first aspheric lens?

[ho_co]

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According to a Nikon press release quoted at Nikon publishes Nikkor lens 80th anniversary video: Digital Photography Review:

The OP Fisheye-Nikkor 10mm f/5.6 fisheye lens for SLR cameras, released in 1968, was the world's first lens to incorporate aspherical lens elements.

 

I thought the first series-produced lens for 35mm format with an aspherical surface was the Noctilux 50mm f/1.2 of 1966.

 

Am I wrong?

[01af]

According to a Nikon press release quoted at Nikon publishes Nikkor lens 80th anniversary video: Digital Photography Review:

 

I thought the first series-produced lens for 35-mm format with an aspherical surface was the Noctilux 50 mm 1:1.2 of 1966.

 

Am I wrong?

I have no idea which lens was the very first with aspherical elements. But the Noctilux 50 mm 1:1.2 indeed had two aspherical elements and it appeared in 1966, so it pre-dates any aspherical lens that appeared in 1968. So the original Noctilux was, uh, firster than the 10 mm OP-Nikkor (which sure was, and still is, a unique lens—but definitely not the first with aspherical elements ... maybe it was the first aspherical fish-eye lens?).

[elgenper]

In the ´70es I owned a Kilfitt Makro Kilar 2.8/90 lens that came with an old Exakta camera. This lens was designed in the ´50es, and it had an aspheric surface of a rather special kind: the curvature changed from one value in the outer part to another in the inner, rather abruptly. Obviously, this made it possible to grind the lens element in two steps using the usual methods instead of more complicated methods.

 

The optical performance was rather mediocre, but it did focus from infinity to 1:1. It would have been well qualified for the ´older glass´ threads here.

[UliWer]

Is it true that the Prado slide projector already had aspheric condenser lenses in the early fifties?

[120]

"1955: World’s first mass produced aspheric lens element used in the Elgeet Golden Navitar 12mm f/1.2 wide angle lens developed for 16mm movie cameras." (from Navitar homepage)