When you're doing something new that you have no experience with, there is always a risk of things going wrong. I spent months learning, designing, and preparing everything that would be necessary to build two advanced ambitious lenses. I only get access to the machines I need to manufacture and test the theories I have learnt every few months when I return to the UK, meaning that prototyping periods are short, stressful, and far apart. When I do get access to the machines, I have to make real progress and battle through problems and difficulties extremely quickly in order to finish what I need on time. Most of the problems cannot be premeditated and solved, as they usually happen in front of you as a result of machines or tools which you do not have control over. This is the nature of one off prototyping; after all, anyone can design something. Making it is a totally different ball game.
The 2 lenses I managed to manufacture are the 50.2'8 PMMA-PC (5) {1} and the 90.2 PMMA-PC (8) {2}. Lets not beat around the bush; the prototyping period was partly successful in terms of the lenses actually coming to existence, but overall it was ultimately a failure due to the disastrously poor results generated by them.
Samples are shown below. They are all taken on a full frame Canon 5D Mark II, and they are all terrible. I will explain why in the next post, but for now take a look at the plethora of errors on display.
50.2'8 PMMA-PC (5) {1}
90.2 PMMA-PC (8) {2}
