Quote:
Originally Posted by innerimager
Two questions about the 50 cron, rigid. It is also designated "5 cm" on the lens. What does that mean? Also, it has a lock for infinity focus which I haven't seen on other lenses. Anyone know this history? I have one that lives on my M7 used for B&W. It draws very beautifully, low contrast, very sharp at 2.0, great tonality. I only just got an IR filter for it and will give it a go on the M8. best....Peter
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"5cm" instead of "50" is typical of the older lenses... Leitz used to express focal lengths in cm for years, before and after WWII, and changed after Summicron 50 birth. (Curiosity: the very very FIRST Leica lenses of '24 / '25 were indeed marked "50 mm", but changed after few hundreds items).
The infinity lock / tab is another case of "classic Leitz" , born with the first Leica cameras: with lenses like the retractables (Elmar or even Summicron) or the "supercompacts" (old 28s and 35s) is useful to operate the focus ring: they maintained it for a while also on lenses like the rigid Summicron, which has an easily manageable focus ring... then they abandoned it.