atournas Posted May 10, 2012 Share #1 Posted May 10, 2012 Advertisement (gone after registration) Leica now offers two APO-Summicron-ASPH lenses. It makes me believe the next upgrade of the 35mm Summicron will be an APO-ASPH version, completing Leica's classic 35-50-90 lens set. Paul Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted May 10, 2012 Posted May 10, 2012 Hi atournas, Take a look here An APO-Summicron-ASPH line of lenses?. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
bpalme Posted May 10, 2012 Share #2 Posted May 10, 2012 Don't forget the 75 Summicron. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
01af Posted May 10, 2012 Share #3 Posted May 10, 2012 Leica now offers two Apo-Summicron-M Asph lenses ... Three. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wudai_e Posted May 10, 2012 Share #4 Posted May 10, 2012 Whatever, not that I'll care if they continue their current pricing philosophy. I'm buying a photographic tool, not expensive jewelry that can be used as photographic tool when you feel like it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
IkarusJohn Posted May 11, 2012 Share #5 Posted May 11, 2012 Isn't the 50 Summilux ASPH also Apochromatic? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bpalme Posted May 11, 2012 Share #6 Posted May 11, 2012 Isn't the 50 Summilux ASPH also Apochromatic? No. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdk Posted May 11, 2012 Share #7 Posted May 11, 2012 Advertisement (gone after registration) I’m not sure why the new 50mm/2 Apo-Summicron-M ASPH is going to be priced substantially higher than the 75mm/2 Apo-Summicron-M ASPH. It seems like the 50mm should be less expensive, not more. The MTFs look very similar, so in real life prints it will be hard to discern a quality difference. The biggest differences between these 50mm and 75mm lenses will be in depth of field. It was only a few, low general inflation rate, years ago that the 50mm/1 Noctilux lenses were selling in the $7000 range. This seems like a mistake in pricing to me, though I suppose people will buy it. It’s not one I’m interested in though. The 50mm just does not excite me, and if I did buy one it would be the Zeiss 50mm/2 Planar ZM. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
algrove Posted May 11, 2012 Share #8 Posted May 11, 2012 I just checked the 50/2.0 APO pre-order price from Dale Photo and it was a whopping $7195. That makes the 50/1.4 seem reasonable and the 50/0.95 Noctilux seem high, but OK. Gosh, the 35 FLE is still $5k! What's happening at Leica? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff S Posted May 11, 2012 Share #9 Posted May 11, 2012 I’m not sure why the new 50mm/2 Apo-Summicron-M ASPH is going to be priced substantially higher than the 75mm/2 Apo-Summicron-M ASPH. One distinction is that the new 50 has a floating element in addition to being an APO. It may also be that the glass, which may be lens specific, is quite pricey. (According to E. Puts, one glass element in the new 50 Summilux asph cost more than all seven elements combined in the prior lens version). But, only Leica knows the rationale behind pricing decisions, which most certainly involves an estimated sales projection. Jeff Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
pico Posted May 11, 2012 Share #10 Posted May 11, 2012 [...] It was only a few, low general inflation rate, years ago that the 50mm/1 Noctilux lenses were selling in the $7000 range. [...] Two words: De Mand Demand, not inflation. It has been a depression here in the US. Besides, luxury goods are generally depression-proof because their buyers suffer far less than the median. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sdk Posted May 11, 2012 Share #11 Posted May 11, 2012 One distinction is that the new 50 has a floating element in addition to being an APO. It may also be that the glass, which may be lens specific, is quite pricey. (According to E. Puts, one glass element in the new 50 Summilux asph cost more than all seven elements combined in the prior lens version). But, only Leica knows the rationale behind pricing decisions, which most certainly involves an estimated sales projection. Jeff Their 75mm/2 AA lens also has floating element for close range correction, as well as anomalous partial dispersion glass types. Of course we don’t know their rationale on pricing at Leica, and it’s been a long time since they had a marketing failure on high priced lenses that didn’t sell well. I’m sure they think there is a market for this lens at this price, but they probably could have had a larger market with a lens that was almost this good at half the cost. I’m not going to worry about the 50mm/2 AA, and I'll just enjoy my 75mm/2, a stunning lens which was a bargain by comparison. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
horosu Posted May 11, 2012 Share #12 Posted May 11, 2012 Isn't the 50 Summilux ASPH also Apochromatic? Yes Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff S Posted May 11, 2012 Share #13 Posted May 11, 2012 Their 75mm/2 AA lens also has floating element for close range correction Yep, my mistake (and I should remember as I used to own the lens!). I do, however, remember this interview with Peter Karbe, in which he describes how one lens design often influences another, including the 75 Summicron asph. Jeff Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
IkarusJohn Posted May 11, 2012 Share #14 Posted May 11, 2012 Yes So who's right; Brian or Horea? The thing is, I've read so much about the lenses I have that I seem to have confused some of the information and the relationships. As I recall, the APO-Summicron 75/2 ASPH is based on the Summilux 50/1.4 ASPH, and Erwin Puts made the comment in his Compendium that it is also an APO lens (my copy of the Compendium is at home). However, on his website review of the Summilux, he makes the comment that it is "almost apochromatic". Certainly, the only lenses designated APO by Leica are the 75 & 90 Summicrons, and now the 50. I just wondered if my memory was serving me well over the 50 Summilux ASPH. Anyone have the Compendium handy? Cheers John Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
01af Posted May 11, 2012 Share #15 Posted May 11, 2012 Isn't the Summilux-M 50 mm Asph also apochromatic? In another interview, Peter Karbe once said that technically the Summilux-M 50 mm Asph is an apo lens just as much as the Apo-Summicron-M 75 mm Asph or Apo-Summicron-M 90 mm Asph are. The only reason why it is not named "Apo-Summilux-M 50 mm Asph" is because they felt the Apo designation would look funny on a 50 mm standard lens. However what really looks funny is the flipping inscription on the new Apo-Summicron-M 50 mm Asph's front ring. I thought we left behind this ugly nonsense decades ago. Yuck! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lars_bergquist Posted May 11, 2012 Share #16 Posted May 11, 2012 No, it isn't. And apochromatic correction gets less interesting the shorter the focal length gets. CA is a serious problem only in tele lenses. The old man from the Kodachrome Age Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
01af Posted May 11, 2012 Share #17 Posted May 11, 2012 And apochromatic correction gets less interesting the shorter the focal length gets. Less interesting doesn't mean, not interesting at all. At the modern Leica lenses' level of performance, an apochromatic correction definitely is interesting enough even for standard lenses ... and in the future, possibly even for moderate wide-angle lenses. Chromatic aberration is a serious problem only in tele lenses. Not true. It's a problem in all kinds of lenses. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
IkarusJohn Posted May 11, 2012 Share #18 Posted May 11, 2012 No, it isn't. And apochromatic correction gets less interesting the shorter the focal length gets. CA is a serious problem only in tele lenses. The old man from the Kodachrome Age So the new Summicron isn't really APO? Just marketing? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
atournas Posted May 11, 2012 Author Share #19 Posted May 11, 2012 Don't forget the 75 Summicron. Thank you for correcting me. Paul Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lars_bergquist Posted May 11, 2012 Share #20 Posted May 11, 2012 There is no standard or agreed definition of 'apochromatic'. When Ernst Abbe coined the term way back then (the late 1880's I think) it was applied to microscope optics. Such an 'apochromat' focused red, green and blue to the same plane, but only on or close to the optical axis. That was enough for optical observation. A photographic apochromat obviously needs high correction over a larger field. How high? How far off axis? Every manufacturer (or maybe rather every marketing department) is free to create its own definition of the term. I understand that Leica's definition is stricter than most. Yes, most Japanese manufacturers would have been proud to stick the 'APO' apellation onto the 50mm Summilux ASPH, if they had it. Except maybe Mamiya. So the Apo-Summicron may be just inside Leica's definition, and the Summilux ASPJ just outside it. What do I know? It's for Leica to decide. The old man from the Achromatic Age Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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