Here is the one of two very rare lenses donated to the Pavek Museum…this one is a 27 element Zoomar long lens used at CBS Television City (the other lens is in the next post down on this page). Although Steve does not have the full history on these 2 great rarities, this one has the CBS markings. Congratulations Steve!
The 27 Element Zoomar Field Lens
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3 responses to “The 27 Element Zoomar Field Lens”
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A big disadvantage of early TV Zooms was that they lost t-stops as you zoomed in.
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First zoom lens I ever ran as a summer relief tech was a Zoomar push rod lens (50:100mm) on a TK-41 at WLW-C in Columbus while I was in college. Unlike today’s cameras, to achieve focus throughout the entire zoom range, you had to zoom out and back focus using the camera focus, then zoom all the way in and front focus with the push rod on the lens.
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This is wonderful. I’m currently writing a PhD on the use of zoom lenses in American film and television between the 1940s and the 1970s, and the (largely untold) history of the Zoomar lens is a major part of this. If anyone has any personal memories of using this lens, or has any documents relating to the Zoomar companies, I’d be very grateful if they would consider contacting me – my email address is nh260@exeter.ac.uk.
One thing I have struggled to find out is for how long this particular model Zoomar – this would appear to be one of the original Television Field Zoomars introduced in the late 1940s – continued to be used in television. Anyone have any ideas?
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