[Leica] New Zeiss lenses compared against Leica

[bdcolen at earthlink.net (B. D. Colen)]

I am aware of that, Feli - I am also aware, as are you, that they can
put any label they want on something, yet it can be radically changed
from the original design. I may well be completely wrong - but I
seriously doubt that given the major push Zeiss is making, they're going
to put out a 50 1.4 that isn't the equal of the latest Leica M lens. But
as I said, I may be very wrong.

-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+bdcolen=earthlink.net@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+bdcolen=earthlink.net@leica-users.org] On Behalf Of
feli
Sent: Wednesday, December 22, 2004 2:36 PM
To: Leica Users Group; 'Leica Users Group'
Subject: RE: [Leica] New Zeiss lenses compared against Leica




-----Original Message-----
From: "B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net>

>I don't find it hard to believe that it matches it, Feli. I'm sure this

>is NOT your father's Planar.

It has more to do with physics B.D. Every optical design has it's
limitations which at a certain point hits a performance ceilling set by
the laws of nature. Then you have to switch to different technologies
like ASPH surfaces or  floating element, APO correction etc to reach the
next level. If is also more difficult to extract greater performance out
of these designs when you have to keep the lens compact. The Planar
design hasn't changed radically in the past hundred years. It's
basically a math formula and unless the laws of physics have changed in
the past 100 years it should be just as valid today as it will be in
another 100 years from now. It's a very good design but has it's limits.
It's like the Summicron 2/50, which is a double Gaussian design. The
current formulation has pretty much been pushed the design as far as it
can go. To take it's performance to the next level, you would have to
break with tradition. It's not a Leica vs Zeiss issue.



>I owned and used the lenses for the G1 for a while - I got rid of the 
>outfit because the autofocus was so attrocious on the G1 - and my 
>feeling is that in real world use, those lenses were every bit as good 
>as their Leica >equivalents. In fact, some of the results I got were 
>really stunning.

No doubt that Zeiss makes great lenses. I love the Planar on my
Hasselblad and Rolleiflex. Wouldn't mind coming across a 1.5/50 Sonnar
for my IIIc...


>Sure, there's a huge technological difference between a 1955 planar and

>a the new asph 50 summilux, but I >wouldn't bet on this being a 
>re-issue of a 50s lens. ;-)

Well,  that's the $64,000 dollar question. Is it a classic Planar design
or have they added some more exotic features? If it's a straight classic
Planar design it's almost certainly not better than the new Lux.

Feli



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Feli di Giorgio * feli2@earthlink.net
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