It's ***NOT*** a "Zeiss" lens, in manufacture or design, or technically in
name either. They were a "pass-through" product in which the **East**
German Carl Zeiss Jena, VEB, prostituted its name on lenses designed and
made somewhere in the Pacific Rim in various lens mounts popular at the
time to increase its sagging revenues.
Following WWII and the partitioning of Germany, the ONLY "Zeiss" was the
Zeiss Stiftung reconstituted in/near Stuttgart. Zeiss Jena, VEB, was
formed by former employees of Zeiss who were not fortunate enough to get
spirited out of the Soviet Sector to the U.S. Sector, but were fortunate
enough not to get spirited off to the Ukraine along with all the surviving
Zeiss tooling to Kiev (which is what the Soviet's created from Zeiss people
and tooling siezed as war reparation).
The reason these lenses are not found in the U.S. or some other countries
with the name "Zeiss" on them is a result of the trademark lawsuits that
followed the partitioning of Germany. The East German Zeiss, VEB, was
forbidden from using any marking, name or symbol associated with the Zeiss
name in the U.S. Anything from them that was imported was under the names
such as Jenoptik, and AFIK there wasn't much. There are a few that were
brought in by individuals in single quantities who purchased the lenses in
Europe and weren't caught by U.S. Customs officials (who would force them
to grind off the name/marking or forfeit the item for destruction).
As to how good it is, they are run-of-the-mill generic zoom lenses from
their era and you should NOT pay any more for one of them than you would
for any other reasonable 3rd-party lens from their era.
At 12:22 AM 8/15/03, you wrote:
Quck question -- I'm teaching in Singapore this weekend and
although working flat out managed to find a few minutes
to check out the nearby shops.
Found a Carl Zeiss Jena 35-70mm 3.5-4.8 OM mount zoom.
Personally I've never come across one such before.
Is this a good lens?
Is approx $US250 a good price? It's NIB.
Seems a little high to me.
thanks
Andrew
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