[Leica] RE: Thou insulteth Takumar, Sir?

[Jim Brick <jimbrick@photoaccess.com>]

Mike... I was looking for something in my trash when the following arrived
in my trash... as you can see, some folks don't read very well. And will
call you on a mistake that you did NOT make. This is why I have a large
"filter to trash" segment.

Jim


At 04:59 PM 10/20/99 -0700, you wrote:
>Michael,
>
>You are mistaken about the first coated lens, Japanese made at least.  It
>was found on Rokkor lens which first appeared on a Minolta Semi IIIA.  This
>was the first time anti-reflective coatings were used on a Japanese lens.
>I believe Zeiss lenses had coatings prior to that, with Dr, Smakula working
>on coated lenses in Germany in 1935.
>
>Peter K
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Mike Johnston [mailto:michaeljohnston@ameritech.net]
>Sent: Wednesday, October 20, 1999 11:13 AM
>To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
>Subject: [Leica] Thou insulteth Takumar, Sir?
>
>
>Dan C. >>>First Mike Johnston's post on the weakness of Summicron versus
>$79 Pentax
>Takumars, now this.
>
>Has the world gone MAD????<<<<
>
>Dan, the Takumar in question is a used lens, more than 25 years old. It
>is well built. It focuses more smoothly than any other lens I have ever
>used, including any Leica or Zeiss lens. It has spherical surfaces where
>other 50/1.4's have flat surfaces; it was among the first lenses on the
>market with multicoating. Pentax beat even Zeiss's first multicoated
>lens to market. In the late '60s and early '70s both Zeiss and Pentax
>were working with Optical Coating Laboratories (? I have a poor memory
>for descriptive names), which invented multicoating for the space
>program. Every surface is fully multicoated, not often the case on many
>lenses today. I don't know when Leitz's first multicoated lens came to
>market, but Nikon's first was the 35mm f/1.4 in I believe 1977, some 5
>years later.
>
>It is a very fine lens, the equal or more of Leica's lenses at the time.
>In my judgement, if it were to be produced for sale today in Japan, it
>would have to sell for something like $1,200-$1,400--way above what the
>market will bear for Japanese normals.
>
>Of course from what I hear from several sources, Leica has a new
>APO-ASPH Summicron-M 50mm in prototype and it would be above what the
>market will bear, too, which is why it hasn't yet been released for
>production.
>
>Of course I've never found an M42 screwmount camera that both had an
>onboard meter and was reliable. In that way it IS inferior. And it does
>have this wierd veiling-glare thing going on in some kinds of light,
>that makes the highlights look almost flashed. Oh well. It ain't
>perfect.
>
>--Mike
>
>P.S. I wrote a long reply to a reader yesterday that recounts some of my
>opinions and prejudices about lens quality and lens connoisseurship, if
>anyone is interested. Perhaps I could send it privately. I hesitate to
>post it because it is pretty long--I know I get wordy. Don't want to hog
>the bandwidth. (I know, I know. Hold those wisecracks.)
>