sboyle92

Having been to Italy, and Venice in particular, I'd suggest taking a 28mm and a 50mm. I had in my bag a 21mm Voigtländer. As much as I love this lens, this and my 35mm f/2.4 ASPH pretty much stayed in my bag. Less is more and I really don't like swapping out lenses ever other shot. Less gear means more time for photos.

A horizontal pano of four images at the Dyrhólaey Lighthouse in Iceland taken with my M10 and 50mm Summicron Collapsible. 1/180 sec | f/11 | iso 200

A vertical pano with three images taken at the Hallgrimskirkja church in Reykjavik, Iceland with my M10 and 50mm Summicron Collapsible 1/125 sec | f/11 | iso 100

Kirkjufell in Iceland Country is a 463 meter high mountain on the north coast of Iceland's Snæfellsnes peninsula, near the town of Grundarfjörður. It is claimed to be the most photographed mountain in the country. 1/4 sec | f/16 | iso 100 | Leica M10 w Voigtländer 21mm f/4

“Flowers are the music of the ground. From earth’s lips spoken without sound.” – Edwin Curran Leica M10 w/ 50mm Summicron Collapsible 1/90 sec | f/5.6 | iso 200 - cropped in by 65%

this image was taken with the basic m10 - not the m10m. for post production, it was done all in lightroom. first was to apply lens correction as if any leica lens needs it, even my venerable 50mm summicron collapsible. next was to set it to b&w mode. from there, it was a combination of using the basic sliders and tone graph to adjust my tones. a special trick of mine to tweak certain tones is to place a horizontal gradient just outside the frame and use the range mask feature. by using the luminance slider on this feature, i can better target just the tones i want to adjust. to me, if i wanted to target just the shadows in the image, this works better than using the basic shadow slider because that basic slider will move around the rest of the tones. in a few spots, like the darker areas of the stairs, i did apply a radial tool and used a ranging mask so by using the luminosity slider, i could target just the deep shdows without affecting the surrounding highlights. i hope this all makes sense to you. thanks again for your compliment

A midwinter's scene - shot with Leica M240 and 50mm Summicron Collapsible 1'60 sec | f/11 | iso 200

"It is not enough to stare up the steps, we must step up the stairs." - Vaclav Havel Leica M10 w/ 50mm Summicron Collapsible 1/15 sec | f/ 5.6 | iso 1600

Leica M240 with 50mm f/2.0 Summicron Collapsable.

Leica M240 with Summicron 50mm f/2.0 collapsable.

Leica M240 with Summicron 50mm f/2.0 collapsable.

I bought the Fotodiox Lens Mount Adapter for like $25 to use my older manual focus Nikon lenses on my M240. It works perfectly. The fit is snug and secure. And, as there are obviously no optics involved, all that matters is the fit.

It was a difficult choice - until I saw how thorough the cleaning was and the results I'm getting from this lens. And it does look AWESOME on the camera.

Summicron 5cm f/2 collapsible on an M240. Shot at 1/2000 sec, f/2.8, iso 200 as a DNG. Exported as a JPG ( 307kb ) to fit in this post. No Edits, as is.

@Keith (M) I'm thinking, looking at the contrast and tonal range, the top image would be the ASPH.

@Reini The cost for a full CLA is $135. What made me consider this was the condition of the lens. There were no scratches, no dings, no swirls, no cleaning marks. So, the glass itself was in terrific shape. It was just the haze from the lubricants that dried out - and this also affected the smoothness of the aperture; it was hard to close it down smoothly. I know the front element on this is said to be as soft as chalk so, the moment this lens came back from DAG, I put a B+W filter over the front. For those wanting to see results, here's a test image I did with my M240. ISO-200, f/2.8, 1/2000, shot in DNG, straight out the the camera, into Lightroom, and exported as a JPG, no edits. And reduced in size ( 307kb ) to be accepted in this post.

Update. Back in early November, I sent my 5cm collapsable 'cron to DAG for a full CLA. It came back yesterday and I've never seen a lens cleaned to this level of perfection. I knew the elements did not have any scratches, cleaning marks, dings etc - even though the front element is said to be very soft glass. The aperture blades are clean, all the internal haze is gone - I was expecting to see maybe a little. OMG, the elements are so beautifully clear. And both the aperture and focus ring have a very nice feel to them. Testing the lens on my M240 reveals the real magic of this lens. Is it super contrasty like a new lens? No, but it does have that beautiful film quality to the shots. I really cannot be any happier I went with the cleaning.

Thank you everyone for thoughtful info and special thanks to you @luigi bertolotti, those demo pictures of yours shows a clear and remarkable difference. Under controlled lighting, the haze is not too bad in my lens; it's just when there is strong back or side lighting that the lens flares out a bit. And @sinjun, I agree with you, the newer lenses are technically better in terms of image quality - but less characterful. There's something really special about the bokeh this lens has and to me, this lens has a more "film" quality to it than the technically correct modern lenses.

Hello all. Recently, I obtained a Leica Summicron 5cm collapsable lens. Overall, it's in really great shape and surprisingly, no marks on the lens elements - no scratches, no cleaning marks, etc. Not even fungus. The only noticeable issue is some slight haze on the inner elements. I know this is probably due to the oils drying on the lens elements. The lens is remarkably sharp and shows great detail, however, the haze does diminish the contrast a little. In Lightroom, I can correct it with the dehaze slider but I really don't want to. The only other issue the haze causes is when there is strong side or back lighting, there is a bit of haze in the image. This side lit haze effect is a bit more difficult to correct in Lightroom. The question I have is, would a thorough CLA remove the haze and help improve the contrast? After pouring through this forum, I was thinking of sending to to DAG for service. His price seems reasonable but I was curious to know from readers here if it would be worth it. I'd rather sell the lens and apply the CLA fee for a newer Summicron if there won't be much of a return on the CLA. With the exception of the haze, the optics are really in excellent shape. That's what's making my choice tough. And the fact, it looks really cool on my M240. I'm eager to hear everyone's thoughts on this.

A drizzly, cold, damp afternoon on New York City's famed High Line gave a moody, monochrome atmosphere which called for this shot to be captured in B&W. This M240 is my first Leica since my M2. This camera made me fall in love with B&W all over again. I could so trade this in for the M262 Monochrom.