Hasselblad / Zeiss Makro-Planar CF 120mm f/4

Put a stamp, a watch face, or a page of type flat on a copy stand and shoot it at close range with a normal Planar, and the corners go soft while the center stays crisp. Field curvature. The 120mm Makro-Planar exists to kill exactly that problem. It is the V system's flat-field lens, computed by Zeiss to hold a plane sharp edge to edge at close distances instead of being optimized for infinity like the 100mm and the 80mm. For flatwork, repro, and detail copying on 6x6, it is the obvious tool, and most shooters who do that work do not bother trying anything else in the lineup.

The CF generation arrived in 1982 with the new Prontor leaf shutter, which replaced the older Synchro-Compur used in the C lenses, and an F setting on the shutter ring that holds the leaf open so the focal-plane shutter on the 200 and 2000 bodies can run the exposure instead. The optical formula is a Planar, the symmetrical double-Gauss layout Zeiss has built for decades, but corrected for the close range rather than the far one. Stopped down to f/8 or f/11 it is brutally sharp across the whole frame, the kind of detail that survives a flatbed scan and still rewards a loupe on the negative. Wide open at f/4 the center is already excellent and the corners catch up by f/5.6. Contrast is high without going harsh, and the T* coating keeps flare in check even with a bright window in the frame.

Flat subjects are its home turf, but it travels. At portrait distance the 120mm focal length on 6x6 sits in a flattering place, a touch longer than normal, and the out-of-focus rendering is smooth and unfussy rather than swirly or busy. Still-life and product shooters use it constantly because the same flat-field correction that helps copy work also keeps a tabletop scene sharp corner to corner. Documentary and landscape shooters tend to skip it; for general work the 100mm f/3.5 Planar is the sharper choice at infinity and the one most people cross-shop against.

The honest limitation is magnification. On its own the lens only reaches about 1:4.5, which is close-up, not true macro despite the name. Add the Extension Tube 32 and it reaches 1:2; getting near 1:1 means a bellows. Either way you are racking the optics off the film plane and losing light, sometimes a stop or two, and a meter reading scene luminance knows nothing about it. Zone Light Meter handles this directly. Enter the lens and your extension and it computes the bellows factor, so the metered exposure already accounts for the light you lose at close focus instead of leaving you to guess.

Prices have climbed with the whole V-system revival, and a clean CF 120 is no longer the bargain it was a decade ago. It typically sells for more than the common 80mm Planar, though the bellows-only 135mm Makro-Planar is the rarer piece. People still buy it for the reason they always did. When the job is a flat thing that has to read sharp into the corners, on film, with high Zeiss contrast holding the fine texture, this is the V-mount lens that does it without fuss.