Air recce photos.
 

Has anyone got details of the resolution of the photos for the different focal lengths?
I have never seen an original Luftwaffe photo but have experience of Allied photos. At f35/28,000ft picking out individual tanks is easy on an Allied photo but getting the correct type is hit or miss. I have seen statements that reolution is c.3-9 feet for the Allied f35/28,000 ft combination and wonder what the German resolution was.
So many claims are made for the superior German optics but I suspect reading car number plates at this height was never a possibility

Re: Air recce photos.
 

I have seen quite a few of both, but probably never f35/28,000 side-by-side for a reasonably accurate apples-to-apples comparison. What I have seen left me with the impression that the German resolution was not noticeably better than the Allied photos.

The book noted below gets into the photography aspect of the subject in considerable detail, as I recall, and can probably answer your questions concerning focal lengths, altitude and resolution of the prints. It has several illustrated chapters on the cameras used and the settings.

Wadman, David, John Bradley and Barry Ketley. Aufklärer: Luftwaffe Reconnaissance Aircraft & Units 1935-1945. Aldershot (Hants): Hikoki Publications, 1997. ISBN: 0 9519899 8 7. Hb (oversize). Dj. 272p. Pictorial with accompanying text. Dwgs. (incl. color profiles). Map(s). Tables. Charts. Glossary. Bibliography.

Re: Air recce photos.
 

Resolution is fairly easy to work out. All I need is a very high quality scan of a small section of a German original showing buildings or objects of known size. Provided I also get to know the focal length and the altitude then I can get a good approximation.

Re: Air recce photos.
 

This will help i think.

Re: Air recce photos.
 

Thanks for the pointers. I am fairly well up on the theory of Air Photography but in the 1940's there was no standard tests for resolution. Today an ordinary camera will give you a resolution of 100 lines /mm rather than the 10-20 lines/mm that passed for acceptable in 1940 air views.
I think there was no real quality difference between the Allied or German photographs but would have liked to have seen it with my own eyes. Rather than getting bogged down in a complicated debate with reams of technical specifications I prefer the simple method of looking at the real thing. It appears that 3-9 foot was the smallest discernable object for F36/30,000 ft. combination and the German Rb 75/30 was not that much better.

Re: Air recce photos.
 

German recce Lodz May 1942: http://galeria.geoportal.edu.pl/details.php?image_id=3

Re: Air recce photos.
 

Just a quick question, 30,000 ft is mentioned several times, would most Luftwaffe long range reconnaissance have been flown at this altitude or somewhat lower? IIRC, the copies of Luftwaffe photos had pertinent data written on the images, did this include altitude?

Best Regards,

Artie Bob

Re: Air recce photos.
 

There are plenty of German photos online

http://www.wwii-photos-maps.com/aeri...941/index.html

but no matter how big they are they are nowhere near the resolution of an original. I know the online photos look ok but at 400% magnification they show the pixels. Only a high res copy of a (section) of an original will work.
I use F35/30,000ft as this is roughly a 1:10,000 map scale. I am not after a scientific answer just want to make a visual comparison.
Low level and Obliques are (i know) more or less the same for both sides.
I guess I just want an answer to the claims made for German lenses at the higher levels .

Some users of Zeiss lenses are so enthusiastic about these optics that they believe Carl Zeiss can do wonders. Well, this is not exactly true. The fact is: Carl Zeiss has to adhere to nature's laws just as anybody else. So far, Carl Zeiss's physicists have found no way around it.


http://www.dantestella.com/zeiss/resolution.html