F/1.2 Noctilux Is A Real Street Lens

[johnbuckley]

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I picked up my f/1.2 Noctilux ASPH today, and spent about 30 minutes with it on a cold street under a grey and damp sky. Long ago I learned that, while some photographers may relish the prospect of taking the f/1 Noctilux or the f/0.95 Noctilux out on the street, those lenses were just too big, too noticeable for me to be comfortable doing so. But when I learned that the new/old Noctilux 1.2 was approximately the same size as the 50 Summilux, my heart soared.

But I have to say, the photos Leica used in their promotional rollout, and some of the limited number of other photos I saw wide open, made me wonder. All the images were a bit too soft in the in-focus areas. And then a few nights ago, I read Sean Reid's quite favorable writeup, and as important, saw a number of his wide-open photos, and my conclusion was, it really is a Noctiulux and, should be sharp enough!

Taking this lens out on the street today was sheer delight. I own the 75 Noctilux, and have previously owned the f/1 50, the f/0.95 50, and even a CV Nokton. None of them made me feel like I do when using a rangefinder with a 35 Summicron or 50 APO -- that is, near invisible. This one does. It is light in the hand. It is small and unobtrusive and takes the kind of images I love.

Before going further, let me say: I know there are plenty of people who don't appreciate the dramatic bokeh of the Noctilux. I get it. A steady diet of images taken with a lens as fast as a Noctilux or even a Summilux wide open can be like eating too much cake. Yet in moderation, for special circumstances, there's nothing like it, in my humble opinion. 

So here are a few pictures just to give an indication of the results from my quick outing. Everything was shot wide open, at ISO 400, under absolutely flat and cold East Coast skies.

 

 

 

 

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Edited February 11, 2021 by johnbuckley

[johnbuckley]

In this picture, the focus was on the lights in the upper right.

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[johnbuckley]

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[johnbuckley]

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[johnbuckley]

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[johnbuckley]

My conclusion is that carrying this lens on an M10 Monochrom is no different than carrying it with a 28 Summicron. So, the lens has completely passed my first test.

Is it that much different than, say, using a Summilux lens wide open? Um, I think so, yes.

Is it sharp enough wide open? I believe it is, and even when allowing for the difference between what you see in the down-rezzed images here and what I see on my monitor, I have no problem with the level of sharpness in the in-focus areas.

Is it a substitute for the current 50 Nocti 0.95 or the 75 Nocti? No. Not at all. But, I can't take them out on the streets. To be honest, I shoot my 75 Nocti almost entirely with the SL2. This lens can be used on an M10 chassis perfectly well. I did, in fact, use the Visoflex on a couple of these shots, including the one directly above.

So, my verdict is this is a Noctilux, it is a delightful street lens (for me) and I am certain I will get a lot of use out of it. Thank you, Leica, for reviving it.

Edited February 11, 2021 by johnbuckley

[g2van]

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1 hour ago, johnbuckley said:

 

So, my verdict is this is a Noctilux, it is a delightful street lens (for me) and I am certain I will get a lot of use out of it. Thank you, Leica, for reviving it.

Thank you for sharing your photos and your user experience on this special lens!

[Bo-Sixten]

10 hours ago, johnbuckley said:

My conclusion is that carrying this lens on an M10 Monochrom is no different than carrying it with a 28 Summicron. So, the lens has completely passed my first test.

Is it that much different than, say, using a Summilux lens wide open? Um, I think so, yes.

Is it sharp enough wide open? I believe it is, and even when allowing for the difference between what you see in the down-rezzed images here and what I see on my monitor, I have no problem with the level of sharpness in the in-focus areas.

Is it a substitute for the current 50 Nocti 0.95 or the 75 Nocti? No. Not at all. But, I can't take them out on the streets. To be honest, I shoot my 75 Nocti almost entirely with the SL2. This lens can be used on an M10 chassis perfectly well. I did, in fact, use the Visoflex on a couple of these shots, including the one directly above.

So, my verdict is this is a Noctilux, it is a delightful street lens (for me) and I am certain I will get a lot of use out of it. Thank you, Leica, for reviving it.

Thank you johnbukley, for your valuable and fine hands-on review with nice photos to go with it. I'm interested in this lens, and after your post even more so. I am curious to know more about a few things:

1) The sharpness at the edges seem very good - much better than the mtf curves would suggest. Is this your impression as well. How does it compare to the 0.95 and F1 in this respect? I have used these two quite a lot.

2) I was impressed that your focus on a corner detail maintained to stay in focus. Does this lens have a flatter field of focus compared to the F1. How do you see resolution, sharpness and focus vary across the the image field?

3) Did you use the rangefinder or live view to focus the corner?

4) What is your impression in terms of "modern" looking out of focus rendering compared to the non-asph F1 and asph 0.95. Does this lens lean towards one or the other in looks? Smooth or more busy?

5) Does it have any tendency to a "swirly" bokeh wide open? My earlier F1 v.4's had this. My current v.2 does not.

6) Please post your impressions using this lens on BW film. I would find that very interesting.

Thanks again for posting. Looking forward to see more from you with this lens. :))

Edited February 12, 2021 by Bo-Sixten

[TonyS]

It's really good.

But........the question is .....

How can I get one as thousands in the queue   

 

[johnbuckley]

6 hours ago, Bo-Sixten said:

Thank you johnbukley, for your valuable and fine hands-on review with nice photos to go with it. I'm interested in this lens, and after your post even more so. I am curious to know more about a few things:

1) The sharpness at the edges seem very good - much better than the mtf curves would suggest. Is this your impression as well. How does it compare to the 0.95 and F1 in this respect? I have used these two quite a lot.

2) I was impressed that your focus on a corner detail maintained to stay in focus. Does this lens have a flatter field of focus compared to the F1. How do you see resolution, sharpness and focus vary across the the image field?

3) Did you use the rangefinder or live view to focus the corner?

4) What is your impression in terms of "modern" looking out of focus rendering compared to the non-asph F1 and asph 0.95. Does this lens lean towards one or the other in looks? Smooth or more busy?

5) Does it have any tendency to a "swirly" bokeh wide open? My earlier F1 v.4's had this. My current v.2 does not.

6) Please post your impressions using this lens on BW film. I would find that very interesting.

Thanks again for posting. Looking forward to see more from you with this lens. :))

Hi Bo-Sixteen -- I'll try answering your questions, though admittedly, I have a small data set of photos to work from. And let me make an observation about how I process B+W images, and what my small experiment was designed to do. (I'll note also that it is horrifically grey and cold today, and tomorrow is supposed to have an ice storm, so it may be a few days before I get out with camera and lens again.)

I tend to apply a great deal of contrast and lower highlights when processing B+W -- I like a fairly "muddy" look, so some of that is coming across in these images. But that shouldn't hide the two most important things to me, which is in-focus areas being actually in-focus, and the bokeh pleasing, and I think both apply to this lens.

What I was most interested in yesterday was how the in-focus areas rendered wide open, and i was pleasantly surprised. It is nothing at all like the 50 APO, which I use, and which has, as you know, razor sharp rendering of the in-focus area, which renders the accompanying bokeh interesting less because of its swirls and creaminess and more because of its contrast against the in-focus area. It is not really like like the 0.95 50 or my 75 f/1.25, both of which have a sharp in-focus rendering and a very smooth, astonishing bokeh. I think this lens behaves much more like my old f/1 Noctilux, which I found pleasingly soft in-focus and in the corners, and difficult to use because I was newer to rangefinders and had a harder time focusing.

My instinct is that the pictures I've seen posted online of the 1.2's rendering wide open have been the result of shooting using the optical viewfinder, and some of what has seemed "soft" in the in-focus area is actually a bit of mis-focus. So yes, in the image showing the chandelier/globe lights in the upper right corner in sharp focus (and the cushions below somewhat captured in that same focal plane), I used the Visoflex. To me the image has sharp focus in the in-focus area, nice drop off elsewhere and pretty sharp corners! Which tells me this is a really high quality lens if used right, and it's possible that it requires, on an M -- film or digital - either the Visoflex or eyes that are younger than mine to capture the image. Can you use the Visoflex on the street? I'd say absolutely, though it's not as natural a process as using the optical viewfinder.

It has been some years since I've used the f/1 Noctilux, which I sold because, in those early days of the M8 and M9, I found it too cumbersome and difficult to use. It was "soft", but much of that was user error. My fear was the new 1.2 washing to be soft, but I don't think it is, provided focus is correct, and that can be aided by the Visoflex. One note: because the focusing distance is 3.4 feet, a fair amount of the time yesterday I found that I was focusing right at the edge of that distance, which of course leads to imprecision because the body sways slightly to keep it in focus right at the moment the shutter is triggered. Better to step back so you have some margin for error based on focus, not body position, if you know what I mean.

"Swirly" bokeh will be explored when I take it out at night. What I saw from the Leica video they put out a few weeks ago with images taken in Brooklyn at dusk is that, yes, there is swirly bokeh around lights. I haven't checked that out yet, but I believe it is, in this regard, a true Noctilux.  I hope this response helps. I'm going to post one more image to make a point about using your eyes vs. the Visoflex to focus.

 

[johnbuckley]

In this image, which is taken at the edge of a large sidewalk sculpture, I focused through the optical viewfinder on the outward point/edge of the sculpture. That's an easy thing to do with the unaided eye, and while this is a fairly crappy picture, it does show: in-focus area actually in focus, and out-of-focus area with a pretty classic Leica Noctilux look,

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[tommydom]

Great write up, John.

I look forward to more of your work!

Tommy.

[Bo-Sixten]

2 hours ago, johnbuckley said:

In this image, which is taken at the edge of a large sidewalk sculpture, I focused through the optical viewfinder on the outward point/edge of the sculpture. That's an easy thing to do with the unaided eye, and while this is a fairly crappy picture, it does show: in-focus area actually in focus, and out-of-focus area with a pretty classic Leica Noctilux look,

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Thank you so much John for your elaborate answer. Your answers sound very promising. I agree very much with your comment on in-focus sharpness, which both the F1 and 0.95 have, but could be so difficult to succeed with given the wide aperture and very much depending on your calibration and way you focus. I like the rendering in this photo very much. Bokeh is of course a matter of taste, but I find these smooth transitions and yet a bit busy backgrounds very lively and "realistic". 

Look very much forward to the continuation of your work with this lens. Like your home page photos a lot too, by the way. Cheers. :))

[johnbuckley]

Thank you so much!

[T25UFO]

17 hours ago, johnbuckley said:

Thank you so much!

John,

Thank you for an excellent set of photos showcasing what this lens is capable of producing.  I am waiting for mine to arrive and will use it on the M10M and SL2.  I do not have the Visoflex so focusing wide open on the M10M will probably be a challenge.  My lens may see more use on the SL2, but always interesting to experiment.

Thanks also for taking the time to write such a detailed summary.  Very helpful for me and I'm sure it will greatly assist other forum members who are thinking about purchasing this lens.

[johnbuckley]

Not trying to prolong a thread, but the freezing rain finally stopped and I was able to get out in the streets for some street photography with the new Noctilux. This lens is a delight. The camera feels in the hand like you are carrying an M with any Summilux and Summicron. And yet it behaves like a true Nocti.

 

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[johnbuckley]

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[johnbuckley]

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[johnbuckley]

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[Bo-Sixten]

7 hours ago, johnbuckley said:

Not trying to prolong a thread, but the freezing rain finally stopped and I was able to get out in the streets for some street photography with the new Noctilux. This lens is a delight. The camera feels in the hand like you are carrying an M with any Summilux and Summicron. And yet it behaves like a true Nocti.

 

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Thanks John for coming back with more photos and comments. I find these photos valuable because they show some of the lens characteristics that are not so evident in more staged photos and reviews. 

1) You seem to have nailed the focus very well. Did you use RF or Visoflex to do this?

2) Are all taken at 1.2? The edge sharpness is pretty good. Looks better than F1.

3) There is very little vignetting. Did you compensate in PP or is this the look at 1.2?

4) I agree with your comment on Noctilux look. There is a clear object separation even at larger distances. You can have this with e.g a 1.4 Lx ASPH as well but with a different look.

Thanks again for posting and please send more samples when you find the time. :))