One of the finest example for a Jamins Cone Centralisateur Portrait Petzval lenses i ever had in my hands. Its a complete set, with both middle elements!

History: The Cone Centralisateur lens design (which is a petzval design with a larger back element to avoid reflections), is absolutely famous and sought after in the late 19th century and even more today. It was the flagship lens for Jamins workshop in the early 1850ies and 1860ies in Paris. It offered better optical quality then most of his rivals, but also a possibility to it as a portrait (portrait mode) lens and also as a landscape lens (paysage). Even though its a normal petzval design, you will see a slight difference to other portrait petzvals from that time. The Cone Centralisateur lenses have this cenrtain 'something' to their image, which is hard to grasp, but many people are looking for.

The engraving reads:

'JAMIN & DARLOT Btes - R Chapon 14 Paris - 4736'

That engraving puts the lens in the short time period of early 1860 where Darlot became the partner of Jamin. Just a couple of years later (around 1863) Darlot took the workshop over.

Condition: This brass beauty comes in a great condition! The brass shows only light wear and still a warm patina, the rack & pinion mechanism seems complete and working (a bit jumpy though). The lens features a washer stop option inside. The glass is in nice condition too, there are some light marks and fine cleaning streaks here and there,  which is quite normal for that age and wont affect the image at all.

With its fast open aperture of F4.5 and a focal lengh of 330mm (or almost 13"), this lens will work anywhere from 5x7 to 8x10 format (and very likely even 10x12 if you really want to see alot of petzval character in your images and some light vignietting).

In landscape mode it will have an estimated focal lenght of 600mm, covering huge ULF formats like 20" x 20" !

The best part about this lens is, it comes with a fitting setup including the original flange, the original brass Lenscap and both middle inserts, including the insert with glass which shortens the bellows draw in the landscape mode. This one is missing 90% of the time!



height: 22cm
width: 13cm
weight: 2300gr

Insured and tracked shipping cost:

Germany - 20 eur
EU* - 30 eur
Worldwide - 80 eur**

*(the site offers only 2 shipping variations, DE and worldwide. buyers from EU please either contact me beforehand for a reduced EU cost, or after buying so i can send a refund over the difference)

** the high cost is due the high insurance value

Importent Note: This item comes from my private collection and is around 100 years old (antique). I try my best to describe all the faults and major damage which are relevant for the function of this item. But the actuall item can show signs of wear and also some cosmetic blemishes/damage which is not described in the auction text! When buying this item the buyer agrees to this terms.