Leica M Elmarit 2.8/90

[herzie]

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hi folks,

what's wrong, but nobody wants to sell his M 2.8/90 Elmarit - the lens is so good or so rare?

please, see "buy & sell" - thanks

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The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[spydrxx]

I sure wouldn't want to sell mine...it took too long to acquire and discover its nuances.

[H. James Wolf]

It's nearly an ideal combination of speed and size. Although it's slightly larger than a Tele-Elmarit, it's still not too big for rangefinder use and I can hand hold mine at a lower shutter speed than the Summicron. I've had it since new and have no intention of parting with mine.

[gberger]

Keep looking! IMO, it's a superb lens for portraits and landscapes. I had to let mine go to a good new home, as I developed macular degeneration and lost the capability to focus accurately

 

My son-in-law claims it's the best he's seen for prtraits since the old Nikon f2.5 105mm.

[colin_d]

What is the difference between the Elmarit and the Tele Elmarit, apart from size?

[Guido]

What is the difference between the Elmarit and the Tele Elmarit, apart from size?

Leica 90mm f/2.8 Lenses

[luigi bertolotti]

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In chrome it is a delicious item... not common, but here's one for sale (my one is identical ) :

Newoldcamera - Scheda prodotto

[lars_bergquist]

Well, you should not give any weight to that bigmouth Rockwell.

 

The v.2 Tele-Elmarit was conceived as a ultra low weight, ultra compact lens. Wide open, it is low contrast but with decent definition centrally. The far edges and the corners are noticeably soft. Improvement is great as the lens is stopped down, which shows that the design is not really up to the 2.8 speed. Performance is decent at f:4, and brillliant at 5.6. But the thing weighs just 225 grams and fits in a jacket pocket. You decide your priorities.

 

The Elmarit-M is optically identical to the last version Elmarit-R. Weight is 410 grams. But it is indeed rock solid, and capable of excellent definition from center to corners already wide open. You stop down mostly to create a bit more depth of field.

 

The Summarit-M is mechanically less over-engineered -- you should not use it to drive nails -- but far, far superior to the flimsy plastic-mounted lenses now peddled by Canikon. It can be sold for less money than the Elmarit because it shares lots of mount components with the 75mm Summarit-M, which is one of the sweetest lenses I have ever worked with in the last half century.

 

Mr. Rockwell has no idea what "really Leica" is. His business concept is to side with the loudest ignoramuses he can find, as a sure path to self-promotion.

 

Lars Bergquist

The old man from the Age of the 9cm Elmar

[luigi bertolotti]

... and the Tele Elmarit v2, though of fantastic compactness, suffers also, in some items, a strange issue of hazing of back element... I remember to have red something about...

[roydonian]

What is the difference between the Elmarit and the Tele Elmarit, apart from size?

 

I set out to buy a Tele-Elmarit a month or so ago, but when I tried it on my M8 I was not impressed by its definition at full aperture. The dealer also had a couple of Elmarits, so I tried one. One look at the resulting full-aperture image was enough to make me decide he'd got a sale.

 

Obviously I'm talking about a single sample of each lens, so other examples of the Tele-Elmarit may give better results.

 

Best regards,

 

Doug

[lars_bergquist]

[ ... ] Obviously I'm talking about a single sample of each lens, so other examples of the Tele-Elmarit may give better results.

 

Best regards,

 

Doug

Don't forget that these by now are quite old lenses. You cannot expect their performance to be up to modern specs.

 

The old man from the Age of the 9cm Elmar

[roydonian]

Don't forget that these by now are quite old lenses. You cannot expect their performance to be up to modern specs.

 

The old man from the Age of the 9cm Elmar

 

That’s true – but having bought my first Leica in 1963, I’m not up to modern specs either!

 

But the two lenses I tried that day were of similar era design-wise, so I think it was a fair comparison. I’ve always wanted a Tele-Elmarit, but when I compared its imagery with that from the Elmarit, I immediately knew which lens I’d be buying.

 

For a couple of years (while I was awaiting for the M8 to get past its initial teething troubles) I used a Nikon D200 with the 17-55mm f2.8 zoom. But when I finally bought my M8.2 and went back to my old Leica lenses I can’t say that I noticed any significant change in image quality. I haven’t had a chance to give the Tri-Elmar a decent workout, but it will be interesting to see if there are any obvious signs in its images of the effects of some 40 years of lens evolution.

 

I’ve tried a few test shots of the view from my bedroom window (a crude first test I try on all newly-acquired lenses) and I can see the higher performance of the Tri-Elmar in terms of fine detail, but I’ve got to go to full size (1 image pixel = 1 screen pixel) to see this clearly. So my older lenses are still holding their own in general terms, even though the newer designs are superior in difficult conditions. (At 'full bore', the 35mm Summilux ASPH utter eclipses the pre-aspheric - another instance where a couple of test frames had me reaching for my credit card.)

[elgenper]

That’s true – but having bought my first Leica in 1963, I’m not up to modern specs either!

Touché! That certainly goes for me too...

 

...For a couple of years... I used a Nikon D200 with the 17-55mm f2.8 zoom. But when I finally bought my M8.2 and went back to my old Leica lenses I can’t say that I noticed any significant change in image quality....

Funny; that´s what I used too; one of Nikon´s very best! But horribly heavy to lug around... And, while resolution, contrast & c were tops, the "looks" of the images were downright flat and crude compared to Leica glass, even the Digilux 2 I bought in 2004. Now my oldest son has my Nikon gear; I got the M9 - now that´s my camera! As an old M2 (and Leicaflex) user, I´ve finally come back home!

 

So my older lenses are still holding their own in general terms, even though the newer designs are superior in difficult conditions. (At 'full bore', the 35mm Summilux ASPH utter eclipses the pre-aspheric - another instance where a couple of test frames had me reaching for my credit card.)

I own the Summicron 35 V1, too; a lens with a distinct personality, and one who draws beautifully. But the new Summicron 35 ASPH that I got with the M9 is far more to my liking (regrettably, it had to go back to Solms because of a back focussing problem...). And, after using a Summicron 50 and a TeleElmarit 90 for some weeks, yesterday I got an Apo-Summicron 75 ASPH at an auction here in Stockholm; it´s just incredible!

 

So, for the moment, my old Leica glass will return to the cupboard, to be used for special purposes. My two new Summicrons will be in my camera bag for daily use; they´re the Stradivari of photography (maybe those old Mandler ones are the Guarneri...).

[wda]

That’s true – but having bought my first Leica in 1963, I’m not up to modern specs either!

 

But the two lenses I tried that day were of similar era design-wise, so I think it was a fair comparison. I’ve always wanted a Tele-Elmarit, but when I compared its imagery with that from the Elmarit, I immediately knew which lens I’d be buying.

 

I’ve tried a few test shots of the view from my bedroom window (a crude first test I try on all newly-acquired lenses) and I can see the higher performance of the Tri-Elmar in terms of fine detail, but I’ve got to go to full size (1 image pixel = 1 screen pixel) to see this clearly. So my older lenses are still holding their own in general terms, even though the newer designs are superior in difficult conditions. (At 'full bore', the 35mm Summilux ASPH utter eclipses the pre-aspheric - another instance where a couple of test frames had me reaching for my credit card.)

My experiences mirror yours quite closely, with one or two differences. I bought the 1st version of the Tele-Elmarit new in 1966. At the time it gave me fine results. Fast forward 40+ years and I am trying it on my M8. Good, but not quite so good reflecting, no doubt, improvements made during that interval. Then I discovered that the Tele-Elmarit was really good once stopped down. So what about its full aperture performance? It suddenly became a forgiving portrait lens though decidedly soft, by modern standards, for more demanding subjects!

 

I also have the TriElmar (MkII) which has managed the adapt from film to M8 extremely well. Certainly at the 50mm setting it surpasses my 1966 Summicron until the latter is well stopped down. In fact it is often my walk-about lens on my M8 until I want a wider or longer or faster lens. Only at the 28mm setting do I prefer to fit my current 28mm Elmarit. In my view the TriElmar is a most useful lens for all but low light conditions. However, with the M8 you can set Auto ISO to compensate for its relatively slow full aperture.