Interesting LFI article

[carstenw]

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The 35 Lux Asph is one of the worst. I would not buy a copy without testing it first. The Cron Asph has had very few problems, but I would still recommend testing it. The 28 Cron has had no focus shift trouble that I can recall.

[modschiedler]

Hi Albert,

keep in mind that "problematic" is relative. First, I would presume that in most practical cases you wont’t even notice ist (we’re not talking about dejusted lenses here); second, you can always compensate for it after a bit of practice; as mentioned above, with the 35 f/1.4 Asph you simply have to shift focusing distance a tiny bit closer after having focussed with the finder.

It is a problem of (older) true high speed designs. You will mostly detect focus shift with the Noctilux, the 75 mm f/1.4, but surprisingly also the 90 mm f/2 Asph.

If you don’t need f/1.4 speed at 35 mm, then go for the 35 mm f/2 Asph; on the other hand in terms of focus shift of the 35 mm f/1.4 Asph we speak about dimensions in the micron area – so why not giving the best 35 mm f/1.4 design a chance?

At 28 mm the f/2 Asph is a very good choice, but again if you are not that interested in high speed the tiny new 28 mm f/2.8 Asph is a really nice one too and much of a bargain as well (relatively spoken of course)

[ho_co]

... I am sure that they want to see the 1Ds3 and D3x specs before committing themselves to anything...

I think this camera is already well down the planning line. Probably all the specs are firm. You're always interested in the competition, but you can't always react. With Mssrs Lee and Kaufmann in charge, I'd be surprised not to see something very soon.

 

... The 3:2/4:3 switch would be very cool, to be honest.

I agree, it's nice to have 16:9, 4:3, and 3:2 on the D-Lux 2 as well. Useful feature.

 

But there may be a contradiction here: In RAW, the sensor always records whatever hits it, and then apparently simply marks the size of the file in the EXIF data. So no matter what format you use, in the D-Lux 2 the RAW files are always the same approximate size. (With the smaller formats, JPGs are actually stored as smaller files.)

 

It'll be interesting to see what turns up. If the system is AF as we suppose, there's a certain freedom to move to a new and larger format. Larger sensor with still moderate pixel count would yield lower noise via greater pixel pitch. Current R lenses would likely work, but one might could choose to limit the sensor's imaging area (and pixel count) to the 3:2 or circular f.o.v. of those lenses.

 

I'm sure that whatever we 'invent' here, Leica will surprise us!

 

--HC