Duckiescoping

with Conan 180-205mm f/269-300L

13.4.2008 Conan Optics has introduced the first ever Conan zoom lens. With an effective focal length of 180-205mm at f/269-300 the revolutionary lens opens a new era in duckiescoping.

Story behind Conan

My dear husband Henrik Herranen was about to turn 40. Ten years ago we arranged a spectacular birthday present of 30 rubber ducks. Since then, our interests had shifted towards photography and I got the impression that Henrik was wishing for a 200mm lens for his birthday present. I had long design discussions with a fellow amateur photographer Antti Mäkelä and we concluded that the wish might very well come true.

The duck contains a push-pull zoom mechanism.

Pinole zoom

One of the major problems in design was to find a big enough duck for the zoom mechanism. Finally Camilla Lukkarila kindly donated one of her ducks for the purpose. The zoom mechanism (constructed by Pasi Ojala and me) is made of ice cream container plastics, epoxy glue and an extension tube from my dad's old Pentax.

The hole of the lens sits nicely over the Conan text. The duck was painted and customized in my old workroom... I suppose the workroom floor still contains some grey paint.

Test images

The duck is equipped with an EOS mount, so it could be connected to our Canon EOS 5D without trouble. And indeed, Henrik was able to take some pictures with the new lens. The image quality has its problems, like heavy glare in the middle. But hey, what image quality would you expect from a rubber duck? ;)