mmm

[francotirador]

mmm

[jamaeolus]

Nice shots! Good color. Pretty model.

[TrueLoveOne]

One of my most used lenses!

[iangreenhalgh1]

Why do you call it a Leica lens?

[Aanything]

[Mir]

I wouldn't call it a Leica..... in fact the Leica folks should call theirs a Minolta !

According to Red Baily's chronology
http://thesybersite.com/minolta/historical/Minolta_Lens_Chronology.htm


May, 1973
- MC W.Rokkor-X SI 24/2,8 [9/7] (ø55mm) 0,3m f/16 62,2x50mm 410g
A brand new lens in the extra-wide class, the design incorporates floating-element focusing for near-range correction and it is a marvelous lens. Leitz took this one for their own, too, and it’s probably the best one they got.

July, 1977
- MD W.Rokkor-X 24/2,8 [9/7] (ø55mm) 0,3m f/22 65x50mm 275g
MD up-date of the 24mm lens.

November, 1978
- MD W.Rokkor-X 24/2,8 [9/7] (ø55mm) 0,3m f/22 64x49mm 215g
A slightly lighter version of the 24mm lens, distinguishable by its barrel which tapers slightly from the mount.

June, 1981
- MD 24/2,8 [8/8] (ø49mm) 0,25m f/22 64x39mm 200g
A new optical design for the 24mm, it has been shrunk again by removing an element from the formula. Slightly closer focusing distance. Besides cost-cutting, it’s hard to see why they abandoned the classic design which was successful for Leitz as well.


I own the 1977 version...

[Aanything]

[iangreenhalgh1]

Thanks for the explanation. I knew Leica took some Minolta zooms but didn't know they took the 24 too.

[Attila]

[TAo2]

Aaaaw maan,

same old arguments...Leica did not "buy" the lens design, they bought the lenses, complete.

Minolta built the 24/f2.8 for Leica, they also built MD 35/70mm - f3.5, 16mm/ f2.8, 80-200mm/ f4...all rebranded for Leica, most if not all these re-branded lenses have "made in japan" on them(IIRC)... only difference is the lens mount...

Sigma built a 28-70mm/f3.5-4.5 zoom as well for Leica. Naturally, Leica owners will tell ye this is all spurious nonsense and all these lenses had tae be rebuilt completely and sprinkled with genuine, German, fairy dust before they could grace such cameras.

[francotirador]

[francotirador]

[Lightshow]

[kuuan]

[Mir]

The optical scheme stayed the same throughout the updates, until the 1981 "plain" MD designs....

Again according to Red Baily's chronology :

June, 1981

- MD 24/2,8 [8/8] (ø49mm) 0,25m f/22 64x39mm 200g

A new optical design for the 24mm, it has been shrunk again by removing an element from the formula. Slightly closer focusing distance. Besides cost-cutting, it’s hard to see why they abandoned the classic design which was successful for Leitz as well.

And according to Stephan from http://artaphot.ch/minolta-sr/objektive/143-minolta-24mm-f28

That last MD version is an improvement....

[kuuan]

thank you Mir

[Mir]

My German is.... well .... nil......

And i could say that google.translate's German is ....not much better !

Thanks

[kuuan]

oh, ok, German is my mother tongue

in that site quotes from various sources are collected. One person said that he regards the AF version to be 'equal' to the 9 element, another said that they have different characteristic, the old 9 element offering better center sharpness but the AF has better sharpness towards the edges, more even sharpness

btw. it also says that Minolta continued to make the 9 element lens for Leica while they already 'only' made the 8 element Rokkor, later again discontinued to manufacture a 'special' glass that was required for it's production which forced Leica to look for another glass manufacturer which also forced them to adjust optical construction

[shapencolour]

[shapencolour]

[shapencolour]

[Badr12]

I had the 1981 design wasn't impressed and ended up using the 28mm f2.8 more, I ended up selling it. Now I understand why, +/- a bad copy?!
I wonder how it compares to the Sigma super mini II as this could be found really cheap.

[stevemark]

A few remarks from my side about the different 2.8/24mm from Minolta. I do own (and use) the following samples:

1) MC-X Rokkor-SI 24mm 1:2.8 (heavy "brass" version, 390g, 9 lenses / 7 elements, #26 on http://minolta.eazypix.de/lenses/, 1973)
2) MD-I Rokkor 24mm 1:2.8 (light alu version, 275g, 9 lenses / 7 elements, #28, 1977)
3) MD-III 24mm 1:2.8 (275g, 8 lenses / 8 elements, #31, 1981)

I do own various other vintage 2.8/24mm lenses, such as the Minolta AF 2.8/24mm, the Nikkor AiS 2.8/24mm, the Canon nFD 2.8/24mm and the Zeiss C/Y Distagon 2.8/25mm.

The early, heavy MC 2.8/24mm ("MC-X") and the early MD 2.8/24mm (MD-I and MD-II) seem to have the same lens section. The early MC 2.8/24mm, however, has a yellowish color cast, indicating some special glasses not found in later versions. The later MD-III 2.8/24mm [8/8] has a much better performance than the earlier MC/MD 2.8/24mm [9/7], and i have written this clearly in my website ( see http://artaphot.ch/minolta-sr/objektive/143-minolta-24mm-f28). In this very page i have published an image from the MD-III on my Sony A7II (24MP Full Frame): Just scroll down and right-click the winter image from Luzern, then choose "save link as" and look at the 6000x2000 px file which shows the upper part of the original image including its extreme corners.

I have also published a small test with Canon, Nikon, and Minolta 24mm lenses: http://artaphot.ch/systemuebergreifend/objektive/450-24mm. The Minolta MD-III may be slightly superior to the Canon nFD and Nikkor AiS from the same time (around 1980), but the differences are minimal. The ealier MC/MD 2.8/24mm (1973) is inferior, and so are the Minolta MD 4-50 and 24-35mm zooms. The Zeiss C/Y 2.8/25mm is similar in performance to the early MC 2.8/24mm and thus inferior to the later MD-III, nFD, and AiS 2.8/24mm lenses.

Stephan

[Badr12]

[kuuan]

thank you very much Stephan!
haha Mir, so your google translation was better than my German, I am very sorry for that!
well, I'd think not really, my error was that I only read the quoted articles below the photos of the two lenses, there various people do say that the late MD is weaker, and I had overlooked Stephans assessment that comes on top of the photos where he says that the late MD is better, which I readily believe. My bad, sorry again!
Thank you again Stephan to come here and put that right! also for pointing to the comparison with the Nikkor Ais and Canon nFD, also Zeiss. ( I'd be curious how the Zuiko MC 2.8/24 would fare in this mix )