Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1997/07/02

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Subject: Re: Evidence of a Contax/Leica partnership?
From: Joe Berenbaum <joe-b@dircon.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 2 Jul 1997 14:10:58 +0100 (BST)

At 06:56 02/07/97 -0400, you wrote:
>On Wed, 2 Jul 1997, Kari Eloranta wrote: 
>> Martin Tai wrote: 
>> >On the contrary, the only way to get best optical performance
>> >is UNIT FOCUSING, ie,  move the lens as a whole. The internal focusing
>> 
>> I'm quite sure this is false. For example <snip>
>> Kari Eloranta
>
>   Wrong !
>   None of Leica's macro lenses,  Macro-Elmarit 60/2.8, APO-MACRO-ELMARIT
>100/2.8 Macro-Elmarit-R 100/4  use  floating element design at all.
>   Variable spacing focusing ( internal focusing ) is widely used
>in Japanese designs, not favoured by Leica
>martin tai

The original statement- that the only way to get best optical peformance is
unit focusing, ie moving the lens as a whole, may be a bit of an
over-generalisation. Even if Leica do appear to follow that principle
themselves, they are not the only high quality German lens manufacturer. I
did read that the new 40mm Distagon used on the Hasselblad and Rollei 6000
series has a floating element that requires the user to adjust it, and that
this lens is said to have better performance than the earlier
unit-focusing-only version.

Joe Berenbaum