Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/03/04
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]The leica glow is really just a combination of flare, uncorrected chromatic aberration rendered in BW, and a slight amount of coma associated (mainly) with a particular design of wide-aperture non-retrofocus wide-angle lenses. It's the 'leica' glow rather than just a regular glow because it is combined with the usual Leica rendering of fine detail (only partially obscured by the defects I mention). It's easy enough to get it: shoot any of the pre-aspheric 35 or 50 Summiluxes or Summicrons wide open, particularly contre-jour or with high lighting contrasts, and you will have it in spades. The 35/1.4 pre-asph is probably the most spectacular source of it. The thing is, it's an effect. A very very very nice effect to be sure, but an effect nevertheless. I got pretty tired of it, because in many contexts it surrounds whatever you are shooting with a sort of romantic fog, which can be very effective especially when it is completely against the grain of whatever you are shooting, but eventually I just wanted to scrub the damn fog off. It's like playing a guitar through the same amp the whole time. Some people can do that and make a career out of it. I couldn't. On Tuesday, March 4, 2003, at 10:58 AM, Daniel Ridings wrote: > It's hard for me to say ... I really have never seen the Leica glow. > But > if "glow" means the nice optical quality that shines through when you > use > Leica glass ... I suspect any of the Summicrons will do. I have the > second > generation (I think) and it does just fine. I did have a better > Summicron > once (also second generation I think) but it got stolen. I've never > felt > that the replacement lives up to the first one. - -- John Brownlow http://www.pinkheadedbug.com - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html