Anyone got an 18mm F3.8 Super Elmar?

[Guest mc_k]

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...Or you may want to put the moon inside the far depth of field but focus nearer than infinity to get a sharper foreground...

thanks, that's what I was missing.

 

Ken

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[markowich]

Hmmm. Maybe Leica needs to learn from Panasonic's manuals.

 

 

 

 

 

Leica could say:

 

Or:

 

 

 

let me add one:

 

'High levels of CA on backlit photographs taken with leica high speed wide angle lenses are no indication of malfunction, they are normal operating mode. Either remove in PP or enjoy the photographs as they are'

 

peter

[tashley]

Tim--"focuses waaay past infinity." Understood.

 

Specific, different question:

 

A) When you focus with the rangefinder on an object at infinity, does the infinity mark of the lens line up the focus mark of the lens?

 

Or, instead, does the lens barrel's infinity mark match up with the lens' infinity stop?

 

That is: When you pick up the lens in the shop, without putting it on the camera, do you have to rotate the focusing ring past the engraved infinity mark to reach the lens' infinity stop?

 

 

Those are two different possibilities and represent two separate but easy problems for Leica to fix.

 

The lenses shouldn't have left Solms that way, but if you use the rangefinder, the discrepancy will make no difference in either case; and in only one of the two cases will accurate focusing by scale be precluded.

 

The lenses all seem to physically stop at pretty much exactly the infinity mark - however the moon, for example, will at that point make you feel like you're drunk and seeing double and as I have stated elsewhere this will have a slight but visible effect on the final image.

 

I don't want to cut my nose off to spite my face here: without using cornerfix (which is brilliant but doesn't suit my workflow) the CV15 is simply not useable for colour work on the M9 due to terrible colour shifts. I don't like (have never liked) the WATE. Consequently the 18mm super elmar is the only game in town and I might just have to accept that all current models are badly buily but with care can be used to give good results. I just don't like encouraging bad QA at Leica, or spending silly money on poorly assembled products!

[thrice]

let me add one:

 

'High levels of CA on backlit photographs taken with leica high speed wide angle lenses are no indication of malfunction, they are normal operating mode. Either remove in PP or enjoy the photographs as they are'

 

peter

 

They actually increased with the first version of the canon 24/1.4L while stopping down! The second version having a bit wide open that slowly decreases while stopping down. Unfortunately it's resolution isn't quite as good as the Leica... But obviously incredible resolution and a very large maximum aperture are insufficient. Luckily no one is holding a gun to your head to make you buy one right? In fact no one is making you buy any Leica products.

[UliWer]

The lenses all seem to physically stop at pretty much exactly the infinity mark - however the moon, for example, will at that point make you feel like you're drunk and seeing double and as I have stated elsewhere this will have a slight but visible effect on the final image.

 

I don't want to cut my nose off to spite my face here: without using cornerfix (which is brilliant but doesn't suit my workflow) the CV15 is simply not useable for colour work on the M9 due to terrible colour shifts. I don't like (have never liked) the WATE. Consequently the 18mm super elmar is the only game in town and I might just have to accept that all current models are badly buily but with care can be used to give good results. I just don't like encouraging bad QA at Leica, or spending silly money on poorly assembled products!

 

jaapv described a problem with the infinity setting of his rangefinder and found out what possibly caused it. Perhaps it's something like this as well causing your issues with the lens:

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/customer-forum/104689-sent-quite-some-gear-cs-solms.html#post1105847

[tashley]

jaapv described a problem with the infinity setting of his rangefinder and found out what possibly caused it. Perhaps it's something like this as well causing your issues with the lens:

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/customer-forum/104689-sent-quite-some-gear-cs-solms.html#post1105847

 

Thanks for that but no, that's not it: my RF has just been adjusted at Milton Keynes and is perfect. The reason is much more likely Mark Norton's, as above in this thread!

 

 

t

[ho_co]

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Tim--

It's a goof-up at Leica. Another one. A particularly stupid one.

 

So what?

 

Buy the lens and send it to Solms for adjustment.

 

You've got enough interest in it that you've gone to this amount of effort to figure out the problem.

 

I think you've set yourself a false standard when you say, "I just don't like encouraging bad QA at Leica, or spending silly money on poorly assembled products!"

 

You can buy now and have it fixed; or you can wait till Leica wakes up and fixes the product prior to shipping and buy it then. You'll be spending the money now or later. Leica will also need to pay now or later ([wo]man-hours) for the correction. If you don't buy, you're holding yourself hostage to Leica's poor QC.

 

The company gets your money now or later or never, but the person who did the sloppy assembly never knows of her/his complicity in the loss of a sale. They're simply too far removed from your choice.

 

Buy it. Fix it. Enjoy it. We'll have more problems later.

[marknorton]

As I understand it, Tim has tried a number of SEs on his M9 with consistently incorrect results.It would certainly be interesting to try a 24mm Elmar on the same camera because it has the same type of focussing cam. I suspect the results may be similar.

 

The M9 may have been adjusted and now appear perfect but there's still a question mark over it IMHO.

[therbert]

I have had an 18mm SE for about 2 months - The rangefinder images line up perfectly when the lens is focused at the infinity mark - on both my M6TTL and my M8.2. (I don't have easy access to an M9.) The M8.2 pictures look great but I haven't put a roll of film through the M6 yet.

[tashley]

As I understand it, Tim has tried a number of SEs on his M9 with consistently incorrect results.It would certainly be interesting to try a 24mm Elmar on the same camera because it has the same type of focussing cam. I suspect the results may be similar.

 

The M9 may have been adjusted and now appear perfect but there's still a question mark over it IMHO.

 

Hi Mark,

 

I haven't tried all the 18's on bodies other than mine but I have tried over half of them and they do the same thing on whatever body, M8 or 9, that they are tried on. The guys in the shops agreed and one yesterday told me that he had mentioned it to Milton Keynes and more or less been told that 'they all do it'...

[tashley]

Tim--

It's a goof-up at Leica. Another one. A particularly stupid one.

 

So what?

 

Buy the lens and send it to Solms for adjustment.

 

You've got enough interest in it that you've gone to this amount of effort to figure out the problem.

 

I think you've set yourself a false standard when you say, "I just don't like encouraging bad QA at Leica, or spending silly money on poorly assembled products!"

 

You can buy now and have it fixed; or you can wait till Leica wakes up and fixes the product prior to shipping and buy it then. You'll be spending the money now or later. Leica will also need to pay now or later ([wo]man-hours) for the correction. If you don't buy, you're holding yourself hostage to Leica's poor QC.

 

The company gets your money now or later or never, but the person who did the sloppy assembly never knows of her/his complicity in the loss of a sale. They're simply too far removed from your choice.

 

Buy it. Fix it. Enjoy it. We'll have more problems later.

 

 

Yup, you're right, assuming that I stick with Leica.

 

But there is a large part of me that wants to throw the baby out with the bathwater, given that the poor mite is often barely able to breath! My 5dII doesn't feel anywhere near as nice but in truth it's a lot more versatile, only a little larger and heavier, can take R glass with an adaptor, etc etc etc. What's more it and every canon lens I have purchased for it worked right out of the box.

 

Whereas with Leica, I spend the first week or two with around half of the stuff I buy discovering that it is in some way faulty and needs repairing or replacing or, worse, just stretches technology past the point at which it can perform as its hype and price point indicate it should.

 

I do understand the argument that the cost of entry to the magic is not just money but skill and patience. And when the magic strikes, it really seems worth the hassle. But the fact is that a lot of the time I could spend taking pictures gets wasted on trying to track down slippery faults that are frustratingly hard to analyse and fix.

 

There was a thread here a week or two ago entitled 'I'm out' and I have to say that I am getting very, very close to that point. And to think, last month I was preparing to sell my Phase gear to buy an S2!

 

:~{

[ho_co]

Tim, believe me, I understand, though at a much lower level of commitment than you.

 

It's crazy that you keep getting bodies/lenses with these unending strings of problems connected.

 

I don't understand how these stupid but actually minor lapses keep happening. Mark may be right that the initial M3 design isn't up to snuff today, but my guess is that the difficulty comes from trying to cost-cut a design that can't be cost-cut, which is itself another of Mark's peeves with Leica.

 

You're right. You don't need to stick with Leica, and it's your choice.

 

Reminds me of an survey the Spiegel (or was it Stern?) did in the '60s. They asked people in France why they bought Citroen 2CVs instead of VW Beetles. One of the answers they got was that a car should be like a woman, different every time you approached it.

 

Considering recent Leica history, it looks as if the company has somehow taken the French tack.

 

 

I hope you'll stick around, because you hold Leica up to their reputation, and you do so publicly. Without people like you, I'm getting too old to put up with the crap myself. We need to stick together to make the camera live up to its promises.

[UliWer]

The lenses all seem to physically stop at pretty much exactly the infinity mark - however the moon, for example, will at that point make you feel like you're drunk and seeing double and as I have stated elsewhere this will have a slight but visible effect on the final image.

...

 

Perhaps it's my lack of understanding the English language, but I have to admit that I am getting lost.

 

From your first postings I understood that your lens was mechanically going past infinity, while even for very distant objects on infinity you had no exact definition neither in the rangefinder nor on the results.

I understood as well that you tested several other lenses and they all had the same issue: i.e. going mechanically past infinity but giving no exact results on infinity but only "way past inifinity" (#1 and #10)

 

 

In #17 you said that it was exactly the case when the issue was described as focussing on very distant objects before the infinity stop, whilst going further to infinity the rangefinder and the result went out of focus.

 

Now I read that "the lenses" all stop almost exactly on infinity, but at this position they don't give exact results, but only a double images of objects very far away like the moon.

 

So I don't get it anymore how "all" lenses behaved. I can only understand that they behaved completely different - sometimes exactly focussing before and sometimes way past infinity - though in no case exactly on infinity. Perhaps it is helpful for Leica for solving the issue to describe it - as well for the mechanical focussing as for the optical one - just in one way.

[tashley]

Perhaps it's my lack of understanding the English language, but I have to admit that I am getting lost.

 

From your first postings I understood that your lens was mechanically going past infinity, while even for very distant objects on infinity you had no exact definition neither in the rangefinder nor on the results.

I understood as well that you tested several other lenses and they all had the same issue: i.e. going mechanically past infinity but giving no exact results on infinity but only "way past inifinity" (#1 and #10)

 

 

In #17 you said that it was exactly the case when the issue was described as focussing on very distant objects before the infinity stop, whilst going further to infinity the rangefinder and the result went out of focus.

 

Now I read that "the lenses" all stop almost exactly on infinity, but at this position they don't give exact results, but only a double images of objects very far away like the moon.

 

So I don't get it anymore how "all" lenses behaved. I can only understand that they behaved completely different - sometimes exactly focussing before and sometimes way past infinity - though in no case exactly on infinity. Perhaps it is helpful for Leica for solving the issue to describe it - as well for the mechanical focussing as for the optical one - just in one way.

 

OK, though I believe I have already done so, here we are for one last time!

 

Physically every one of the lenses, when turned towards infinity, reaches the point at which it can turn no further. For all the lenses, this point was, physically, the same point at which the infinity marker on the barrel lined up with the distance marker correctly.

 

In other words if you never looked through the rangefinder you would have no reason to suspect the lens. It does not rotate physically past the physically indicated infinity mark.

 

In terms of the rangefinder however (and let us continue with the moon as an example) as you turn the lens towards its physical infinity mark, the moon's image in the RF patch will move towards the main image of the moon but it will then come into perfect alignment BEFORE the physical infinity point of the lens. It will then continue through and past until the point where the physical infinity point is reached so that at that physical point there is an overlapped but not quite double image of the moon.

 

Now I do understand that Einstein would not call the distance between here and the moon 'infinite', for the purposes of rangefinder focus of an 18mm lens, this behaviour counts as focussing past infinity. And if I take two shots, one at 'RF focussed infinity' and one at 'lens barrel infinity' then the second file will not be as well focussed as the first. This means that focussing using the lens barrel markings (zone focussing) is at least in this one instance unreliable. I really can't be bothered to test how true this is at other distances!

 

Hope that is clearer!

 

Tim

[tashley]

Tim, believe me, I understand, though at a much lower level of commitment than you.

 

It's crazy that you keep getting bodies/lenses with these unending strings of problems connected.

 

I don't understand how these stupid but actually minor lapses keep happening. Mark may be right that the initial M3 design isn't up to snuff today, but my guess is that the difficulty comes from trying to cost-cut a design that can't be cost-cut, which is itself another of Mark's peeves with Leica.

 

You're right. You don't need to stick with Leica, and it's your choice.

 

Reminds me of an survey the Spiegel (or was it Stern?) did in the '60s. They asked people in France why they bought Citroen 2CVs instead of VW Beetles. One of the answers they got was that a car should be like a woman, different every time you approached it.

 

Considering recent Leica history, it looks as if the company has somehow taken the French tack.

 

 

I hope you'll stick around, because you hold Leica up to their reputation, and you do so publicly. Without people like you, I'm getting too old to put up with the crap myself. We need to stick together to make the camera live up to its promises.

 

LOL!

 

I know how often this happens to me but I also know that I am very picky about this sort of thing - having learned early in my Leica experience that $$$ does not always buy you a properly finished product, I always test everything immediately. In particular I suspect any lens, and the RF adjustment on any camera.

 

Given that I test more than most people I am certain to find more fault. I need to do this because I like to print large, which a properly calibrated digital M system does very well. But a lot of Leica's other customers don't print large or are, for other reasons, less critical. That's why I get more problems than many other people. I look for them!

 

But I do feel that for every post from someone who doesn't see the 'Leica magic' we need (and Leica needs) to understand that that person quite possibly has a decentred lens or a badly adjusted RF etc etc.

 

The issue is further complicated by the fact that some equipment behaviours (CA on the wide angle luxes, focus shift on the 35 lux etc.) are not production faults but unadvertised characteristics of the design itself. Half the life-force of this forum is generated by the effort to work out what is 'fault' and what is 'feature'.

 

Anyhooo.... I'm off to take some pictures! Oh yes, I really am!