Talk:C-mount

C-mount lens without aperture adjustments, etc

I'm curious where the writer has ever seen a C-mount lens without aperture adjustments. I have been collecting and dealing in this equipment for over 40 years, and have neither seen nor heard of such a lens. Since I'm currently writing the book on the early history of 16mm, in which material on the evolution of mounting systems will be included, such a lens would be of great interest. Are you sure you don't mean focusing lenses? Many C-mount lenses were made in fixed focus, but there were none ever produced without aperture controls. The C-mount itself indicates a level of sophistication that would preclude such an arrangement.

I am reluctant to edit the main entry because I'm not sure what the writer has in mind, but he seems to be writing in English as a second language, so there are a few things that lack clarity. I'm not sure what he means by survey cameras; perhaps surveillance cameras? It would also be well to define or describe the CS mount that is mentioned, as it is one I have never heard of, though if it is new and limited to surveillance use, that would not be surprising. In any event, it needs to be clarified. Past reflections

Thank you for bringing this up. Here is the history of the page; at first it may seem that it was written by two people, but it's clear that one of them merely added a template and that the text is actually by one person.

If you're writing a book on the early history of 16mm you may well be in a better position to write an article here. (As for me, I know little about C-mount lenses, but even I am surprised by the statement that "f1.7, f1.8 and f2.8 are the most common standard lens speeds of still cameras": which kind of still cameras?) Skipping what's here now and starting afresh would be fine.

Certainly there would be interest here in the result, what with µ4/3 and the C-mount Kenko (still) camera. (Eventually, a little about image circles would help, but if your interest in 16mm means that you're not much interested in the margin by which image circles exceed the 16mm frame, don't worry; perhaps somebody else will come later to add this information.) Zuleika 08:48, 29 March 2011 (PDT)

Yes, I would also take exception to the paragraph on lens speeds. It's pretty much nonsense. When I get a few minutes later, I'll do some editing and try to get it back to a more realistic description. I don't see the 4/3 applications as being particularly relevant to a Camera-wiki description of C-mount, since the digital adaptaion is a late arrival in what amounts to a fad application, and has nothing to do with the original purpose of the mount or the lenses bearing it. The silly prices that some lenses were bringing for awhile have already started collapsing, so I expect C-mount lenses will again be accessible by collectors before too much longer. Past reflections

Although, keep in mind that this has largely been a wiki of still-camera equipment up until now, and we have very limited coverage of movie gear. Many of the folks looking for a C-mount article could very well be those wishing to adapt them to a digital body. You might object to that personally, but this wiki has to accommodate photographers and collectors of all stripes. --Vox 11:43, 29 March 2011 (PDT)

OK, I've gotten it off to at least a start. I removed the nonsense statements, provided a little more information about the nature and history of the mount, and de-emphasized the micro 4/3 use, but left mention of it for those who are interested. As for still vs. cine, I don't quite follow your reasoning in that. I know of nothing that excludes cine information from Camera-wiki, and if there is some bias, I would ask "whatever for?" It's all about cameras. Why would there be any kind of exclusion? It seems to me the name alone should make it all-inclusive. Past reflections

Nobody has, or wants to, exclude anything. It's just that the earlier contributors never pursued movie equipment. That only began to change within the past couple of months. Thus most of the site traffic comes from still-camera users and collectors.

Your edit looks great, although I'm unsure what "Bokeh experiment" means (see bokeh—and bokeh can be written lowercase). Perhaps "soft focus" is the more appropriate term there. --Vox 13:23, 29 March 2011 (PDT)

Bokeh takes advantage of optical defects or shortcomings to create non-conventional effects. Such defects in the case of these lenses would be minor, but still evident in comparison with the raw images from modern lenses. Lower contrast would be more a factor than soft focus, since anything in a C-mount is likely to have reasonably good optics, but if you feel that part of the description doesn't belong, I can remove it. Past reflections

You've put me in an argumentative mood, at least for one sentence, viz: It's my understanding that bokeh is merely a matter of out-of-focus-ness, although its characteristics are determined by the shape of the aperture (at the extremes, a triangular aperture will look hideous [or "distinctive" or whatever]; a circular aperture will have pleasing results).

My argumentativeness out of the way, I'd agree with what both of you are saying. Use of C-mount lenses on new digital still cameras is indeed probably a mere fad, and we can call it so on this talk page; but we shouldn't rush to have the article insult its readers, some of whom may be proud (if underinformed) purchasers of these lenses. And as fads go, this one does seem to "have legs", what with the announcement of a "dedicated" C-mount camera from Kenko. Though I can understand how people wanting to use these lenses in sensible ways might be irritated by the jumps in their pricing.

I've added some factoids to the article from off the top of my head. This is of course a poor way to create articles. Time and energy willing, I'll return either to back up the factoids with evidence, or to delete them. However, if you find them hard to believe or plain wrong, please don't wait for me, just go ahead and delete them. Zuleika 17:09, 29 March 2011 (PDT)

I edited out some red links in the article, and in the process, I took out a wikilink to 'Hugo Meyer' because that redirects to Meyer, which was also wikilinked. Lenses marked 'Meyer Görlitz' are very familiar, and I have seen that there are also lenses marked 'Hugo Meyer', but I don't know what significance that has (beyond that Görlitz is simply the town where the company was). If anyone else does, feel free to correct what I did; perhaps we should have a separate page on Hugo Meyer, or a section in Meyer, explaining the different markings?