Hey man, just stumbled across this video after receiving my MIR today and it helped me out a lot. However I am beyond confused how, with such a long and professional video in terms of both advice and visuals, it has 16 views and your channel has one subscriber. This is incredible quality content and after seeing the other vids on your channel, I hope that creating them is already satisfactory enough to keep pushing through this early phase of a youtube channel. Big thanks for this from my end, and a brief reminder that you're being seen! :)
Thank you so much! It means a lot to know someone actually found it useful. Glad it helped. I hope that lens does well for you; it's been great for me so far. I appreciate the support too; it definitely give me a bit of motivation to do more. I hope to make more videos soon, so maybe I'll see you around.
I am very glad to have stumbled upon this video. I have a question- do you know if the Mir-1 and Mir-1B (up until the body style a change in the late 1980’s) are essentially the same aside from the mounts (m39 and then m42)? Thanks- looking forward to using your video to help me with my lens disassembly.
Hey, honestly, I don't have a copy of the MIR-1b. However, based on some of the mod videos I've seen around youtube, I would wager that they're fairly similar. If you look up "MIR-1b anamorphic mod", there are quite a few videos that show the how the lens elements are arranged. Also, if you compare the focus ring and the aperture ring markings, the silver and 1b versions seem identical, which would suggest that the mechanical components are identical if not similar as well. Worst comes to worst, if you try opening it up and it seems different from what I show in the video, just make sure to take photos with your phone along the way so you can put everything back together. Remember that any moving parts will require lithium grease when put back and that aperture blades need to be dry. It'll be a worthwhile adventure regardless!
First of all: This is an absolutely outstanding video! Very well done. I recently purchased a Mir-1 37mm lens. The lens was pruchased straight from Lithuania and looked to be in very good condition. Like a lot of people I went to do the close focus modification that you mentioned which seems to be pretty straight forward. After reassembling the lens I took out my trusty measuring tape to see how close the focus would get.To my suprise the close focuse only got to ~0.7/0.75m. I went to check the infinity focus as well and noticed that the lens would focus way past inifity. After disassembling and reassembling the lens one more time to make sure that I did everything correctly I decided to put the close focus screw back in to see if the lens would work in it's "normal" form. To my suprise the focus on the lens is also off with both screws. The close focus is at about 0.9m instead of 0.7m and the lens focuses past infinity. Sadly I did not check the focusing distances when I first got the lens, before I disassembled it for the first time.I'm pretty sure that the m42-Sony E adapter that I use is not the problem as it works perfectly with my Helios. I'm also fairly sure that it's a m42 version (its a black one) and not an m39 one. As the only thing that you really disassemble in the process of taking the lens apart is that one ring that holds the focusing block in place I assume that this is the only part where there might be an issue? Does the ring have to "stop" in a certain position in regards to the rest of the lens when you screw it back on? Or could it be that it has to be screwed down even further? (It sits really flush on the rest of the lens though and there is absolutely no play/movement in the focusing block) I've already watched all the other videos on youtube and red through the comment sections but I cant find anything that seems to be helpful.
So I ran into this issue as well with my copy. That aluminum spacer ring that sets the distance for the optical block seems to vary a lot between copies. I'll probably make a separate video on this once I get mine calibrated properly, but one idea I have is to cut soda cans to use as shims to add to that thickness. The walls of a soda can is approximately 0.1mm to 0.15mm thick, so you can likely use some very light adhesive to glue 2 soda can shims onto the original ring, then sand the whole thing so that it's level, then try to go down in thickness from there. From my experience so far, 0.1mm is apprimately very roughly 5-degrees in the focus ring. I know that's not ideal, since it'll take some trial and error, but that's the best idea I have for now. Hope that helps. Alternatively, if you don't need the distance markings to line up, then you can just perform the close focus mod on the lens and live with the fact that it focuses past infinity. On the close end, it should focus to about 0.5m on your copy after the mod.
@@coffeeandspice So you mean my copy of the lens (or some copies of the lens at least) are flawed right from the factory and never focused properly in the first place? Somehow adding to the spacer ring seems like a good idead to fix this. Regarding the focus mod: I might try to measure this again, but since my close focus without the mod is only roughly 0.9 - 0.95 meters I ended up at around 0.7m with the mod which is not really great/usable. I mean, that's obviously why people started the mod in the first place. I'd be fine if I could get it to around 0.5, but maybe the easiest way to achieve a proper working lens is just to buy another copy and hope for a better one.
I wouldn't say its "flawed". From what I recall reading, photography lenses in general aren't like cine lenses, in that photography lenses don't have the best tolerance in terms of focus calibration. I think many mass produced photo lenses will have some over focus at infinity to make sure that they are actually able to hit infinity without the factory having to perfectly calibrate each copy. It may as well be that we just have outlier copies or they've been altered before we got them; couldn't be sure. Edit: don't quote me on this..... I could be way out to lunch.
@@coffeeandspice I appreciate your input on this. I guess I'll keep tinkering with my copy and see if I can make something usable happen and if not I'll probably buy another copy in the future. Maybe I'll find a buyer for my "flawed" copy that is better at working with lenses than I am.
@@marcelohm123 I know it can be a bit frustrating. I hope you make it work though; I find shooting with a lens that you fixed yourself is much more rewarding!
Thanks for the very detailed tutorial man. My Mir-1 focus ring still rotates smoothly, but kinda heavy ( i'm not sure is it considered as "stiff" or not), but the amount of force that my hand has use to turn the ring really shakes the camera, especially when using focus magnifier. Maybe i have to check the grease section?
Ya, if you the lens hasn't been serviced before the grease in the helicoid is probably drying up. When I opened mine the first time, the grease in the focusing mechanism had the consistency of dry toothpaste when it should feel more like a cream. There may also be metal shavings stuck in there from production (happened on my copy of Helios 44-2). Give it a clean and see how it goes!
I have an early 60's KMZ Mir 1. I'm having trouble getting the black ring off so I can access the helicoids for regressing. I've tried wd-40, but that doesn't loosen it. Should I throw this in rubbing alcohol to loosen the old grease? Also have lighter fluid to clean the old grease off
Erm, when you say "black ring" I'm gonna assume you're talking about the rear retaining ring with the 4 holes in it? WD-40 and alcohol would not be helpful, since there are no glues or oils in that region of the lens, and there are no elements that "rust". The black ring is secured using 2x M1.4 set-screws. If you've already removed these, then the you need a spanner wrench to unscrew the black ring. There's a type of spanner wrenches specifically for lens work. You can get them fairly inexpensively from AliExpress but they're an absolute must. Let me know how your project has gone on or is going. I'll try to help more if I can.
for sure. i completed it a couple months back and regreased the focus helicoid. mmmmmmmmm it didn't have four holes in it. it was secured with 1 tiny screw. I did need a spanner wrench, i ended up getting the japan hobby tool one for extra torque. At first even with the wrench i coudn't open it. I put lighter fluid in a sringe and dropped some into the openning fixing the black rings threads to the focus helioids outer thread. That ended up doing the job to loosen the thing. Only cut myself once getting it off@@coffeeandspice
Hi can I ask you Which one would be the best version to buy? Mir-1 silver M39 (early version). Mir-1 black M42 (most common) Mir-1A with t-mount (uncommon); Mir-1B M42 (VOMZ). Mir-1V
If you don't want to do much tinkering, get the m42 version, unless you have a specific camera that is m39 or t-mount. It's much easier to adapt m42 to modern cameras. I don't think there's anything optically different in much of them. I would assume that mir-1B is better in terms of serviceability, since they're generally newer.
Hey, sorry for the late response; hope this might still be useful. The optics center themselves fairly well. The barrel is fairly snug around the elements and minor deviations based on whatever tolerances there are will not affect image quality as much as you might expect. Although based on your other comment, I assume you already noticed how tight the manufacturing is.
Interesting. What about element rotation alignment for the entire system? I'm worried less about tilt adjustments, tho I don't know which element is the compensator for adjusting parameters. From what little I know, I don't think it's either of the front 2 groups
I think you might be overthinking the complexity in these older lenses. In terms of alignment, the fact that there are so few elements means that the overall operation is less sensitive to modern lenses. if you're really worried, play around with it; you should be able to see any decentering in the lop-sidedness of your bokeh.
After speaking with Ilya Volokov of moscow optical workshop, i'm not sure how much i am over thinking. I did a lens test between an unopened (fungus) Mir 20 and one that was disassembled just to compare though. ua-cam.com/video/WJsgADzve9s/v-deo.html @@coffeeandspice
@@bryanoliveira9513 last two rear element needs to be aligned. without lens projector or measurement equipment, mark the orientation of each ring and element so you have a reference to rotate them back where it was. download ISO 12233 chart to shoot a test reference before you open up the lens to check for any misalignment. I have serviced and tested approx 10 pcs of Mir-1/Mir-1b/Mir-1w with ISO 12233 chart. (Ilya Volokov also shared with me that that the last 2 elements are indeed aligned. Just that I don't have expensive lens projection toy like him 🤭)
Hey man, just stumbled across this video after receiving my MIR today and it helped me out a lot. However I am beyond confused how, with such a long and professional video in terms of both advice and visuals, it has 16 views and your channel has one subscriber. This is incredible quality content and after seeing the other vids on your channel, I hope that creating them is already satisfactory enough to keep pushing through this early phase of a youtube channel.
Big thanks for this from my end, and a brief reminder that you're being seen! :)
Thank you so much! It means a lot to know someone actually found it useful. Glad it helped. I hope that lens does well for you; it's been great for me so far.
I appreciate the support too; it definitely give me a bit of motivation to do more. I hope to make more videos soon, so maybe I'll see you around.
I am very glad to have stumbled upon this video. I have a question- do you know if the Mir-1 and Mir-1B (up until the body style a change in the late 1980’s) are essentially the same aside from the mounts (m39 and then m42)? Thanks- looking forward to using your video to help me with my lens disassembly.
Hey, honestly, I don't have a copy of the MIR-1b. However, based on some of the mod videos I've seen around youtube, I would wager that they're fairly similar. If you look up "MIR-1b anamorphic mod", there are quite a few videos that show the how the lens elements are arranged. Also, if you compare the focus ring and the aperture ring markings, the silver and 1b versions seem identical, which would suggest that the mechanical components are identical if not similar as well.
Worst comes to worst, if you try opening it up and it seems different from what I show in the video, just make sure to take photos with your phone along the way so you can put everything back together. Remember that any moving parts will require lithium grease when put back and that aperture blades need to be dry. It'll be a worthwhile adventure regardless!
First of all: This is an absolutely outstanding video! Very well done.
I recently purchased a Mir-1 37mm lens. The lens was pruchased straight from Lithuania and looked to be in very good condition. Like a lot of people I went to do the close focus modification that you mentioned which seems to be pretty straight forward.
After reassembling the lens I took out my trusty measuring tape to see how close the focus would get.To my suprise the close focuse only got to ~0.7/0.75m. I went to check the infinity focus as well and noticed that the lens would focus way past inifity.
After disassembling and reassembling the lens one more time to make sure that I did everything correctly I decided to put the close focus screw back in to see if the lens would work in it's "normal" form. To my suprise the focus on the lens is also off with both screws. The close focus is at about 0.9m instead of 0.7m and the lens focuses past infinity.
Sadly I did not check the focusing distances when I first got the lens, before I disassembled it for the first time.I'm pretty sure that the m42-Sony E adapter that I use is not the problem as it works perfectly with my Helios. I'm also fairly sure that it's a m42 version (its a black one) and not an m39 one.
As the only thing that you really disassemble in the process of taking the lens apart is that one ring that holds the focusing block in place I assume that this is the only part where there might be an issue? Does the ring have to "stop" in a certain position in regards to the rest of the lens when you screw it back on? Or could it be that it has to be screwed down even further? (It sits really flush on the rest of the lens though and there is absolutely no play/movement in the focusing block)
I've already watched all the other videos on youtube and red through the comment sections but I cant find anything that seems to be helpful.
So I ran into this issue as well with my copy. That aluminum spacer ring that sets the distance for the optical block seems to vary a lot between copies.
I'll probably make a separate video on this once I get mine calibrated properly, but one idea I have is to cut soda cans to use as shims to add to that thickness. The walls of a soda can is approximately 0.1mm to 0.15mm thick, so you can likely use some very light adhesive to glue 2 soda can shims onto the original ring, then sand the whole thing so that it's level, then try to go down in thickness from there. From my experience so far, 0.1mm is apprimately very roughly 5-degrees in the focus ring.
I know that's not ideal, since it'll take some trial and error, but that's the best idea I have for now. Hope that helps.
Alternatively, if you don't need the distance markings to line up, then you can just perform the close focus mod on the lens and live with the fact that it focuses past infinity. On the close end, it should focus to about 0.5m on your copy after the mod.
@@coffeeandspice So you mean my copy of the lens (or some copies of the lens at least) are flawed right from the factory and never focused properly in the first place?
Somehow adding to the spacer ring seems like a good idead to fix this.
Regarding the focus mod: I might try to measure this again, but since my close focus without the mod is only roughly 0.9 - 0.95 meters I ended up at around 0.7m with the mod which is not really great/usable. I mean, that's obviously why people started the mod in the first place.
I'd be fine if I could get it to around 0.5, but maybe the easiest way to achieve a proper working lens is just to buy another copy and hope for a better one.
I wouldn't say its "flawed". From what I recall reading, photography lenses in general aren't like cine lenses, in that photography lenses don't have the best tolerance in terms of focus calibration. I think many mass produced photo lenses will have some over focus at infinity to make sure that they are actually able to hit infinity without the factory having to perfectly calibrate each copy.
It may as well be that we just have outlier copies or they've been altered before we got them; couldn't be sure.
Edit: don't quote me on this..... I could be way out to lunch.
@@coffeeandspice I appreciate your input on this. I guess I'll keep tinkering with my copy and see if I can make something usable happen and if not I'll probably buy another copy in the future. Maybe I'll find a buyer for my "flawed" copy that is better at working with lenses than I am.
@@marcelohm123 I know it can be a bit frustrating. I hope you make it work though; I find shooting with a lens that you fixed yourself is much more rewarding!
Thanks for the very detailed tutorial man. My Mir-1 focus ring still rotates smoothly, but kinda heavy ( i'm not sure is it considered as "stiff" or not), but the amount of force that my hand has use to turn the ring really shakes the camera, especially when using focus magnifier. Maybe i have to check the grease section?
Ya, if you the lens hasn't been serviced before the grease in the helicoid is probably drying up. When I opened mine the first time, the grease in the focusing mechanism had the consistency of dry toothpaste when it should feel more like a cream. There may also be metal shavings stuck in there from production (happened on my copy of Helios 44-2).
Give it a clean and see how it goes!
Just got me mir 1b,thanks for this video! Cheers😊
I hope you do well with it!
it's ... vintage :) first impression is good but i still need to record some videos with this lens. cheers (●'◡'●)@@coffeeandspice
Mir-1V / Мир-1В (B is Cyrillic V), means it was produced in Vologda (Вологда) optical factory
@@VladDick77 wow! Had no idea... спасибо большое
Thanks man 👌
Ya, glad it's useful!
I have an early 60's KMZ Mir 1. I'm having trouble getting the black ring off so I can access the helicoids for regressing. I've tried wd-40, but that doesn't loosen it.
Should I throw this in rubbing alcohol to loosen the old grease? Also have lighter fluid to clean the old grease off
Lighter fluid did it yall
Erm, when you say "black ring" I'm gonna assume you're talking about the rear retaining ring with the 4 holes in it? WD-40 and alcohol would not be helpful, since there are no glues or oils in that region of the lens, and there are no elements that "rust". The black ring is secured using 2x M1.4 set-screws. If you've already removed these, then the you need a spanner wrench to unscrew the black ring. There's a type of spanner wrenches specifically for lens work. You can get them fairly inexpensively from AliExpress but they're an absolute must.
Let me know how your project has gone on or is going. I'll try to help more if I can.
for sure. i completed it a couple months back and regreased the focus helicoid.
mmmmmmmmm it didn't have four holes in it. it was secured with 1 tiny screw. I did need a spanner wrench, i ended up getting the japan hobby tool one for extra torque. At first even with the wrench i coudn't open it. I put lighter fluid in a sringe and dropped some into the openning fixing the black rings threads to the focus helioids outer thread. That ended up doing the job to loosen the thing. Only cut myself once getting it off@@coffeeandspice
Hi can I ask you
Which one would be the best version to buy?
Mir-1 silver M39 (early version).
Mir-1 black M42 (most common)
Mir-1A with t-mount (uncommon);
Mir-1B M42 (VOMZ).
Mir-1V
If you don't want to do much tinkering, get the m42 version, unless you have a specific camera that is m39 or t-mount. It's much easier to adapt m42 to modern cameras.
I don't think there's anything optically different in much of them. I would assume that mir-1B is better in terms of serviceability, since they're generally newer.
@@coffeeandspice Thanks for your response 🙂 I ordered a 1972 Mir-1 Black M42
Awesome! I hope you get some awesome shots with it!
What is your plan for centering the lens since all the optics came out?
Hey, sorry for the late response; hope this might still be useful.
The optics center themselves fairly well. The barrel is fairly snug around the elements and minor deviations based on whatever tolerances there are will not affect image quality as much as you might expect. Although based on your other comment, I assume you already noticed how tight the manufacturing is.
Interesting. What about element rotation alignment for the entire system?
I'm worried less about tilt adjustments, tho I don't know which element is the compensator for adjusting parameters. From what little I know, I don't think it's either of the front 2 groups
I think you might be overthinking the complexity in these older lenses. In terms of alignment, the fact that there are so few elements means that the overall operation is less sensitive to modern lenses. if you're really worried, play around with it; you should be able to see any decentering in the lop-sidedness of your bokeh.
After speaking with Ilya Volokov of moscow optical workshop, i'm not sure how much i am over thinking. I did a lens test between an unopened (fungus) Mir 20 and one that was disassembled just to compare though.
ua-cam.com/video/WJsgADzve9s/v-deo.html
@@coffeeandspice
@@bryanoliveira9513 last two rear element needs to be aligned. without lens projector or measurement equipment, mark the orientation of each ring and element so you have a reference to rotate them back where it was.
download ISO 12233 chart to shoot a test reference before you open up the lens to check for any misalignment.
I have serviced and tested approx 10 pcs of Mir-1/Mir-1b/Mir-1w with ISO 12233 chart.
(Ilya Volokov also shared with me that that the last 2 elements are indeed aligned. Just that I don't have expensive lens projection toy like him 🤭)