Meopta Opemus 4 Enlarger

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Ok, I know this isn't about Leica gear, but it is of interest to me. I have just been offered a Meopta Opemus 4 B&W Enlarger, complete with a Leica 50mm Focotar lens. All in good condition. I have developed and made contacts for quite a while, now I can go into enlargement. But I have never heard of Meopta, which was made in Czechoslovakia.

Does any one have experience with this gear, and any comments. Thanks for that, PN

-- Paul Nelson (clrfarm@comswest.net.au), July 16, 2001

Answers

Hi, Paul: I can only tell you that here in Chile Meoptas have been sold for quite a time so far and I have heard no special complaints regarding them though they come equipped with an inexpensive lens whose brand I don't remenber now. Even some photo schools use them but there they are not to the required thoughness level. May be at home they could be . . . and the Focotar would be something else.

Regards. Have fun.

-Iván

-- Ivan Barrientos M (ingenieria@simltda.tie.cl), July 16, 2001.


My elementary school (in the late 70's denmark) had 8 of those. They were equipped w. el-nikkor lenses. I don't remember details about them, but they must have been rather rugged, we were not gentle kids. I looked over some of my prints from back then, and I dont notice any particular weakness' for which I can blame the enlarger. At the time, they were the least expensive enlargers on the marked and a typical beginners choice. I even considered buying one for my first darkroom, but an old lady offered me a much more charming Leitz Valoy II with a good Schneider lens. The Valoy was a pain to use with Ilford Multigrade filters, but that is a different story.

-- Niels H. S. Nielsen (nhsn@ruc.dk), July 17, 2001.

http://www.meopta.cz/products/

-- Jeff Polaski (polaski@acm.org), July 17, 2001.

Paul, I am a Meopta Opemus 6 user since 1986. All my photographic work, including exhibition quality large prints, was printed with this enlarger. I have a very good lens. A Schneider APO Componon 45/4 which is very sharp. It is very important in printing to have a good lens. The quality differences between enlarger lenses are more visible that the differences between camera lenses.

I bought my Opemus 6 as a condenser enlarger. After a period of time I noticed that I had less lighting in the right part of the board! I changed the position of the loupe inside and then I noticed that now I had less lighting in the left part! This is a common problem of Meopta enlargers. The loupes are not so good. You can notice the differences in lighting printing a negative with an unique sky ( all the sky the same tone ) and then printing it again up side down. If your enlarger have a problem in the first print you will have a lighter sky on the right and in the second print on the left. The solution for this problem is very simple! You change the condenser head to a color head! So I did and I made my Opemus 6 a diffusion enlarger. More than ten years I am using this enlarger having very good prints. If the negatives are good I print them regularly with no filter on multigrade papers. In other cases I use the color filters of the head. Nowadays I am looking for a used enlarger with a bigger format (6x9 or 10x12,5 / Beseler, Durst,...) but I am not going to sell my Opemus!!

Meopta enlargers are best buy if you count the cost and the quality of them. Check if the loupe is OK. I don’t know if there is a color head for Opemus 4. If it is available buy it! Street Photography by Dimitris Kioseoglou

-- Dimitris Kioseoglou (kosefoto@otenet.gr), July 17, 2001.


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