Novoflex 40cm f/5.6
Very sharp, lens with nice “bokeh”. Lens design is very simple. Focusing is super fast almost fast as an AF lens. Lens barrel made from aluminium so light weight compare with other 400mm lenses. Easy to split for transporting , much easier to handle than others. Before I made any test shoots I was worry about how I able to handle hand shaking, because I use 2x crop camera Olympus-E1. Effective focal length 800mm on this camera first usage was pleasant surprise, sharp at wide open! I could make many great shoots from hand without any tripod. I bought this lens with fungus. I cleaned my self, this lens was the most logical construction in my experience. I didn’t find any weakness I love this lens ! SUPERB!
Lens
Fact Sheet
Vendor name
Novoflex
Novoflex
Type
Fernobjektiv
Fernobjektiv
Product year
1950 ?
1950 ?
Focal Min(mm)
400
400
Focal Max(mm)
400
400
Focus Min(cm)
500
500
Aperture Max
5.6
5.6
Aperture Min.
22
22
Barrel length(mm)
N/A
N/A
Elements In Group
2 in 1
2 in 1
Diaphragm action
manual
manual
Weight (g)
–
–
Filter Size (mm)
77
77
Push on diameter (mm)
N/A
N/A
Angular field
7
7
There are several versions of this lens. The best is the “T-Noflexar” 400mm, there are also 600mm f/8 and f/9 versions, a 5.6/280mm head and a superb 6.3/560mm Leitz Telyt. The T-Noflexar and Telyt are very costly even today.
Hi,
What is the better?
Don’t know both are great, Sigma is shorter almost like a 300mm lens. Makes it to better walk around lens than Novoflex.
Thanks for the review. There’s a 400 5.6 at keh for ~350 US$ I’ve been curious about. How hard was it manually focusing thru the viewfinder on the E1? (I have an E30 with a slightly smaller VF.) Also, do you have to do stop down metering or is there a manual aperature ring?
From my memory I’d say the lens design is 3 lenses in 1 group. Otherwise you wouldn’t achieve the excellent sharpness and contrast of the Noflexar.