future.

Anyway, on my late afternoon walk yesterday I took the GX-85 with the Helios 44-2 mounted to it. Focusing manually is a familiar experience, but it’s not one we do much of any more! It forces one to take one’s time, especially since the Helios 44-2 is a moderate telephoto on this camera. At right is one of the images I got on this outing.