Sean Reid - 4 50mm L- lenses on SL/SL2/S1R

[Ivar B]

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In case there are someone who does not subscribe to Sean Reids reviews - I higly recommend doing so and he just published an interesting and very thorough review of Leica SL 1.4/50, 2/50, Sigma Art 1.4/50 and Panasonic S 1.4/50 on Leica SL, SL2 and Panasonic S1R. I don`t want to undermine his source of income by replicating his findings here - but it is a very interesting read. 

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[RoySmith]

I was surprised at how much barrel distortion the Leica L 50mm lux has before SDC. I thought a lens this large would have better optical correction. Still I like the images my copy produces. The 50mm Summicron is impressive.

[darylgo]

2 hours ago, Ivar B said:

I don`t want to undermine his source of income by replicating his findings here - but it is a very interesting read. 

Having no intention of purchasing any of the lenses the lengthy post of 25 pages is beyond thorough and of general interest to see where the state of art in lens making is today. I was rather surprised at his findings with one particular lens. The other take away of interest are the baked in software corrections commonly seen today. 

[Ivar B]

3 hours ago, RoySmith said:

I was surprised at how much barrel distortion the Leica L 50mm lux has before SDC. I thought a lens this large would have better optical correction. Still I like the images my copy produces. The 50mm Summicron is impressive.

I think that barrel distortion is something which is relatively easy to correct with lens firmware, so designers leave it be so they can concentrate on other issues. I believe Sigma argued among the same lines when they introduced the new Art DG DN 1.4/85mm. Like you say yourself, it was also pointed out that the Summilux draws very nicely and some buy it for that reason. 

[scott kirkpatrick]

I subscribe to Sean's site but wish he didn't obsess so strongly on the subject of software corrections to the things that can actually be corrected more precisely digitally (once the r, g, and b signals have been separated) than optically.  

[Slender]

Don't worry, be happy.... Leica never made a bad 50.

[Brian Puccio]

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A great review. I can sympathize with what lenses do without software correction because I may one day want to use it on a camera that cannot apply it.

 

I do wish a 50mm M lens was thrown in for good measure.

[frame-it]

On 1/18/2021 at 10:09 PM, RoySmith said:

I was surprised at how much barrel distortion the Leica L 50mm lux has before SDC. I thought a lens this large would have better optical correction. Still I like the images my copy produces. The 50mm Summicron is impressive.

plenty of data here :

 

 

 

 

 

[SrMi]

27 minutes ago, Brian Puccio said:

A great review. I can sympathize with what lenses do without software correction because I may one day want to use it on a camera that cannot apply it.

 

I do wish a 50mm M lens was thrown in for good measure.

To clarify: the cameras write op-codes in the raw files that instruct post-processing software on the computer how to apply software correction.

[Brian Puccio]

2 hours ago, SrMi said:

To clarify: the cameras write op-codes in the raw files that instruct post-processing software on the computer how to apply software correction.

Are those open specifications that anyone can implement? Or are developers who aren’t partners with Leica, et al left to reverse engineer them?

EDIT: I’ve answered my own question: https://www.adobe.com/content/dam/acom/en/products/photoshop/pdfs/dng_spec_1.4.0.0.pdf

Edited January 19, 2021 by Brian Puccio

[SrMi]

1 minute ago, Brian Puccio said:

Are those open specifications that anyone can implement? Or are developers who aren’t partners with Leica, et al left to reverse engineer them?

I do not know, but it would be very easy to reverse engineer SDC as the op-codes are extractable from the DNG files.

Only cameras of L-mount alliance can mount L-lenses (Sigma, Panasonic, Leica).  Where else would you mount an L-mount lens? BTW, Nikon is using a similar approach for its Z line.

[jackbaty]

I used to subscribe to Reid Reviews but I have this nervous habit of just randomly double-clicking and selecting text while I read web articles. I wasn't trying to copy/paste his content, but it got me inadvertently banned twice because of his draconian anti-copy system. I gave up after that. I am almost interested enough in this new series of articles to try again. If he'll let me back in!