English-made Cooke Lenses: Still in the Picture
By Barbara Lowry
It's the 1920s. The "great man" sits in his small office in a lens factory in England, located a short cab ride away from the train station in Leicester. Across town, an optical engineer from Technicolor in America pulls into Leicester Station on the morning train from London. The noise and heat emanating from the locomotives fades as he climbs the long staircase, moving upward step-by-step toward the sun. The Technicolor engineer is on yet another pilgrimage seeking guidance from the great man who offers a workable solution to whatever optical challenge is thrust upon him.
The great man behind the desk greets his American visitor and invites him to sit down. He listens to the issue presented, then stares at the wall beyond, leaving the room completely and uncomfortably silent for several minutes. The American wonders, "Did he hear me? Maybe he didn't understand?" Then the great man offers the solution.
The great man behind the desk is Arthur Warmisham, the most prolific optical designer of the 20th century, responsible for 99 optical patents--more than any other single person or company during the first half of the 20th century. The company in Leicester is Taylor, Taylor & Hobson, maker of Cooke lenses, where Warmisham spent 43 years developing lenses for a variety of applications. The story is true, as told by the Technicolor engineer complete with religious imagery, at Arthur Warmisham's retirement party in 1956.
A string of talented lens designers spent their careers at Taylor, Taylor & Hobson--later Taylor-Hobson--designing and making exemplary lenses while German competitors, such as Zeiss, did the same. Yet Taylor-Hobson failed to achieve the name recognition of some of these competitors. Sometimes one company's products of equal or better quality end up lost in obscurity because the other company has a louder voice and bigger publicity budget. (Remember OS2, IBM's elegant, non-crashing operating system that Microsoft pummeled to death?)
These little-known facts about the English-made Cooke lenses may surprise you: Sound movies became possible because of them. Technicolor became a viable process because of them. Virtually all feature films made in Hollywood during the first half of the 20th century were shot with them. By the 1930s, three quarters of the photo engravers in Great Britain and the U.S. were using Cooke process lenses. During the Second World War, they were used exclusively by the U.S. and Britain for photo-reconnaissance and cartography. Last but not least, the Cooke name is revered in the fields of large format portraiture, architectural, and landscape photography.
While Cooke lenses are well known in the U.K., knowledge of their quality in the U.S. seems limited to a handful of seasoned, professional photographers. Even on Ebay, where you have the ability to see a description of what you're buying, little information exists about the original purpose of the Cooke lenses put up for auction.
In this article I hope to provide you with some helpful background about the Cooke lenses that you may find on the used market, so you needn't rely on descriptions such as this one-- ". . . looks like for an enlarger or maybe large format camera? . . ." --a description I recently saw on Ebay to describe a Cooke Series II Anastigmat f/4.5, 4-inch lens for the 3¼x3¼ in. format. Armed with the right information, you'll be in a better position to know whether a lens offered for sale will work for your application. The Cooke lens on Ebay was made for Graflex and reflex cameras in about 1910 to get shots of fast moving subjects at close range in low light-and the photographer was assured of getting an image as sharp at the edges as at the center by virtue of it being an anastigmat lens of Cooke Triplet patent design. It sold on Ebay for $13.
Early Cooke Lenses
The Cooke Triplet, patented by H. Dennis Taylor in England in 1893, was a simple and elegant solution to the problem of what was then called "a streakiness of definition" that appeared in photos, especially at their margins. (Optical engineers call this astigmatism.) The Cooke Triplet, three separated single elements (a negative lens placed between two positive lenses) that achieved a sharp image up to the edges of the photographic plate, was so revolutionary that in the late 1890s the lens design community responded vehemently by accusing Taylor, Taylor & Hobson of doctoring photos taken with the lens. TT&H had exclusive license to the Cooke Triplet design. They gladly used this denunciation as an opportunity to get lots of free and successful publicity for their new product.
The first lenses made using the Cooke Triplet construction consisted of three uncemented elements with adjustable air spaces, controlled by a tiny screw in the center of the lens barrel that could be used for a final adjustment before leaving Leicester for market. The screw head was lacquered to prevent tampering. Various early Cooke anastigmat lenses produced between about 1910 and about 1924 were made of brass and were always engraved with the series number. Cooke lenses had fancy trade names listed in their catalogs, but these were rarely engraved on the lenses. Today's most popular large format Cooke lenses made during the first half of the 20th century are:
- Cooke Aviar lenses, for ultra-sharp definition.
- Cooke Portrait/Soft-Focus lenses in various series for a soft, diffused look.
- Cooke Triple Convertible lenses with separate modules used separately or combined to give a range of focal lengths.
- Cooke wide-angle lenses, especially the Series VIIB, f/6.5, used particularly for architectural photography.
- Cooke process lenses for photo engraving and three-color photography in the printing industry.
- Cooke Aviar
The advent of World War I provided the company with an opportunity to shine. For the war effort, the British government desperately needed a high-speed lens with great definition that could be used for aerial photography. With Jena glass no longer available from Germany, the government approached Taylor, Taylor & Hobson in Leicester for a remedy. In response, optical designer Arthur Warmisham designed the "Aviar" lens, which surpassed in quality the best German lenses used in aerial surveillance at that time. The Royal Flying Corps, and later the Royal Air Force, adopted the Aviar as the best aerial lens available. The lens was such a success that it gained the company a special visit from King George V and Queen Mary in 1919. The company went on to develop the lens for general photography. By the 1950s, near the end of the company's production of lenses for still photography, the Aviar was prized as the finest anastigmat ever produced in any country.
Cooke Aviar Lens, 1930s | The Cooke Aviar Series II f/4.5 and Series IIIB, f/6 and f/6.3 lenses are of what lens designers call the dialyte type of lens construction. This consists of two air-spaced achromatic doublets, the two outer ones double convex, and the two inner ones double concave, with no cement or coatings to become discolored with time. The older lenses, dating back to 1921, are identified by the engraving "Aviar" and "Taylor, Taylor & Hobson." These lenses were made in focal lengths covering smaller plate sizes only. The company recommended that enlargements be made from the negative in order to "preserve the distinctive snap and brilliance of the negative" because the lens was not meant for use on larger plates. The 6 inch focal length was |
made for 4x5 format, the 7 inch covered 6x4, and the 8.25 inch covered 6.5x 4¾ at full aperture.
The lenses are engraved with "Aviar" and "Taylor-Hobson." They still offered the same crisp overall definition as the original Aviar lenses made for aerial photography and were corrected for both black-and-white and color photography.
The Series IIIB, f/6 Aviar lenses were offered in slightly shorter focal lengths, including a 12.5 inch for 8x10.
Cooke Portrait/Soft-Focus Lenses
Clarence White and Alfred Stieglitz, among others, used a Cooke lens known as "The Rapid View and Portrait Lens" (brass lens engraved "R.V.P.") produced by TT&H in the late 1880s. By 1913, because of the influence of these acclaimed photographers, the company received numerous requests for its diffused-look soft-focus lenses that predated the sharp Cooke Anastigmat. In response to an avalanche of requests, they reproduced the single lens R.V.P. as the "Cooke Achromatic Portrait Lens f/7.5" (as engraved) in four focal lengths: 10.5 inch for 4x5, 12 inch for 5x8, 15 inch for 6.5x8.5 and 18 inch for the 8x10 format. The "new" versions of these lenses included an iris diaphragm. A Cooke lens catalog of 1913 notes, "Whoever expects sharp definition will be disappointed, but the photographer who desires softness and roundness coupled with fine modeling and a true perspective will be both astonished and delighted."
Cooke Portrait Lens, 1920s | In addition to the Cooke Achromatic Portrait Lens, Taylor, Taylor & Hobson produced a series of Cooke Portrait lenses called "Portrics," "Portrellics," and "Portronics," though none were engraved with those names. They were, however, engraved with their respective series numbers: Series II, f/4.5 (the most popular of the Cooke Portrait lens series which later prompted Series IIB, IIC, IID, and IIE ), Series IIA, f/3.5, and Series VI, f/5.6. These early soft-focus lenses were sharp anastigmats that employed a |
diffusion adjustment allowing the photographer to distribute any degree of softness evenly throughout the plate. The most refined way to use these variably-soft lenses is to set the diffusion adjustment first, to give the amount of softness desired over the image, then afterward focus on the part of the subject you want to appear sharpest. The Series VI, f/5.6 lens differed from the other two in that the degree of diffusion is adjusted after the lens is focused.
The first Portrics introduced before 1910 controlled diffusion by rotating the front element. In 1924 these three series of lenses were re-engineered so the degree of diffusion could be obtained by using a nifty two-hole finger ("knuckle") grip set behind the front element that protruded from the side of the lens. When set to "Sharp," the lens covers its specified plate when focused on a distant object. When focused on subjects within about 10 feet of the camera at full aperture, the lens covers the next plate size larger, though each lens may need to be stopped down to get a greater depth of field. The newer finger grip models allowed for 60 percent greater diffusion graduated to five positions instead of three as with the previous models. Graduated scales for diffusion and the iris diaphragm were now readable from the same position at the side of the camera.
The Cooke Series II, f/4.5 anastigmat was made from about 1897 to1930. The first lens made was a 13-inch focal length for 8.5x6.5 format. The very first lenses produced are brass and engraved with "H.D. Taylor's Patents." By 1924 there were four: 10.5 inch for 5x8, 13 inch for 7x9, 15 inch for 8x10, and 18 inch for 10x12. The lenses were meant for high-speed portrait and group photos within the studio. The lenses are engraved "Cooke Portrait Lens Ser II." In January 2002, a 13-inch lens listed on lensrepro.com for $400.
The Cooke Series IIA, f/3.5 is an anastigmat lens of Cooke Triplet construction made from about 1909 to 1929. Focal lengths made after 1924 are 9.5 inch for 6.5 x 4¾ plate, 10.5 inch for 5x7 plate, 12.5 inch for 8.5x6.5 plate, and 15 inch for 8x10 plate.
The Cooke Series IIB, f/4.5 was introduced about 1926 in four focal lengths: 10.5 inch for 6.5x8.5 format, 12.75 inch for 8x10, 15 inch for 10x12 and 18 inch for 11x14. The lens was furnished with an iris diaphragm and the finger-grip diffusing device.
The Cooke Series IIC, f/4.5 was first offered in 1930 and was short lived. It was made without a diffusion device and came in three focal lengths for the amateur, at-home portrait photographer: 10.5 inch for 6.5x8.5 format, 12.75 inch for 8x10 and 15 inch for 10x12. The lens was made lighter and more compact for home use on view cameras.
Cooke Portrait Lens, 1940s | The Cooke Series IID, f/4.5 was produced from 1930 through 1950 and came in three focal lengths: 10.5 inch for 5x7 format, 12.5 inch for 8.5x6.5, 15 inch for 8x10.
The Cooke Series IIE, f/4.5 was produced from about 1930 through 1956. It came in the following focal lengths: 10.5 inch for 5x8 format, 12.75 inch for 7x9, 15 inch for 8x10, 18 inch for 10x12 and 20 inch for 12x15. Formatcamera.com listed a 15-inch, all brass Cooke Series IIE lens about a year ago for $649. |
The Cooke Series VI, f/5.6 included focal lengths of 13 inch for 8x10, 16 inch for 10x12 and 18 inch for 16x18 plate sizes covered at full aperture. The earliest version of the lens was supplied with the traditional cords and pulleys for adjusting the depth of focus, diffusion, and iris from the back while viewing the image on the ground glass. A pointer was engraved on the lens barrel so that any exact level of diffusion could be repeated by bringing the pointer to the same spot on the engraved scale. Those earliest lenses can be identified of course by the little metal appendages on the rings, there to attach the cords. At f/5.6, the lens was no longer considered speedy, but for daylight work in the studio and for group shots indoors and out, these lenses were used extensively. These lenses were more compact than the others in the series and traveled well. In 1921, a 13-inch Cooke Series VI sold for $150 and was very popular in the U.S. and in Europe. On the used market today they sell for about $200.
In 1935, Taylor, Taylor & Hobson introduced the next generation of their portrait lenses, all engraved with the series numbers: the Series IID f/3.5 (Portric), Series IIE f/4.5 (Portrellic), and Series VIA f/5.6 (Portronic). All these anastigmats were designed to be sharp to the corners of the plate, still offering the adjustable soft-focus effect via the finger grip on the side of the barrel that distributed the diffusion evenly throughout the plate. All three lenses in the series include a stop device that clicks off the degrees of diffusion to aid in using the lens in a darkroom for enlarging, eliminating any concern over the diffusion altering.
The Cooke Series IID, f/3.5 was made in the following focal lengths: 10.5 inch for 5x7 format, 12.5 inch for 8.5 x 6.5 format, and 15 inch for 8x10 formats.
The Series IIE, f/4.5 was made in 10.5 inch for 5x8, 12.75 inch for 7x9, 15 inch for 8x10, 18 inch for 10x12, and 12 inch for 12x15 formats.
The Series VIA, f/5.6, after 1934 was made in 13 inch for 7x9, 15.5 for 8x10, and 18 inch for 10x12 formats. These lenses are large and heavy. The 15.5-inch lens, for example, weighs about 10 pounds. They sell for about $200 to $350 today.
None of the Cooke Portrait lenses were antireflection coated, so any used lenses you find on the market today should be clear of the discoloration that might be caused by old coatings.
Cooke Triple Convertible
Ansel Adams shot many of his most famous images using a Cooke Series XV Triple Convertible lens made in the 1940s, as documented in his book Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs. The lens provides three separate focal lengths that can be used in combination as a triplet, or the front and rear components can be used separately as individual lenses. All three combinations cover 8x10 at infinity. The combinations are 12.25 inch, 312mm, f/6.8. Back: 19 inch, 483mm, f/12.5. Front: 26.50 inch, 673mm, f/16.
Cooke Series XV Triple Convertible
This convertible lens was based on a 1931 design by H.W. Lee, described by Kodak's Rudolph Kingslake as "one of England's most original lens designers." Lee was with Taylor, Taylor & Hobson for 23 years, where he invented the Cooke Speed Panchro, Hollywood's most-used motion picture lens, and the inverted telephoto used on the three-strip Technicolor camera. This optical innovation later made it possible to use wide-angle lenses with mirror-shutter cameras.
Ansel Adams appeared on BBC-TV stating that he used a convertible lens for many of his photos, and then said, almost as a throw-away line, "A Cooke of course." The lens was made between 1935 and about 1947. They are rarely seen on the used lens market, and no one seems to know the whereabouts of the lens owned by Ansel Adams. A Series XV popped up on Ebay about a year and a half ago with a minimum bid request of $1,200. There were no takers. The price was double what the market would bear at the time. The minimum price set by the seller was due to the connection to Adams.
Cooke Wide-Angle Lenses
The Cooke Series VIIA, f/6.5 "Primoplane" lens (1909 to 1923) and the lens that superseded it, the Cooke Series VIIB, f/6.5 (1924 to 1956), are both found on the used market ranging in asking price from $157 to $899, without a shutter. One sold on Ebay in March for $191.50. The Series VIIB is especially sought after today because of the increased angle of view to 100 degrees at f/32.
The Primoplane lenses are engraved with the name "Primoplane" as well as the series number and were made from 1909 through about 1923 for photographing architecture, banquets, dim interiors, and large groups. They were designed to be accurately focused at full aperture so the photographer could clearly see what showed up on the focusing screen. The literature from 1915 reads, "Satisfactory definition is given at f/6.5, but this aperture is sometimes too large to permit sharp definition of everything grouped within the limited space available. The diaphragm must then be stopped down to increase the depth of focus, but it need rarely be smaller than f/16 to give excellent results. The angle of view expressed in relation to the longer side of the plate for each lens listed is approximately 70 degrees." The catalogue continues, "The Series VIIA lenses will illuminate plates larger than those for which they are listed, and the angle included, as expressed in relation to the diameter of the circle of illumination, is approximately 90 degrees."
Cooke Primoplane lenses were sold mounted to between-lens shutters with the complete lens fitted in the front of the shutter to allow the photographer to take full advantage of the extreme rise of the camera front. They were made in the following focal lengths: 3 inch for 4.25 x3.25 format; 4 inch for 5.5x3.5; 5 inch for 5x7; 6 inch for 8.5x6.5; 7 inch for 8x10; and 8 inch for 10x12.
Cooke Series VIIB Wide Angle | Compared to the Primoplane lenses, Cooke Series VIIB, f/6.5 offered a considerably wider angle, a perfectly flat field, and elimination of zonal defects.
Sharp definition is given throughout a field of 100 degrees at f/32 and throughout 90 degrees at f/16. They were made in the following focal lengths: 2.5 inch for 4.25x3.25; 3.25 inch for 4.5x3.5; 4.25 inch for 5x7; 5.25 inch for 8.5x6.5; 6.25 inch for 8x10; and 8 inch for 10x12.
Last August, a Series VIIB, 4.25-inch (108mm) lens, complete with lens cap and original leather case all in excellent condition, sold on Ebay for $239. |
Cooke Process Lenses
Cooke Process Lenses and Process Prisms helped expert cartographers and graphic arts photographers provide the armed services with maps and charts of every description during World War II. By 1947, three-quarters of the photo engravers in Great Britain and America were using them because of their uniformly keen definition. They were the first Apochromatic Process Lenses of British design.
Cooke process lenses made after the early 1920s were provided with a removable lens-hood that could be covered with a leather cap. The screw thread that attaches the hood could alternatively receive any process prism fitted with the standard screw. Process Prisms are extremely rare now and are the stuff of museums instead of Ebay. An iris diaphragm was provided at that time instead of the stops with circular openings. A narrow slot in the lens barrel near the front of the lens could receive process diaphragms or gel filters (of graphic arts quality) if desired. The slot can be opened and closed by revolving the inscription tube.
The special inserts were Penrose Patent Diaphragm Systems designed specially for use with the Cooke lenses. One diaphragm insert was for half-tone stops, another was for three-color, and one was adjustable. No shutter was necessary for this type of photography because the subject was stationary and inanimate. All that is needed is a darkened room and a light source. The lens was set up on a copy stand with a lens cap to act as a shutter. If the Cooke Process Prism was used, it attached to the front of the process lens, then the door on the side of the three-sided prism would be opened at will to let in the light.
The Cooke Series V, f/8 lens began its run about 1899 and was designed in continued collaboration with Dennis Taylor as an even more refined variant of the Cooke Triplet lens. It was offered as a Cooke process lens a little over ten years later because of its special clarity of definition. The lens was especially suited for commercial photography requiring microscopically fine definition in average lighting conditions. (In 1912, a Professor Pickering of the Harvard Observatory chose several of the Series V focal lengths to record nightly sky survey shots of the stars from Cambridge, Massachusetts.) Until about 1925, the Series V, f/8 lenses were made in these focal lengths: 9 inch for 5x8 format, 11 inch for 8.5x6.5, 12 inch for 8x10, 16 inch for 10x12, 18 inch for 12x15 and 25 inch for 16x18. In January 2002, an 11-inch Series V was listed on www.pgsys.com for $200.
The Cooke Series VA, f/10 and f/16, produced in the early 1920s, were made for recording very large, flat images such as maps that required a lens with no geometrical distortion. It was made in the following speeds and focal lengths: f/10, 25 inch for 16x20 format, f/16, 30 inch for 20x24, and f/16, 36 inch for 24x30. The 42 and 48-inch lenses were made to order for up to 30x40 inch plates.
Series VB, f/8, f/10, f/16 for half tone and line negatives were designed for engravers' cameras and for use on view, commercial, and copying cameras. The glass was untreated. It was made from about 1924 through about 1952. In 1952, the following speeds and focal lengths were produced: f/8, 9 inch for 7x9 format; f/8, 11 inch for 8x10; f/8, 13 inch for 9x13; f/10, 16 inch for 12x15; f/10, 18 inch for 13x10; f/10, 21 inch for 16x20; f/10, 25 inch for 18x25; f/16, 30 inch for 20x30; and f/16, 36 inch for 24x36. On the used market they sell for about $100 or less.
Series IX, f/10, f/12, f/16 is an Apochromatic process lens for photo engraving and three-color work. It was equally suited for half tone and line negatives, for engravers' cameras, and for use on view, commercial and copying cameras. The glasses were not antireflection coated. The lens was made between about 1924 and 1952. In 1952, the following speeds and focal lengths were produced: f/10, 12 inch for 9x13 format; f/10, 16 inch for12x15; f/10, 18 inch for 13x18; f/10, 21 inch for 16x20; f/10, 25 inch for 18x25; f/16, 30 inch for 20x30; f/16, 36 inch for 24x36, f/16, 42 inch for 30x40, and f/16, 48 inch for 36x48. Today you can get one for about $100 or less.
The 21st Century
My story could end here, but it doesn't. The Cooke name is very much alive and well at Cooke Optics Limited, where they make Academy Award® winning Cooke S4 35mm Prime and zoom lenses for cinematography. In 1998, the Cooke lens division was purchased from Taylor-Hobson and installed in a new state-of-the-art facility in Leicester; the same town where Cooke lenses have always been made. Visit the new facility and you will see that the culture of quality and exacting tolerances has been faithfully carried-over from the Taylor, Taylor & Hobson tradition. Their manufacturing style still incorporates individual craftsmanship, mixing the best of traditional lens making methods with innovative new ideas that have won the company awards each year for the past four years their lenses made for the motion picture industry.
Cooke is now branching out by getting back into large format with a new lens for soft-focus photography. The new Cooke PS945 lens is a 9-inch, 229mm, f4.5 lens for 4x5 format cameras, supplied mounted in a Copal 3 shutter. Many people will probably be surprised to know that the lens is a reproduction of a Pinkham & Smith lens, not a Cooke Portrait lens. Why would Cooke do such a thing? Pinkham & Smith soft-focus lenses are extremely rare. Today, the look that can be obtained with them is considered in some circles to be better than with other brands of soft-focus lenses. Famed photographers F. Holland Day, Alvin Langdon Coburn, Alfred Stieglitz, and Edward Steichen, loved the look they achieved with them-as do gallery visitors viewing their works a century later. Coburn owned a dozen Pinkham & Smith lenses; more than any other single brand of lens. It seems fitting for Cooke to produce a lens that allows contemporary photographers the opportunity to experiment and achieve a look that was so coveted by the masters of impressionist photography.
The Cooke PS945 lens will be seen for the first time at View Camera Magazine's first Large Format Photography Conference in late June.
Reprinted by Permission, View Camera Magazine
Copyright © 2002 Steve Simmons Incorporated
|