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Magic of Leica glass wide open.....?


ola.fiske

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Many people points out the magic of Leica lenses shoot wide open; what is this magic all about? For natural reasons I often use the f-1.4 with my 35 ASPH and 50 ASPH Lux during dark winter here in Stavanger.

But the particular magic in it I only se after drinking wine;)

I add to pics: Both with lens wide open.

Tri-x in Diafine scanned on Epson 750

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There is no 'magic', there is only intelligent design(not in the Cosmic sense).

Leica glass is usually designed to be just as sharp at the widest aperture as when stopped down.

I use the 35mm Lux ASPH v1 most of the time and aperture only figures into my exposure, not into any consideration of lens performance. Same for all my Leica ASPH glass.-Dick

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Saying that a Leica glass is designed to be just as sharp wide open as stopped down is not true, Almost all lenses sharpness improves when stopping down. It's just the nature of optics. Saying other wise is wishfull thinking,

I do apprecaite the "signature" of my 35 1.4 Summilux pre ASPH , and my 50 1.0 Noct wide open on my Leica film M's.

 

 

Gregory

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I think the magic of wide open is the fact that the DOF is very shallow so you have a narrowly defined 'in focus' plane and the rest is fuzzy. You can see that effect very well in portraits, where the eyes are sharp and the rest (more or less) blurred. An additional effect with wide open older lenses is that they're not optimally corrected causing a very particular atmosphere.

 

M8 1951 Summarit 1.5/50 wide open.

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1158813922_tEENg-L.jpg

 

Taken with 50 1.0 Noctilux and Leica MP on XP2 film.

 

 

I agree about the shallow depth of feild when going wide open, especially with the 50 1.0 Noctilux. The Noct really sharpens up @f4 but it just seems ... wrong to stop this lens down. :)

 

 

Gregory

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[quote

especially with the 50 1.0 Noctilux. The Noct really sharpens up @f4 but it just seems ... wrong to stop this lens down. :)

 

It's really soft wide open and without digital sharpening it's tough to get an acceptable portrait image.But the extreme shallow DOF and the woolly, fuzzy OOF area is a marvel.

 

M8 Noctilux 1.0/50 f1.0 1/1500s ISO160 (Thank you, Coup de foudre, for letting me use this fantastic lens!)

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It's marketing puff, for the most part. I would defy anyone to consistently pick out "Leica magic" photos from among a set of images taken with lenses of broadly comparable aperture and performance, and non-sequitur gratuitous pussy shots prove nothing. I use a Sonnar in preference to a Summilux because I prefer the non-clinical behaviour and rendering but there is no witchcraft involved, only physics.

 

Regards,

 

Bill

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