My Leitz selection

[vilva]

I just calculated that I've invested almost exactly 1000 Euros into Leitz glass, into six lenses which cover the for me most usable focal length range from 35 mm to 180 mm. I don't have very much use for shorter lenses even on a crop body, and longer lenses are heavy to carry and difficult to aim hand-held.

Some of the lenses aren't the latest and/or sharpest versions, but after some testing I've concluded that it probably makes very little or no difference - even on a high resolution crop body, let alone on the 5D with its lowish resolution. I have now gone through the lenses on the 350D, only the 60 mm Macro-Elmarit needs some more testing as the present photos have all been taken in low contrast lighting.

The 35 mm Summicron-R (2nd version) isn't perhaps the sharpest Leitz 35 mm lens, but looking at the sharpest of my test photos I no more feel a temptation to acquire a 35 mm Elmarit. The Summicron also gives me one stop more speed under circumstances where ultimate sharpness isn't the most important aspect. http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/eos350d_summicron35.html

The 50 mm Summicron-R (1st version) was my first and cheapest Leitz lens. Most people try to get the current version, which is optically superior - although this older version just might have a slightly better bokeh. Well, at 78 Euros I'd consider this lens a best buy, and the results I've achieved with it are so good that I feel I have no justification for a better Summicron. Just have a look at e.g. the full-size version of frame 6979 at http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/eos350d_summicron50.html

About the 60 mm Macro-Elmarit-R there never was any doubt, it is my best lens corner to corner even on the 5D.

My 90 mm Elmarit-R is again a 1st version, but never mind, I've nothing to complain about it mounted on the 350D. http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/eos350d_elmarit90.html

No one has complained about the performance of the 2nd version 135 mm Elmarit-R. The only blemish is the very, very slight red-green CA, which to some extent plagues most non-APO lenses longer than 100 mm. However, in this case it is slight enough to be well nigh invisible on any print. http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/eos350d_elmarit135.html

The 4/180 Elmar-R isn't supposed to be a sharp lens and perhaps it is a wee bit lacking in the finest details. However, it is small and light, about the size of the 135 mm Elmarit but a lot lighter, and much easier to handle than the 2.8/200 CZJ Sonnar or the 2.8/180 Jupiter-6, a good match for the small 350D and at least as good as my heavier alternatives, even the bokeh doesn't leave much to desire. This lens has become one of my favorite walk-around lenses on the 350D, not too wide and has quite a reasonable reach for the size, especially if cropped for web use - see e.g. the crops on the Tallinn page. http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/eos350d_elmar.html and http://galactinus.net/vilva/retro/tallinn_elmar.html

I've been slightly happier with these lenses than with my Zeiss/Contax lenses. The differences in resolution are perhaps marginal and hard to tell given the difficulties in consistently achieving an exact focus, i.e. at the pixel peeping level, for which none of these lenses were designed. The Leitz lenses are perhaps a little bit less prone to produce purple fringing at very high contrast edges.

The greatest danger with these and any other very high quality lenses is getting complacent and sloppy, just trusting the lens to produce superior results. I've taken technically bad photos with each and everyone of these lenses and without the more successful shots I might have dismissed some of them solely on the basis of their reputation of being just so-and-so or not as good as some other version. Now I think it doesn't really matter whether your lens is the best one or not as long as it produces good enough results for all reasonable purposes.

Veijo

[LucisPictor]

Very nice collection and some very reasonable thoughts...

[Orio]

hi Veijo,
very nice selection of lenses, very good bargains you made, and I agree very much on most of what you say.
And usual selection of very nice and tasteful pictures, make me what to go and visit Helsinki some day.

About the Leica versions, I agree on your point of view, what many people forget about is that even a first version Leica is a much better lens than most other lenses around. And in most of real life situations, the differences between the versions are not really significant.

As far as I know, most of the changes brought with the second versions were aimed to optimize the weight and size and optical betterments were sort of a consequence of that, and not the first premise for the changes. Only in one case (I can not remember, but I think it was the Elmarit-R 90, or perhaps the 35) the change of version was done to bring a total change of lens, adapting for the R series the optical scheme of the equivalent rangefinder lens.

I have a few Leica lenses, but I personally find myself more "at home" with the Zeiss lenses. it's a matter of feeling mostly, the way Zeiss lenses render the images, than a judgement based on the strict facts. I easily recognize that Leica lenses are superior to Zeiss in terms of resolvance and clarity, and probably also less prone to optical defects such as aberrations (although I never made tests of that). In other words, they have better IQ.
But as you said, IQ only matters for as much as a lens is able to deliver its owner the kind of results he is happy with.
One example of this statement, which I heartily agree upon, is the Flektogon 4/20, which for me, is a lens I will never give up, although I easily see that along with its strenghts (the geometrical rendition and the colour saturation), it also has visible shortcomings, such as the limited resolvance. But, even with its limitations, it's good for me.

[cwcs]