3 months of M240 - am I keeping it?

[tashley]

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Tim, thanks much for your terrific insights. You're a wonderful, natural writer and it is a deep pleasure to read your reviews.

 

I don't suppose you have the 50 APO on order, do you? I'd love to hear your thoughts on it...

 

 

Thank you so much for the very kind words!

 

I was tempted by the APO but on balance I won't be getting one: I already have two 50's and love them both in different ways but it isn't a focal length I shoot often. If there were, say a 24 or 28 or 35 I might. But I may try to get a review copy from Leica because I am very interested by the question of focus shift: some people see it as a deal-breaker and some seem totally unafflicted. Hmmmm...

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[k-hawinkler]

Hi Tim,

 

I still wonder what would be an optimal strategy to accomplish best focusing with the EVF on the M?

[tashley]

Hi Tim,

 

I still wonder what would be an optimal strategy to accomplish best focusing with the EVF on the M?

 

It would vary per lens. I'd get a lens align target or similar at first, and check there's no focus shift. Then I'd see where in the wide open DOF, such as it is, best focus seems to be. I'd then try the technique of focusing thereafter with the EVF accordingly. For example if that lens, when focused wide open with the RF, tends to place focus close to the front of the DOF then I'd focus the EVF by coming from near to far on the focus ring and stopping at 'first shimmer'. This assumes I want the EVF to mimic the placement of the field of focus achieved by the RF, which might not be true.

 

But if I wanted, for example, best focus on a central subject I would simply make sure that I focussed the EVF either wide open or just a stop closed (for lenses that are a bit 'milky' wide open) and then stop to my shooting aperture before triggering the shutter...

 

In other words, 'best' is subjective, determined by your needs for that shot, and the method might vary...

[billo101]

The RX1 also has its niche purposes and I continue to carry it from time to time

 

WOW!

 

b

[billo101]

The 35mm F1.4 Lux FLE has an odd, unpredictable and inconsistent shape to its curved and wavy field of focus such that F5.6 or even F8 can be required to get a planar subject sharp to the edges, even when very skilfully focussed. Bokeh is nervy, OOF areas a little hectic. Technically, I would rather use the Sony RX-1/Zeiss combination or the D800 with a good copy of the Sigma 35mm F1.4 Art lens. Creatively, however, the 35 Lux has a beautiful look and lovely clarity. Overall, a great lens but not reason enough in itself to stick with the M system.

 

Are you sure?

 

b

[tashley]

The 35mm F1.4 Lux FLE has an odd, unpredictable and inconsistent shape to its curved and wavy field of focus such that F5.6 or even F8 can be required to get a planar subject sharp to the edges, even when very skilfully focussed. Bokeh is nervy, OOF areas a little hectic. Technically, I would rather use the Sony RX-1/Zeiss combination or the D800 with a good copy of the Sigma 35mm F1.4 Art lens. Creatively, however, the 35 Lux has a beautiful look and lovely clarity. Overall, a great lens but not reason enough in itself to stick with the M system.

 

Are you sure?

 

b

 

I think I am.

[Paul J]

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The 35mm F1.4 Lux FLE has an odd, unpredictable and inconsistent shape to its curved and wavy field of focus such that F5.6 or even F8 can be required to get a planar subject sharp to the edges, even when very skilfully focussed. Bokeh is nervy, OOF areas a little hectic.

 

It's also impossibly beautiful, incredibly sharp at the plane of focus and has stunning colour and contrast. Apart form the untoward diffraction at f16 I think this lens is beyond remarkable and the curvy field has never been a real problem for me.

[k-hawinkler]

I have the non-FLE version, has substantial focus shift, but produces great IQ.

Mine is adjusted to be spot on for f/1.4.

How do folks focus that lens on the M for the f/2 to f/4 range?

With RF or EVF?

[gpwhite]

I was tempted by the APO but on balance I won't be getting one: I already have two 50's and love them both in different ways but it isn't a focal length I shoot often. If there were, say a 24 or 28 or 35 I might. But I may try to get a review copy from Leica because I am very interested by the question of focus shift: some people see it as a deal-breaker and some seem totally unafflicted. Hmmmm...

 

Tim, from the comments I have read by Peter Karbe, plus my own experience with the 50 AA, I don't imagine that we will see a wider lens with the remarkable rendering of organic shapes like the 50 AA (i.e., lack of any distortion). I too would love a 28mm f/2 of the quality of the 50 AA.

 

My 50 AA was from the first (January) batch shipped into USA. I have not experienced focus shift with my lens along the lines of 35 FLE or 50 SX ASPH, where it is maddening. I do notice a forward flop in the DOF at f/2, which is my preferred aperture, that moves to being typically backward leaning by f/2.8 or 3.4.... maybe some consider this evidence of focus shift, but I find that my focus point does not move-- it is just the flop of the DOF that moves. In any case, I find the effect very pleasing because it heightens subject/context separation.

 

I have read a number of posts that reject the 50 AA as having a "transparent" signature and, therefore, producing boring images. Well, I must have Karbe-itis because I think the lens is uniquely smooth and lovely at f/2 on both M9 and M240. [However, having looked carefully at beautiful work from the "lens signature" crowd, I have reserved rental of a Noctilux 0.95 to try one in my hands.] I would be interested to read your review, if you get a tester... who knows, you may keep it after 3 months:o.

 

Peter

[tashley]

Peter, you've whetted my appetite - I will try to get hold of one. I too don't mind a little focus shift as long as the POF remains within the DOF. And I also have a lot of lenses with 'character' (whether I want it or not!) and truly value very accurate, neutral lenses for some classes of work. Thanks for the heads up!

 

Tim, from the comments I have read by Peter Karbe, plus my own experience with the 50 AA, I don't imagine that we will see a wider lens with the remarkable rendering of organic shapes like the 50 AA (i.e., lack of any distortion). I too would love a 28mm f/2 of the quality of the 50 AA.

 

My 50 AA was from the first (January) batch shipped into USA. I have not experienced focus shift with my lens along the lines of 35 FLE or 50 SX ASPH, where it is maddening. I do notice a forward flop in the DOF at f/2, which is my preferred aperture, that moves to being typically backward leaning by f/2.8 or 3.4.... maybe some consider this evidence of focus shift, but I find that my focus point does not move-- it is just the flop of the DOF that moves. In any case, I find the effect very pleasing because it heightens subject/context separation.

 

I have read a number of posts that reject the 50 AA as having a "transparent" signature and, therefore, producing boring images. Well, I must have Karbe-itis because I think the lens is uniquely smooth and lovely at f/2 on both M9 and M240. [However, having looked carefully at beautiful work from the "lens signature" crowd, I have reserved rental of a Noctilux 0.95 to try one in my hands.] I would be interested to read your review, if you get a tester... who knows, you may keep it after 3 months:o.

 

Peter

[tashley]

I have the non-FLE version, has substantial focus shift, but produces great IQ.

Mine is adjusted to be spot on for f/1.4.

How do folks focus that lens on the M for the f/2 to f/4 range?

With RF or EVF?

 

I had two or three copies of that lens and they all had the famous focus shift - so much so that the POF fell out of the DOF as you stopped down. It was otherwise brilliant.

 

I hear that the chrome ones are less affected. But given that you know that yours is affected I would use the EVF to focus it. That will cure the focus shift problem but it won't necessarily place the focus field where you want it - that will only come through experimentation. There is a simple method:

 

Find a planar subject at a focus distance that represents your most used distance. Square up to it as perfectly as you can. Make sure there's a really good focus target on it exactly on centre. Focus it at your favourite aperture using the EVF, three times: coming from near to far on the barrel, first shot at 'first shimmer', then at 'max shimmer' then at 'last shimmer'.

 

See which one gives you the best average focus across the entire planar target. You can then test whether that works at other favoured apertures and focus distances but largely, you will have your method....

[algrove]

I love the rendering of my APO 50 and nothing that I can see, even a flop which I can't see on mine so far, will deter me from using it regularly on my M and MM. Frankly, this lens has gotten me back into liking the 50mm FL again as I have been mostly a 35 and/or 28 guy recently. That says a lot to me about this lens.

 

APO 50 images have been posted here and on Reddot Forum. Check out the Dry Tortugas brick arches of Fort Jefferson comparison versus the S + Macro 120 step focused while the APO 50 is a single f8 shot in order to safely get the 75 meters depth wanted.

[douglasf13]

Douglas, let me try to explain what I mean but I caution that the best way, if you have the time, is to read my review of the 35FLE (especially the part added on April 13th) and my article on How to Focus a Tricky Lens.

 

In short:

Many (most?) cameras that use contrast detect AF (which is in effect an automated version of what you do when you use the 'shimmer' on the M240 EVF) do their focussing full open and then stop down for the exposure. This is because, at stopped down apertures, the DOF can be too great to focus accurately due to the ambiguous number of depths into the scene at which elements can appear to have good edge contrast.

 

Clearly M240 users don't have Auto AF or Auto Aperture so both these things must be done manually but the same logic follows, and you will experience less ambiguity as to the correct placement of focus for a centrally located subject if you focus wide open using Live View.

 

They key phrase here is 'for a centrally located subject' because, for many shots, the subject is either not located centrally or is larger than the central region.

 

Let us assume this subject is planar, and fills the entire frame. Say, you are on a cherry picker ten meters in the air and ten meters from a very very large wall that fills the frame. Let us assume initially that there is a sign in the middle of the wall and that you want to accurately capture the lettering on it. In this case, the EVF will always give you a good result though you might still get slightly better sharpness if focussed wide open, as long as the lens has no focus shift at all. If it has some focus shift and you are shooting apertures smaller than maximum but less than about F5.6 then you will generally be better focussing at shooting aperture. Of course this depends on subject distance, focal length etc etc. and will vary per lens and shooting situation.

 

But all this refers to the case where you want the sign lettering in focus and the rest of the wall doesn't matter. But what if the sign is off centre and you want to avoid the possibility of cosine error in focus and recompose? Or what if you want the entire wall in focus? Maybe you've been paid to do an architectural shoot of a brave new building for a glossy double spread page in a book. Something similar happened to me recently.

 

In this case, it doesn't just matter where the point of central focus is placed: it matters where the entire zone of good focus is placed. If that zone is curved or wavy, then there is the possibility that you can place focus at, for example, two different places, both of which satisfy the Circle of Confusion requirements for your output on centre but only one of which positions the entire focus zone so as to capture the entire wall sharply.

 

Here is an idealised example showing a lens with a wavy field of focus at, say, F5.6. Both points of central focus will get your sign in great resolution but only one will get the whole wall in focus.

 

This field shape can be curved, wavy, cone shaped, and it can face forwards or backwards and it might vary its shape with aperture, subject distance and even at different cross sectional heights into the frame. Depending an all shooting parameters there may or may not be a focus setting on the lens that can get the entire wall sharp enough for your needs: but if there is such a setting, then you are less likely to find it by focussing stopped down because of the number of possible 'depths' into the field that can look good in magnified view on centre. Overall, you might find that you are tending to 'home in' on best shimmer, which will tend to place the POF bang in the middle of the zone of good focus. That might or might not suit the field shape of the lens.

 

Live View knows only one thing: is the contrast of edges high enough to activate the shimmer? It has no idea about the lens and its other characteristics, not does it know the aperture or shooting distance. Whereas the properly calibrated rangefinder has more information. It knows (via the shape of the lens cam) for example, the exact shooting distance. It also knows in general where the filed of best focus is placed at different shooting distances though it would ideally like to know more, such as the shooting aperture.

 

But it does seem from my investigations that it knows 'enough'. Time and time again, with a variety of lenses, I have found that careful RF focus will not only get the central subject sharp but will do a better job of placing the entire zone of best focus. Shooting the same planar scenes with stopped down EVF focus is much, much more hit and miss. Shooting again with wide open EVF focus is damned nearly as good as focussing with the RF but is more fiddly because of the need to constantly be changing aperture.

 

As I say this is an idealised argument to show the principles - many steps, caveats and exceptions are left out for brevity. But in general, it explains the situation.

 

Of course, focus shift throws all this out the window. I long ago winnowed from my collection all lenses that had serious focus shift (other than the F1 Noctilux) because a RF simply cannot focus them reliably because it doesn't know the aperture. But it has become very clear to me that the RF on the M240 is capable in a way that the M8 and 9 were not. Not only does it not 'drift' (so far!) over time but it also gives me consistent performance across all my lenses. It is as if the cam shape in each lens is brilliantly designed, but the previous version of the RF could not understand what each individual cam was saying all the time. For my current collection of lenses, the RF in the M240 pretty much can!

 

This stuff afflicts SLR users quite badly. Many of the lenses that D800 users use can appear actively faulty in that they cannot resolve the edges of a simple landscape well even at F5.6 and this has led to a lot of people returning perfectly good copies of, for example, the 28mm F1.8g which is in fact a very nice lens if focussed correctly. This is particularly daft because actually the D800 knows everything: shooting distance, wide open AF best placement, aperture... but it doesn't have the smarts to compare these parameters to an internal lookup table containing information about the field characteristics of the lens and jiggle its focus accordingly.

 

Of course, this can only ever help if the subject is all at a uniform distance. For most subject shapes, it is down to the photographer to know the field shape of his/her lens and to shoot according to how it maps onto the shape of the subject field. I, for example, would always use the 28mm F1.8g Nikkor if I wanted to shot an alley of trees because it has a cone-shaped zone of best focus.

 

HTH!

Tim

 

Tim, I'm aware of field curvature and everything else you mention (and I've read your articles.) I still sounds like it just comes down to poor implementation of live view in the M240. Even stopped down to f8, one should be able to tell the exact point of sharpness of a lens with magnification and peaking enabled. I've done it quite a bit with other cameras. Of course, being able to move around the magnified focus point would also let you check your work.

 

I would definitely pick a rangefinder in any kind of dynamic situation, but, if we're talking static situations, a good live view situation should guarantee perfect focusing.

 

I'm still not sure how a rangefinder would be aware of the different field curvatures and focus shifts that occur across different lenses (assuming they're calibration is also perfect.) Focus and recompose is another issue, unless the field curvature of a lens just so happens to compensate for it.

[k-hawinkler]

On a tripod and a static subject 10x magnification seems to give a better indication than focus peaking.

Certainly for my NEX-7 and OM-D E-M5.

I can even get hummingbirds focused that way with manual only Leica lenses.

As I don't have my M yet, of course, I can't speak to that camera.

[120]

...

post 44, I don't think you mean "image space".

 

Again, the cams are an artifact of having interchangeable lenses of different focal lengths. Someone pointed out that some of them are ground piecewise and not a careful curve; so they would be lucky to do their intended purpose, much less anything else.

[algrove]

On a tripod and a static subject 10x magnification seems to give a better indication than focus peaking.

Certainly for my NEX-7 and OM-D E-M5.

I can even get hummingbirds focused that way with manual only Leica lenses.

As I don't have my M yet, of course, I can't speak to that camera.

 

To me with both my M's using 1x, 5x or 10x via LV on the LCD or in the EVF is focus peaking. Once you get your M you will better understand what I am saying.

[k-hawinkler]

To me with both my M's using 1x, 5x or 10x via LV on the LCD or in the EVF is focus peaking. Once you get your M you will better understand what I am saying.

 

Would you mind please explaining the highlighted part?

You certainly have aroused my curiosity!

Thanks.

[120]

However much you fiddle with the roller adjustments, it boils down to a shaft going up into the top of the camera from the lens throat. There, a cam is used to set the position of the telescope which projects the rangefinder patch image into the frames. Turn the shaft and the patch moves with a precise definition of the shaft position - coincident distance relationship.

 

In the earliest days, the roller used to simply press against the back of the lens barrel so that relationship is based around the classic 1/U + 1/V = 1/F equation, to a first approximation anyway. The roller and its adjustments translate the image distance into the required shaft rotation.

 

When the M8 came out, the lens mount was moved forwards by a few mm to create space for what must sit behind the shutter and a conversation I had with someone from Leica at Photokina in 2006 told me the roller pivot point had to move forwards as well and it had been a real problem re-establishing the correct mapping of shaft position to coincident distance.

 

One possible reason for the improved rangefinder (and I still maintain the shallower sensor helps here) is that they have revisited the problem, come up with a better way and restored the correct mapping with greater latitude across the range. Makes me wonder how things will be for those who have had their lenses calibrated to a particular camera.

 

I tried to do a thread on a related subject. It seems like the Leica rangefinder has always been the same thing--two lever arms and a cam. I am assuming that is a cam in the II/III that Leica just calls a shaft (achse)? I have not seen the camera taken apart in person. (Talking about the cam in the rangefinder now...cams on the back of lenses were first added when?)

 

If one had to redo the rangefinder, it is simple to get some lengths for the two levers, some pivot points, and a cam shape. The only complicated part I think is confirming the standard. I am thinking the standard for roller travel is either the extension of a "50" mm lens, or it is making the travel linear with the turning angle of the other lever. The extension of the lens seems natural, but I have heard it's the other one. Help with sources, anyone?

 

So far I have not heard anything about a new rangefinder in the 240 camera. No details, no pictures, no statement from Leica, no part numbers, etc., so I am assuming so far it is the old rangefinder.

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[algrove]

K-H

 

Sure, first start by reading the M Manual p178-Focus Peaking Procedure.(FP) You can download it or go to your dealer to read it in person.

 

It should be quite clear after that except for the word trimming which is some crazy translation from German. Some of us assume trimming means select the portion of the image you want to magnify. Some others think it means the magnification level of 1x, 5x or 10x. It probably is the former as the manual continues on to say "All subject details that are in focus at the set range are indicated by red outlines." The set range must surely be the focus plane.

 

Also p 177 talks about using the zoom factor with LV active. As soon as LV is called up you automatically have 1x magnification unless you used it previously. I that case it will remember the last magnification level you used, i.e., 1x, 5x or 10x of the central detail.

 

You can use manual focus assist by pressing the #3 button or Automatic set to On where it will magnify and turn on FP whenever you turn the focus knob of any M lens, but not R lenses which must be used with the #3 button in order to activate FP and any magnification level.

 

Words are far more complex than just using it. Trust this helps.

[Peter Branch]

........So far I have not heard anything about a new rangefinder in the 240 camera. No details, no pictures, no statement from Leica, no part numbers, etc., so I am assuming so far it is the old rangefinder.

 

Except that Stefan Daniel has quite clearly stated that it is not the same as previous rangefinders. He should know. Quite what the differences are is not known and one could speculate for a long time. What I know is that the rangefinder in the M240 is much better than any previous rangefinder. It is easier to use and all my tests show conclusively that it is more accurate in normal use.

 

I can't comment about an M240 being used with wideangle lenses at f2 when photographing planar subjects; something which over the years Leica has repeatedly pointed out is not what they design their lenses to do because it would involve too many compromises with other more desirable attributes.