[Leica] Erwin's Summilux writeup

[jbcollier at shaw.ca (John Collier)]

I have to go with Henning on this one B.D.

Erwin does say that it is better than the Summicron at every aperture 
and that it is even more flare resistant than the Noctilux. Not too 
shabby in my books. Erwin has never been comfortable with bokeh and he 
has included it only grudgingly in his later lens tests. We can hardly 
expect Erwin to wax eloquent on the differences in bokeh between all 
the Summilux lenses! I guess he has something in common with Ted in 
that. He also usually sticks to comparing similar focal lengths. Though 
he did mention the 24 when reviewing the 21 but the 21 was based on the 
24 design.

The real test will be to see how much sample variation there is. Was 
Erwin's lens cherry picked and will mine almost out perform a coke 
bottle? You know that old coke bottles are pretty valuable these days 
:-)

John Collier

On Jun 24, 2004, at 1:21 PM, B. D. Colen wrote:

> Come on, Henning - I would think that when reviewing a new ASPH
> Summilux, whatever the focal length, one would provide some comparison
> with other Summilux lenses - particularly because the 35 ASPH is so
> staggeringly good, as is the older 75. Great, the new 50 is better than
> the old 50 Summilux. Big whoop. So, arguably, is the 50 Nokton for $2K
> less. The question really is, is the new lens worth an investment of
> $2.5K - does it produce images that compare to the Summilux lenses on
> either side of it in the line-up. I think the answer's pretty obvious.
> Because if the answer is "yes," you can bet that would have been
> included in the review.
>
> As to the difference in focal lengths - 35 is standard for me. I can 
> get
> closer with it than with the 50, I can crop in to get a 50-like image 
> if
> I want to; I get a bit more depth of field at 1.4 but can still isolate
> subjects; and I can get more air, or more subjects into the frame,
> without stepping back. But I realize we all have different preferences
> and needs. :-)
>
> Henning Wulff wrote:
>
>> Not only did he fail to compare it to the 35 and 75's, he also failed
>> to compare it to all the other focal lengths.
>>
>> As most testers have noted at some time or other, you can't
>> meaningfully compare lenses with different focal lengths. For your
>> own use you might like to do a comparison between two lenses that you
>> tend to use interchangeably, but that is different. I, like a lot of
>> other people, don't use 35's and 50's interchangeably so the
>> comparison would be rather pointless.
>>
>> If I bought the new 50, I would be very unhappy to discover that it
>> produced images equal to my 35 Summilux ASPH, when what I wanted was
>> a narrower angle of view.....:-)
>>
>> As far as image quality is concern, note that Erwin wrote that at all
>> apertures that the 50 Summilux and Summicron have in common, the
>> Summilux is better.