Rodenstock Bistigmat

I recently purchased a very old lens, a Rodenstock Bistigmat 13 x 18 ‘Bildaufn Mattsch’ lens made at the end of the 19th or early 20th century. A very simple two lens design, made of brass but with no shutter. It does have four aperture settings only marked 1, 2, 3 and 4,  but with no indication of how those values might relate to modern-day F-stops.

I took an opportunity at a Photosynthesis Open Studio event a couple of weeks ago to try the lens  out in the studio with a simple stiff-life. Using flash made it easier to try. I made the studio dark and then triggered the flash having removed the dark slide. Knowing the power of the flash and different aperture settings should give an approximation for the f-stops. I have a bit more experimenting to do, but the lens seems fairly sharp but a little ‘flarey’. 

Below is an image taken on the night, developed at Photosynthesis, scanned and then tweaked a little in Capture One. Hopefully, I can take it out and try a landscape another time and give that a go. Exposure time will be interesting to set, however.