Lomography Brings Back the 19th Century Petzval Lens

Lomography is crowdsourcing the funding for this lens project. The lens will be available for Canon and Nikon DSLRs. The Phoblographer has a good article to learn more about the Petzval lens. For sample pics check the Kickstarter page.

Quoting the project:

In the 19th Century, the vast majority of photos were shot with the extremely popular Petzval lens. The lens was invented by Joseph Petzval in Vienna in 1840 and had a huge impact on the development of photography. Photos shot with a Petzval lens are immediately recognizable for their sharpness and crispness, strong color saturation, wonderful swirly bokeh effect, artful vignettes and narrow depth of field. The totally distinctive look of Petzval photos is all about the fantastic lens design that gives you the satisfaction of the instant optic experience that goes far beyond using photo editing software and filters.

For this Kickstarter project, we are reinventing the Petzval Lens for 21st century photographers and videographers. It doesn’t matter whether you shoot analog or digital; the brand new Lomography Petzval Portrait Lens is designed to work withCanon EF and Nikon F mount cameras. So, for the first time, you can easily get the fantastic Petzval photographic look with 35mm analog cameras and DSLR cameras too. This will bring with it a whole new world of possibilities; from shooting Petzval photos with your 35mm SLR or DSLR, to creating amazing DSLR movies with the lens!

The specs:

• Focal Length: 85mm
• Maximum Aperture: f/2.2
• Apertures: Waterhouse aperture set, up to f/16
• Image Circle: 44mm
• Field of View: 30 degrees
• Lens Mounting Profile: Canon EF and Nikon F
• Electronic contacts: No
• Closest Focusing Distance: 1m
• Focusing Mechanism: Gear Rack Focusing
• Lens Construction: 4 Elements in 3 Groups
• Filter Thread: 67mm
• Max. Diameter x Length, Weight: 120mm x 85mm x 80mm (Please note: This is an estimate based on the first working sample)
• Weight: 500g (Please note: This is an estimate based on the first working sample)