[Leica] Tale of the elusive 35/1.4 non ASPH......

[MCyclWritr at aol.com (MCyclWritr@aol.com)]

This troubles me. Frankly, Frank, I thought I was securely in the company  
of 
similarly wired compulsive, impulsive adult children afflicted with a  
cash-flow intensive photographic addiction. You claim to not only  employ 
good sense 
but, if we can believe it, fiscal boundaries. And patience.  Lots of 
patience. 
 
If you don't change your ways, I'm ratting you out to the BLPALA  
(Bankruptcy 
Lawyer Promotion League of America). If you don't change your  ways, you can 
expect wool-suited demonstrators carrying wordy, but neatly  lettered, signs 
of protest at your home . 
 
-Chris Lawson 
 
 
_red735i@earthlink.net_ (mailto:red735i@earthlink.net)   writes:

Some of  you are aware that I have been on the hunt for a non-ASPH 35/1.4.
It is  light, and fast.  My 2 parameters of importance.  I own a 35/2  
Classic
non-ASPH, and a 35/1.4 ASPH.  The ASPH is pretty heavy, and  the F2 is ,
well, F2.  I shoot in pretty low light and use TMX100  almost exclusively.
So what seemed most appropriate was a 35/2  non-ASPH.  And thus, the hunt
began.

I must have bid on 100 of  these lenses on Ebay..... no luck.  Did I mention
that I had set a  limit on the purchase price?  That knocked out about 99% of
the  lenses  on Ebay, and the other 1% was knocked out when I read of  lousy
feedback or no prior sales.  So I kept looking, and advising the  LUG of my
desires.   One of our esteemed members responded.   His lens was a bit older
than I wanted, so for a while I continued the Ebay  route.  Finally I gave
in, sent off an email and waited for the  response.  Ned Learned was a real
gentleman.  He sent the lens to  me without any funds sent to him!  Totally
on consignment!  I  wanted to try the lens out, to see if it would excite
me..... or drive me  nuts with poor optics.

I received my chromes today.  I "tested"  the 50 Summilux, 35 ASPH Summilux
and 35/2 Summicron along with Ned's  lens.  I have had the 35'Cron the
longest, and I know that lens pretty  well.  So it was the "standard"  by
which the lenses were  compared.  I use a tripod and a M6TTL which was set to
only 2 shutter  speeds, 1/500 and 1/1000.  It makes things easy that way. The
lenses  were all tested wide open.  Why?  Because if I am buying the lens  
for
use in dim light, I need to trust the dark room response.  That  means F1.4
( and F2 for the Cron).

The 50 and the other 35's all  performed about the same.  The lenses are all
well saturated color  wise, and had really good detail in leaves and other
foliage.   Surprisingly to me, the 50 and the ASPH showed up pretty
identically.   The 35 Cron was a built below on saturation.  The 35/1.4 LUX
was the  "weak link".  It showed less color saturation and less detail in
the  leaves that the other lenses.  Probably if I stepped the lens  down,
these differences would go away.  But I am not into testing  lenses
endlessly. You must make your best shot and decide.  This  pretty much agrees
with the general opinion on this lens, so my "testing"  must be pretty close.
The 35/2 is sharper wide open.  The 35'Lux is an  overall better performing
lens.

Why am I keeping a lens that does  not perform as well as others I have?
Because it is F1.4 and it is  light.  And I do not believe I could find a
better lens in as good  condition.  Overall I use F1.4 pretty infrequently.
But when I need  it, I need it, and I want to trust it.

Thanks Ned for allowing me to  test and review the lens.  I hope I was not
too big a pain in the  behind.  But owning lenses like this is tough.  You
hear so many  stories, some true others not, that it is hard to judge for
yourself the  reality of a lens.  This one is better than I am, so it is  a
keeper.

Hunt over.  Gotta go out and shoot.

Frank  Filippone
red735i@earthlink.net