Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2004/05/27

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Subject: [Leica] new 50/1.4 M lens
From: mark at rabinergroup.com (Mark Rabiner)
Date: Thu May 27 20:15:56 2004

On 5/27/04 12:50 PM, "B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net> wrote:

> It wouldn't surprise me if this was their best all time lens. But the
> reality is that unless one's ultimate use of the lens is shooting test
> charts, that isn't a reason to buy it; is it the best lens ever made, or
> ever made by Leica, in a focal length that will get enough use to
> justify the expense? For me, if it was a 28 or 35, the answer might be
> "yes," although I'd be hard pressed to figure how Leica could improve on
> the 35 Summilux ASPH, or the 28 Summicron ASPH, both of which are
> stunners. (Of course if they produced a 28 Summilux, that would be a
> whole different reason to rob a child of tuition!). :-)
> 
> B. D.


I think some of this is an image thing.
:)

It's a thing of "so you're a premium camera system huh? HOW GOOD IS YOUR
50MM 1.4 LENS?"
For that to be anything resembling a sore point really is intolerable.
Leica needed to amend that. And it had just done so in the R system.
Shooters porting their workflow over to rangefinder still think 1.4 is all
about forgetting the fact that this does not brighten the groundglass making
it pop in and out more defiantly. As the groundglass is completely clear! :)
And they may forget how few times they really use the 1.4.
The 50 1.4 is a standard benchmark from way back despite the wide use of
35's.
Bu they have to be compared against a 50 f2 which is a lens MUCH easier to
design and implement and much more likely to be superior even perhaps as a
high speed lens. The front glass to air surface perhaps being the toughie.

To quote part of Erwins summary on his new Summilux R report:

Summarizing:
the new 1,4/50 Summilux-R defines the current state of the art of large
aperture standard lenses. It outclasses the previous version of the 1.4/50
Summilux-R by a clear distance. It edges ahead of the current Summicon-R and
improves upon the current Summilux-M 1.4/50. Nonscientific comparison
pictures with the Summicron-M show comparable performance in most picture
taking situations however. The current Summicron-M is still the high speed
standard lens to beat.


Any quote is of course out of context the the whole article should be read.
I just read it 3 times it is intriguing and has many unexpected points.
http://www.imx.nl/photosite/leica/rseries/testr/r14-50.html



Mark Rabiner
Photography
Portland Oregon



New-improved
http://rabinergroup.com/




Replies: Reply from banacloj at mac.com (Juan Gea-Banacloche) ([Leica] new 50/1.4 M lens)
In reply to: Message from bdcolen at earthlink.net (B. D. Colen) ([Leica] new 50/1.4 M lens)