Differences between Summicron, Summilux, Elmarit Lenses

[batmobile]

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I dont have too many Leica lenses overlapping in this way and the goalposts shift a little when comparing non asphs with asphs (i.e. a 50 Cron with a 50 lux asph). Comparing like with like though:

 

21 and 24 Elmarits seem to test stronger at 2.8 than the Lux asphs do at 2.8.

24 Elmar tests stronger than the 24 Elmarit

Same for 50 lux pre-asph and similar vintage cron.

21 4.5 ZM tests stronger than 2.8 version. Ditto for 2.8 and f2 35 biogons.

 

Distortion tends to be lower on the slower models too, flare resistance is higher etc.

 

Ignoring hair splitting, the argument for buying luxes when used in the aperture ranges of slower lenses would appear quite weak based on technical merits, unless we move into the more subjective area of signature and look - each to their own here.

 

I bought a 24 lux because I needed the speed. Its actually my only lux, after selling the 50 lux asph because I was not a fan of that FL at the time and the ZM planar seemed just as good on print. I will be getting the new 35 asph lux Mk II once again for the speed and nothing more. On the subject of the 50 lux asph, I might get one again as I am shooting 50mm much more with a 0.85 body, but the last one was a LHSA version which felt like depleted uranium to carry about. The next one, if I bite, will be black anodised!

 

 

 

Not really my feeling with Leica lenses. My f/1.4 lenses are better at f/2 than my f/2 lenses and the latters are better at f/2.8 than my f/2.8's. Not your experience as well?

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[bill]

Bill--

The problem I mentioned isn't with what you call "the term 'Barnack,'" but with using the name "Barnack" to designate a class.

 

We distinguish "cars" from "trucks" (US English).

We distinguish "bayonet mounts" from "screw mounts."

What is NX's class of "Barnacks" to be distinguished from?

 

 

Is he referring to lenses made for Oskar and the members of his family? The only thing I can think he means is "screw-mount Leicas."

 

As I said before, I'm unfamiliar with what seems to me an idiosyncratic usage of the name. Please enlighten me! Show me where the name "Barnack" is commonly used to designate a class, eh?

 

Tsk, you do need to get out more, Howard.

 

Have a look here.

 

The Barnack Challenge

 

As you can see, real men eschew modern aids such as a combined range/viewfinder

 

Noel has not coined the phrase - it has been in use for some considerable time.

 

Seriously, I am regularly delighted by the high quality of results that people produce from the Barnack cameras. I have two, the oldest is 80 this year, and is still capable of outperforming me. I will continue to use them until I cannot get film anymore.

 

Regards,

 

Bill

[giordano]

Did the Contarex have mirror lock-up?

No, from memory and the instruction books.

 

But it did have an "instant return mirror" - though it's the slowest on any 35mm SLR.* I think that the Zeiss designers felt they'd made the mirror mechanism so perfectly balanced and so well damped no one would need to lock the mirror.

 

The thing that wasn't quick-return was the diaphragm, so after the leisurely blackout for the exposure you got "brownout" until you cocked the shutter.

I think they built the Hologon body because--like so much on the Contarex, and on the Contax before it--they had built themselves into a hole.

 

Example: Remember the diaphragm-compensated Macro Planar? It was a technically brilliant and complex design that became a hindrance when the meter entered the mirror cavity.

 

When Zeiss put a spot meter into the body (before the Leicaflex SL, I think), they had to offer the lens in a de-compensated version since the metering now saw the extension-produced light transmission reduction.

Nikon did exactly the same with versions of their 50/3.5 (or was it 55/3.5) Micro Nikkor.

 

 

*Footnote: the slowest, that is, unless you count the pre-"b" Alpas, where the position of the mirror is directly linked to the shutter release. As you take up the first few millimetres of travel the mirror is slowly pushed upwards; then the shutter fires; and the mirror doesn't come down until you release the button. Perfect for getting into the Zen of sports photography.

[pico]

[...]

 

Ernst Leitz was one of the first European optical companies to develop and use optical C.A.D. techniques. This was before the middle 1950's. [...]

 

I hope I am not drifting to Off Topic, but do you know what computers of the mid-fifties they used? It was my impression that the deployment of the mini-computer (for example, Digital Equipment Corporation) in the Seventies that boosted computer assisted lens design (ray tracing).

 

But I really don't know. Very curious!

[lars_bergquist]

I hope I am not drifting to Off Topic, but do you know what computers of the mid-fifties they used? It was my impression that the deployment of the mini-computer (for example, Digital Equipment Corporation) in the Seventies that boosted computer assisted lens design (ray tracing).

 

But I really don't know. Very curious!

They were German Zuse computers. Quote from Wikipedia:

 

"The inventor of the program-controlled computer was Konrad Zuse, who built the first working computer in 1941 and later in 1955 the first computer based on magnetic storage."

 

It is an interesting fact that Zuse, who built his first electronic computers in order to make possible advanced aerodynamic computations, used hole-punched 35mm film for his input medium in his WWII computers!

 

Zuse founded a company in 1946 and produced and sold commercially a line of mainframe computers. The company was sold to Siemens in 1967. Zuse died in 1995. The ray-tracing and optimising software was developed by Leitz. Leica, as far as I know, are still running the latest version of that program.

 

The old man from the Age of Relay Computers

[lars_bergquist]

Did the Contarex have mirror lock-up? I remember that it lacked a quick-return mirror, so a lot of mechanics would have had to be changed to mount the Hologon. Remember also that the Hologon body doesn't have the trapezoidal wedge into which the diaphragm stop-down couplings of the Contarex were built.

 

There is a rumour that the development of the Hologon was commenced with the RF Contax in view, but the camera died, of course. Hence the special Hologon camera. You should keep in mind that the Hologon, in contradistinction to modern 15mm lenses of both RF and SLR persuasion, is a 'true wide angle lens', i.e. a short-focus lens, not a retrofocus design. This means that the 'waist' of the middle element is pretty exactly 15mm from the film plane. A recessed mount would have been possible on a RF camera, and was used on the Leica, but the lens would have simply disappeared inside any SLR camera (with raised mirror, natch.) The flange-to-film distance ("back focus") of the M is 27.8mm, but SLR flange distances are usually around 40mm.

 

The old man from the Pinhole Age

[ho_co]

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Lars, that makes sense. Thanks. More straight-forward than

... the Hologon in the Contarex SLR would have photographed the lens mount internals ...

though the latter is cuter.

[ho_co]

NX & Bill--

Thank you both very much for answering my question about "Barnacks" back in Post 31 of this thread. As I said there, the usage is unfamiliar to me. Maybe it's primarily a British usage? Or am I more out of touch than I know?

 

 

While we're at it, "fora," according to the Oxford Dictionary of American English, is not properly used as the plural of 'forum' except in reference to ancient Roman public open spaces. Is that different in British English?

[ho_co]

... But it did have an "instant return mirror" - though it's the slowest on any 35mm SLR.* I think that the Zeiss designers felt they'd made the mirror mechanism so perfectly balanced and so well damped no one would need to lock the mirror.

 

The thing that wasn't quick-return was the diaphragm, so after the leisurely blackout for the exposure you got "brownout" until you cocked the shutter.

John, you're right! Thanks for reminding me. I loved the sound of the mirror winding up on the Contarex--they used a geared mechanism, I think, instead of a spring release catch. It made a kind of 'sqrrt' sound as it rose. And didn't it make a kind of 'kerfluffel' sound when it descended?

 

And those gorgeous diaphragms--Nikon and others today make it sound special that new designs have nine (count 'em, nine!) blades--the Contarex lenses had twelve or sixteen if I remember correctly, and they stayed closed down visible in all their glory till one wound on again! Because of the complex shape of the blades, they formed nearly a perfect circle over a large range of the smaller apertures.

 

 

 

... Nikon did exactly the same with versions of their 50/3.5 (or was it 55/3.5) Micro Nikkor....

Another thing I was unaware of. My knowledge of Nikon history is zilch! Copied the Contax, copied (I guess?) the compensated diaphragm?

 

 

 

... the pre-"b" Alpas, where the position of the mirror is directly linked to the shutter release. As you take up the first few millimetres of travel the mirror is slowly pushed upwards; then the shutter fires; and the mirror doesn't come down until you release the button. Perfect for getting into the Zen of sports photography.

 

Never saw one of those. Do you suppose that's where Leica got the idea for the arm-coupled release on the Visoflexes?

[ho_co]

... I accept that the grip is subjective thing, but I get a lot of pink things on the edges of the frame, with the G1 and Hologon....

So you had said above; that's why I mentioned my experiences with the camera. I've never seen either the 16 Hologon or the G1.

 

But wasn't the Hologon camera a little longer than the G1? A bit more gripping area, the ability to grip it further to the sides, more out of the lens f.o.v.?

 

As I recall, the main problem I had with the grip was that it was almost vertical, not angled far enough forward, so it put the wrist in an awkward position for eye-level use. May be wrong, it's been a few years. Had, what, five different rotational lockpoints, but it was uncomfortable to have a pistol grip pointing 60 degrees left when I wanted to shoot straight ahead.

[giordano]

John, you're right! Thanks for reminding me. I loved the sound of the mirror winding up on the Contarex--they used a geared mechanism, I think, instead of a spring release catch. It made a kind of 'sqrrt' sound as it rose. And didn't it make a kind of 'kerfluffel' sound when it descended?

 

It was a lovely sound of lots of precision mechanisms at work ... but somehow made me feel that there was just too much complication inside. But the weight (substantial even by DSLR standards) and the awful ergonomics meant I was never tempted to buy.

 

My knowledge of Nikon history is zilch! Copied the Contax, copied (I guess?) the compensated diaphragm?

 

Not that simple, I'm sure. The Nikon designers followed the Contax look and lens mount (faster lens-changing and more robust rangefinder coupling) but had the sense not to copy the Contax shutter. Even the business end of the rangefinder owes more to Leica than Canon.

 

As for the 55/3.5 Micro Nikkor, according to 55mm f3.5 Micro-Nikkor-P Auto the model with compensating diaphragm was introduced in 1963 (same year as Topcon's first TTL body). I can't find a date for the Contarex lens, but it must have been about the same time. A compensating diaphragm on a macro lens was such an obvious idea (pre-TTL metering) that until I learn otherwise I'll reckon they were independent developments.

 

Never saw one of those. Do you suppose that's where Leica got the idea for the arm-coupled release on the Visoflexes?

 

Nice thought, but the first arm-coupled Visoflex (the II) didn't have a slow-up, slow-down setting, while some of the older, cable-operated reflex housings did. (And I tend to trust engineers to think things out for themselves:))

[lars_bergquist]

Not that simple, I'm sure. The Nikon designers followed the Contax look and lens mount (faster lens-changing and more robust rangefinder coupling) but had the sense not to copy the Contax shutter. Even the business end of the rangefinder owes more to Leica than Canon.

 

There are some people who maintain that Nikon would have liked to copy the Contax shutter too, but couldn't. It was to damn complicated. In a sense, not even the Germans could -- that shutter was certainly the Achilles heel of the Contax RF. Strangely, not only the shutter of the original 1932 Contax I, but also the 'refined' shutter of the post-war IIa/IIIa was actually even less reliable than that of the Contax II.

 

There is a German saying that goes: "Warum einfach wenn es kann so schön kompliziert sein?" Why make it simple when it can be so beautifully complicated? And that could well have been the company motto of Zeiss Ikon.

 

The old man from the Age of the 6x9cm Zeiss Ikon Roll Film Folder

[bill]

NX & Bill--

Thank you both very much for answering my question about "Barnacks" back in Post 31 of this thread. As I said there, the usage is unfamiliar to me. Maybe it's primarily a British usage? Or am I more out of touch than I know?

 

I'm not aware of any geographical bias here. Certainly I have not come across anyone - from any continent - querying the term before.

 

While we're at it, "fora," according to the Oxford Dictionary of American English, is not properly used as the plural of 'forum' except in reference to ancient Roman public open spaces. Is that different in British English?

 

Well there you go. Two countries divided by a common language - still

 

Regards,

 

Bill

[stunsworth]

Well there you go. Two countries divided by a common language - still

 

Not quite, I'd never dream of referring to forums as fora.

[bill]

"Benefits" of a classical education

 

Actually, I don't really care either way. It's not a fingers on the blackboard usage like "lense", for example.

 

Regards,

 

Bill

[SJP]

How about plural cactus => cacti ??

[The_hog]

--- Fallus - falli ---- Have a nice weekend all.

[lct]

Fallus? Like Farmacus, Farmacy?

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Hallo,

Look here: Interesting Leica gear

[jaapv]

Found this:

 

fora

Irregular plural of forum.

Usage notes

The English plural forums is preferred to the Latin plural fora in normal English usage.

Ref: Modern English Usage, 2nd Edition, ed. Sir Ernest Gowers, Oxford 1968 (article '-um', p.658)

 

Is Internet use of English "normal English usage"?...

[lct]

Is Latin less International than English on International Fora?

Never mind. De niminis not curat praetor.