The Visual Science Lab : As I was recuperating this week I had a crazy thought. What if people who wrote long paeans to old lenses (and new ones) and how glorious they were (and are) routinely supplied photographs taken with those lenses to prove their assertions of optical magic? Wouldn't that me cool?

Thursday, November 13, 2025

As I was recuperating this week I had a crazy thought. What if people who wrote long paeans to old lenses (and new ones) and how glorious they were (and are) routinely supplied photographs taken with those lenses to prove their assertions of optical magic? Wouldn't that me cool?

In some ways I tend to be a throwback to a different time. A time in which we were required, in math class, or engineering, to show our work. To show how we arrived at a solution. To offer a proof, as it were, that our hypotheses were valid and the solutions repeatable. We could not just write a paper and say, "The Answer is 11.395. You'll just have to take my word for it." That would never fly. Imagine buying a house with some property attached but without having a survey or access to a previous land survey. "Sure. It's 1.52 acres --- take my word for it." Says the seller. And you happily write the check.

There is a saying on the web when someone tells an outlandish story. A story that aggrandizes the teller and at the same time strains the credulity of the listener. That saying is: "Photos or it didn't happen."

Along the same lines there are far too many photo bloggers, website copywriters, and some v-loggers who spin endless tales about miraculous lenses from the 1960's, 1970's, 1980's and the 1990's. Thick with nostalgia these lenses become talismans of great photographic power and seemingly their powers were only appreciated by an anointed few. The true cognoscenti. A priesthood sharing of cultish photo knowledge which they now insist on passing down like a story of a lost "grail." To hear the tales it's as if these lenses had magical powers which lent images taken with them a special and almost indescribable affect or power. Like Harry Potter's wand. Or Excalibur.

When "lesser" educated photographers try the lens out on their own and fail to "appreciate" the specialness of the optic the members of the cult are quick to explain that this or that neophyte just doesn't (yet) appreciate the special "character" the lens can bring to an image. And round and round we go.

A few lenses go on to achieve the highest level in the pantheon of camera lenses. But their charms are only apparent to people from the "hallowed" film era. People over 50 or maybe 60 years old. People representing the religion of the Tri-X, the beliefs of the coven of Kodachrome. But to lay people, often the special powers of the lenses are hidden behind opaque curtains. The acolytes must first enter into a suspension of disbelief, engendered by a new belief in the cult master, who will lead them to the appropriate epiphany.

The cult master becomes the reference standard and gate keeper of great knowledge only after repeating over and over again how special and deep his knowledge and understanding are. As Goebbels and Roy Cohn knew all too well, repeating something endlessly turns it into fact --- over time.

Though we are mostly aware that technology moves on and lenses get better and better, as do cameras, we still want to believe in the magic being peddled. And this isn't just aimed at ancient and obsolete equipment but also a new gear. The gist of all this is the idea also of context.

When I was a young photographer I happened to be on a beach in Mexico with a beautiful girl, dressed in next to nothing, striking an alluring pose in front of the most amazing sunset I have ever seen. Golden hour everywhere. Soft, billowing, cascading light. I took a photograph on slide film. The image was, to me, incredible. I praised the lens to the heavens though on some level I knew it was a huge confluence of things, all at just the right time, that made the shot work for me...spilling punctum everywhere. But I let everyone I knew hear about the magic of that lens. I took a photograph months later. It was on a job. I used the magic lens to photograph an unattractive scientist who was bored, boring, far too fat and we did this shoot in a florescent lit room decorated by mimeographed notices and dead houseplants. The lens was horrible. Who could work with such a lens? Why had I fooled myself so badly? I sold the "holy" lens a short time later.

This is all to say that after hearing that X 50mm lens from the 1970s is one of the best 50mm lenses ever for the 1,001th time I decided never to believe the written word about magic lenses ever again. If the writer of an article, blog post, or memoir starts to rattle on about some mythic lens I want to see the proof. I want to see actual results. Not results 640 pixel on the wide side. Nope I want to see proof that makes me sit up and notice. 8K or better. With a sworn statement promising that the image is right out of the camera; no clarity slider action, no complex sharpening, no multi-step color regeneration.

I want the writer to put his lens where his keyboard says it lives. Making photographs. Proving a point.

Memory is fickle but memory is always our personal ally.

It's almost never fact.

Show me, or it never existed.