Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

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Pau
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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Pau »

Thanks for showing your tests!

Duke,
Your tests show very bad performance at the corners but also at the borders, what tube lens did you use? I'm not telling that it had performed badly as your 20X behaves excellently, but about the focal length. Your camera sensor seems a bit larger than mine but, despite it, my results seem better. I have some tests with a silicon wafer showing clear corner degradation but not so bad, although I prefer to re-shot them before posting

Macro-Cosmos,
It's clear that it can't cover FF decently, this was expected (I suppose that you're testing it in your Oly microscope with direct projection, so with 180mm tube lens, I'm I right?)
Pau

Duke
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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Duke »

Pau,
It's a "Nikon LV-TI3 Trinocular Tube" (MBB63425), tubelens installed inside is MXA20696 "CFI60-2,CFI60,CF&IC compatible" f=200mm.
All my images posted above, are single shot, not stacked, no additional processing applied (aside from merging 4 pixel-shifted frames over Pentax Digital Camera Utility). There is, however, slight misalignment of the wafer, since it's press-mounted on the piece of plasticine, and it has some resilience.
Shouldn't matter much on the results of 4x/0,13 though, but corner performance of LMPlanFL 10x/0.25 is a bit affected by it, it's actually better than appears in terms of sharpness, but a bit of LCA is apparent and permanent, unfortunately.
The other thing, it's brightfield epi-illumination, light goes through the objective twice, essentially doubling the aberrations. Note that, on the diffused incident light illumination conditions any objective will always produce better detail by itself, as the effective aperture of the system will be boosted according to Abbe equation.
It's still a chance for the 4x, that the corners may be slightly improved over stacking, and I believe that is why corners on your images might be better (can't really tell if they are), but never to the point I would consider this objective good for anything.
Pattern of corners shows huge amount of sagittal astigmatism, can't do much about that. Clearly for me, "F.N.=26.5mm" is a blatant lie by olympus.
“Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science.” - JCM

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Macro_Cosmos »

Pau wrote:
Fri Dec 11, 2020 12:36 pm
Macro-Cosmos,
It's clear that it can't cover FF decently, this was expected (I suppose that you're testing it in your Oly microscope with direct projection, so with 180mm tube lens, I'm I right?)
Yep, no photo eyepiece. Using a PE2.5x or 3.3x could yield better results.

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by enricosavazzi »

Macro_Cosmos wrote:
Fri Dec 11, 2020 5:47 am
[...]
It [SWTLU] is cheaper than the U-TLU, which surprises me. There's also a U-SWTLU-SP which is $4075 (yes, four thousand), it uses ecoglass. Not sure if there's a pictorial difference.
The fact that the SWTLU is cheaper than the U-TLU is probably explained by the fact that the SWTLU is just an optical assembly meant to be mounted internally in a microscope tube or head, while the U-TLU is a self-standing replacement for a microscope head (e.g. a bi- or trinocular head) and has the standard (for the AX/BX series) conical bayonets for mounting at the top of a microscope stand and for attaching a standard camera tube like the U-SPT at the top of the U-TLU.

I can find no detailed information about the U-SWTLU-SP. My guess is that it is a complete replacement for a microscope head, just like the U-TLU, but differing from the latter in that it contains an SWTLU assembly. So the U-SWTLU-SP is likely a plug-and-play item that lets you skip the drudgery of making or finding adapters. Almost anything starting with U- in the Olympus inventory is a user-mountable accessory or component for the AX/BX scopes and similar scopes.
--ES

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Macro_Cosmos »

enricosavazzi wrote:
Sat Dec 12, 2020 3:15 am
Macro_Cosmos wrote:
Fri Dec 11, 2020 5:47 am
[...]
It [SWTLU] is cheaper than the U-TLU, which surprises me. There's also a U-SWTLU-SP which is $4075 (yes, four thousand), it uses ecoglass. Not sure if there's a pictorial difference.
The fact that the SWTLU is cheaper than the U-TLU is probably explained by the fact that the SWTLU is just an optical assembly meant to be mounted internally in a microscope tube or head, while the U-TLU is a self-standing replacement for a microscope head (e.g. a bi- or trinocular head) and has the standard (for the AX/BX series) conical bayonets for mounting at the top of a microscope stand and for attaching a standard camera tube like the U-SPT at the top of the U-TLU.

I can find no detailed information about the U-SWTLU-SP. My guess is that it is a complete replacement for a microscope head, just like the U-TLU, but differing from the latter in that it contains an SWTLU assembly. So the U-SWTLU-SP is likely a plug-and-play item that lets you skip the drudgery of making or finding adapters. Almost anything starting with U- in the Olympus inventory is a user-mountable accessory or component for the AX/BX scopes and similar scopes.
Thanks for the explanation. That's likely it, the U-TLU costs more because of its plug and play nature. The SWTLU-C is meant for system integration. I've drafted up a method to adapt it, it will involve around $100 in adaptors, one which is custom. Not gonna touch it now.

U-SWTLU-SP is $4000+, a fully integrated SWTLU should me more or less around the $500 mark. That's pretty insane for ecoglass substitutions, and the price list also indicates 120 days of lead time. Maybe it's such a niche product, it only exists because of governmental organisations having to meet environmental standards? Interesting nonetheless. I contacted my local sales representative, and she simply said it's not an Olympus product. I think she got confused because I linked an Edmund Optics page, I'll wait for another response.

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by dmillard »

These are some images I just took with the Olympus UPlanApo 4x/0.16, UMPlanFL 10x/0.30, and an LMPlanFL 20x/0.40 on a Sony A6300, using an ITL200 tube lens. The predicted magnification would have been 200/180 times each objective's nominal magnification - I measured 4.38x rather than the expected 4.44x on the 4x UPlanApo, which is close enough :). I was also trying out a new (to me) LED light set up, and got far more vibration than I had anticipated from our heating system, so I may retry this comparison with flash, or turn the thermostat down while my wife is away from the house for a while (unlikely at the present time). The 4x PlanApo shows some softening and astigmatism in all four corners, but it is most pronounced in the upper left, probably indicating slight decentering.
20x.jpg
20x resized full frame (above), 2 actual pixel crops below
20xBlue.jpg
20xCyan.jpg
10x.jpg
10x resized full frame (above), 2 actual pixel crops below
10xBlue.jpg
10xMag.jpg
4x.jpg
4x resized full frame (above), 3 actual pixel crops below
4xBlue.jpg
4xGrn.jpg
4xMag.jpg
.

Duke
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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Duke »

dmillard Thank you for the test.
How would you assess the performance of your UPlanApo 4x/0.16?
Your results are close, but worse to what I recall on Nikon PlanApo λ 4x 0.20, I found the picture (from 2015), here is it (extreme corner APS-c 24MP/28.12mm @4x):
PlanApoL4x0.20.jpg
Object is star field made of diamond powder (3 micron) on glass, incident light.
It shows the sagittal astigmatism for red line, tangential for blue line, as it on your photos.
The green line on Nikon PlanApo λ 4x 0.20 is fully corrected across the entire field, while on olympus UPlanApo 4x/0.16 there is coma or spherical aberration, maybe both.
However, I feel like neither of the tested objectives are performing to their declared specification. And defiantly do not stand up to the price.
My Lomo GF-PlanApo 5x 0.20 (was 150$ new from factory) beats them all, including Nikon PlanApo λ 4x 0.20, by very, very far. Makes no sense.
“Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science.” - JCM

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Lou Jost »

My Lomo GF-PlanApo 5x 0.20 (was 150$ new from factory)
David, what is that objective? I can't find any examples on eBay...sounds interesting

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Duke »

Lou Jost wrote:
Thu Dec 17, 2020 5:13 am
I can't find any examples on eBay...sounds interesting
This is the only example I'm aware of. Russian designation "ШП-ПЛАН-АПО F=31.4 0.20", LOMO code name "ШП-ОПХ-5Б", infinity corrected objective with WD=20.0mm.
This objective was acquired alongside with the microscope, in 2012, few years before LOMO ceased production. There is, however, more frequent Bright/Darkfield ШП-ПЛАН-АПО 5x 0.17 M27-version, though I don't know if it as good.
"ШП-ПЛАН-АПО" means Wide Field (GrossFeld) Planapochromat, to underline the fact, this series of objectives are closely related with Carl Zeiss Jena GF-Planapochromat series, and basicaly are improved versions of the same principal optical design. By the time this objectives was about to hit production, Opton overtook Zeiss, replaced their product line entirely (with their garbage Axio-series), and JENA CF-250 II generation series was lost forever.
Here's the picture of in alongside others objective I had at the time (sold Wilson L M Plan 5x 0.15).
IMG_20170601_160412.jpg
Here's optical schematic and aberration calculation for this objective.
ШП-ОПХ5Б-0.JPG
This is very simple 4-element 7 lenses double-gauss anastigmat, very close to what is used in photographic lenses.
“Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science.” - JCM

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Lou Jost »

Thanks for that information. I had never heard of it before; I'll watch for it. Nice to know what those Russian initials stand for too. That knowledge might come in handy when trying to understand other Lomo objectives. I thought I was getting pretty good at guessing what their abbreviations meant, but I would never have guessed that one.

I see the 4x that I got from you in that group picture...

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Duke »

Lou Jost wrote:
Thu Dec 17, 2020 7:48 am
I see the 4x that I got from you in that group picture...
Nope, all of these 4x are currently in my disposal.
I've only ever sold L M Plan 5x 0.15 (Wilson VH3100 micro hardness tester) objective.
To be fair, kind of regret it a bit, cause I at the moment I thought that Nikon CF Plan 5x 0.13 would definitely be better than unauthorized Chinese clone, but, surprisingly, it is not, in fact, it's far worse. The only problem with it was horrible greenish-tint coating, so in epi illumination everything looked like salad, but in incident and transmitted light it produced pretty solid results.
I was told that both 'Wilson L M Plan 5x 0.15' and 'NoName Plan Fluor 4x 0.15' are variations of essentially the same objective, and actually based on reverse-engineered Nikon objective.
Now I wonder what Nikon objective exactly are they based on, as they excel over CF Plan 5x 0.13, and being DIN45, can't be based on the later CFI60 series.
The only option seems to be the illusive Nikon CF Plan 5x 0.15 BD DIC WD=12.0mm, this objective was released years after CF Plan (BD DIC) 5x 0.13, and exists only in M27 Bright-Darkfield-DIC variant. Why would Nikon release essentially the same objective again, is that possible that is acknowledgement of failure and attempt to redo? Is it substantially better in terms of CA and corners? If so, I need to have it.
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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Lou Jost »

Nope, all of these 4x are currently in my disposal.
Aha, I see the one I got from you says only "Nikon" where yours says "Nikon Japan".

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Lou Jost »

Duke, my belated apologies. I had missed that you were not the OP, David Millard. The objective I bought was from him, not you.

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Re: Testing Olympus UPlanFL N 4x 0.13 (FN 26.5)

Post by Duke »

Lou Jost wrote:
Wed Apr 07, 2021 7:25 am
Duke, my belated apologies. I had missed that you were not the OP, David Millard. The objective I bought was from him, not you.
Lou, I figured, no worries.
“Thoroughly conscious ignorance is the prelude to every real advance in science.” - JCM

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