Leica SL 21,.. plz

[RoySmith]

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5 hours ago, Jeff S said:

The same can be accomplished using any of the Peak Design straps, without need for an L-bracket, by attaching the second connector to the small plate provided to mount on the camera base.

Jeff

Yes any plate attached to the bottom of the camera works - and any strap attached to opposite corners of the camera.

It’s especially nice with a long enough strap to carry it cross body.  

Edited October 30, 2022 by RoySmith

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[Jeff S]

1 minute ago, RoySmith said:

Yes any plate attached to the bottom of the camera works - any any strap attached to opposite corners of the camera.

It’s especially nice with a long enough strap to carry it cross body.  

I like the PD Leash for its compactness/lightness (yet robustness) and flexibility to adjust length quickly (including cross shoulder) and to either change connection points or completely remove.

Jeff

[robb]

Can we get back to the 21mm discussion on this thread?  
 

lots of other space in the section for new topics.

Robb

[helged]

2 hours ago, robb said:

Can we get back to the 21mm discussion on this thread?  
 

lots of other space in the section for new topics.

Robb

An honest, Leica sate-of-the-art: https://www.macfilos.com/2022/10/18/leicas-stefan-daniel-on-the-retirement-of-the-leica-cl-and-some-hints-for-the-future/

[BernardC]

9 hours ago, jplomley said:

Wonder how this 21mm will perform stopped down for landscape applications? What I have found to be problematic with the APO SC's is that they lose resolution when stopped down to around f/8.0, the aperture I most commonly use when focus stacking.

That's diffraction, and it is a physical law for any optic. To make a long story short, there is a minimum resolved point size at any aperture, based on the proportion of light rays that are bent around the physical aperture, and that effect starts to become noticeable around 5.6 with 35mm-format cameras. As you've noticed, you get an extra stop with medium format cameras, but you need the extra stop to match the depth of field, so it's an illusory gain.

The irony is that you'll notice the phenomenon more with sharper lenses. A softer lens might not be "diffraction-limited" until f:11 or even f:16, but a truly great lens will start to look slightly softer after 4.0. It's still much sharper than the softer lens, but it is not at its absolute peak.

[Jeff S]

1 hour ago, BernardC said:

 As you've noticed, you get an extra stop with medium format cameras, but you need the extra stop to match the depth of field, so it's an illusory gain.

 

Exactly, and of course even smaller apertures required for large format landscape applications, especially when printing very large.  
 

Jeff

[Stuart Richardson]

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Yes, I was coming in to mention this as well...I started to write it late last night and rapidly became catatonic as I figured out how best to word it. I am glad Bernard came in and made it intelligible. This is why most smart phones default to an aperture wider than f4, as the pixels are so small that they require large apertures to limit diffraction, and for the same reason that f32 looks very sharp on 8x10 and would be total mush on 35mm. That said, if you took a 35mm sized crop from that 8x10 shot at f32, it would still look super soft. Diffraction is fixed, but sensor size and magnification ratio are not. As others said, if you took a hypothetical SL Summicron at f11, it would still be as sharp or sharper than a zoom lens at the same aperture, just that it would keep getting better down to f4 or less.

That said, there are certain other things that come into play, such as field curvature and other lens aberrations, but for the most part it is not a function of the zoom lens design that they get better when stopped down...they are just worse to start with and get to "good", while the APO Summicrons start out fantastic and then degrade down to "good" due to the laws of physics.

Edited October 30, 2022 by Stuart Richardson

[MediaFotografie]

here 

the two Leica employees talk about the 21SL, it should appear very soon (at 55 min)

[helged]

Anyone with info to share regarding the release of SL21? 

[cheekz4dayz]

14 hours ago, helged said:

Anyone with info to share regarding the release of SL21? 

I don't have any info either but I'd love to see this lens. Hope Leica is reading this 🤓

[Virob]

It will have been 24+ months since the 28mm APO was officially released. Leica have definitely slowed down the release of their own lens designs for the SL system. There is a rumour of a Leica announcement for mid April. Do we dare to hope it will be the 21mm APO?

[LeicaR10]

Vrob,  I was told "definitely" mid-April, now was told, back to long-term on the date.  Who knows?...Only Leica.  Most likely when the Leica bakery says its ready, then its ready, not before.  I am disappointed as many others with the slow roll out of the remaining SL Apo prime(s).  r/ Mark

Edited April 2, 2023 by LeicaR10

[Virob]

13 hours ago, LeicaR10 said:

Vrob,  I was told "definitely" mid-April, now was told, back to long-term on the date.  Who knows?...Only Leica.  Most likely when the Leica bakery says its ready, then its ready, not before.  I am disappointed as many others with the slow roll out of the remaining SL Apo prime(s).  r/ Mark

Thanks @LeicaR10. Not encouraging news. I realize these are all rumours and it is dangerous to read too much into them. Since  the 21 was first announced by Leica 5 years ago, there have been multiple rumours or leaks, that it is coming “soon”. I try to picture what that means. The design was basically set back in 2018. When a lens gets released, does that mean the design and production run have been finalized and manufacturing is going to start, or does it mean that production has already started and inventory is about ready for shipment?  Seems like when Leica announces a new release from their Solms factory, it takes a couple months before it is on the market. This seems different from lens produced in Portugal or Japan, which are available almost immediately. 
So, I imagine that for this lens, other that a few prototypes and test units, there would be little inventory available initially. Considering the low sales volume and high cost of maintaining inventory, this doesn’t sound unreasonable.
 

It is also hard to imagine that the actual design is changing after all this time, so what is the likely hold up?

1 Not a Leica priority? with recent sales, stocks on APO primes are generally low. My understanding is all these lenses are produced on the same (slow) assembly line, so priority could given to replenish stocks on current production lenses.

2 Lack of critical parts? Most of the housing, mechanical and electronic parts are shared among all the APO primes. The 21 would have unique lens elements, some of these glass types could be difficult to source or manufacture. If there is a bad lens element batch it could take months to redo which can hold up production of the entire lens.
Years ago, I was visiting the Zeiss factory and it was explained to me how it can take a year or more of stepwise cooling and vibration to eliminate air bubbles in certain types of glass. That some glass formulas were so complex, it was impossible to predict the exact final composition and that for curtain, limited production lenses, the lens elements are first made, the properties accurately measured, and based on those measurements the lens design tweaks finalized. Maybe Leica is having a similar problem. Isn’t this the first ultra wide APO lens? It might be harder to make then expected.

Any other ideas?

 

 

[LeicaR10]

Virob,  Leica has learned from its past errors of new product annoucement with months (year + like the S3) more of waiting.  The Wetzlar factory increased in size by 2X and its Portugal factory builds a lot of the parts or assembles some lens there like the new SL 35/50 Asphs.  The way it works for the most part Leica develops product often in parallel with other products.  Once it passes prototype development and testing by users such as Jono Slack and others, it takes the feedback and refines the prototype.  Once Wetzlar says its ready for actual fielding, it sends out to their agents like Leica USA that goes to their dealers and gets an idea how many product the stores want/need.  Often the dealer stock requirement outstrips production capability.  Remember, most of the new Leica products especially the new lenses require very high precision and assembly.  The very highly skilled factory technicians need to learn how best to assemble the new product too.  Remember too, Leica products are hand made, not mass produced.  Like fine wine, it takes time.  Leica then announces product availability based on initial production start up and numbers and ship them to their country agents for distribution and sale. As you can imagine this takes a tremendous amount of planning, coordination, production, etc..  Leica does not want to throw a product over the fence and then find it has issues as it has in the past products, i.e. 50 Apo Summicron, 35 Apo Summicron, M cameras etc.  You can't test everything and find it fault free especially with software/firmware.  I am not defending Leica, but this is basically how its done today.  It could well be Leica is withholding the SL 21 because it may have found a fault.  Rather than sell product that will come back for repair or replacement, fix the issue before giving the green light.  I can't think of any Apo lenses at 21mm out there.  Maybe there are some, I don't know, don't care. But if I were Leica, if the new product isn't ready for show time, then its best to hold off until it is ready.  Hence Leica says nothing about pre-release on anything anymore.  I am certain Wetzlar is doing its best to get this right.  In the meantime, I personally will keep using the 21 SEM for my SL2.  It works just fine.  Hope this helps.  r/ Mark

[beewee]

11 hours ago, Virob said:

Thanks @LeicaR10. Not encouraging news. I realize these are all rumours and it is dangerous to read too much into them. Since  the 21 was first announced by Leica 5 years ago, there have been multiple rumours or leaks, that it is coming “soon”. I try to picture what that means. The design was basically set back in 2018. When a lens gets released, does that mean the design and production run have been finalized and manufacturing is going to start, or does it mean that production has already started and inventory is about ready for shipment?  Seems like when Leica announces a new release from their Solms factory, it takes a couple months before it is on the market. This seems different from lens produced in Portugal or Japan, which are available almost immediately. 
So, I imagine that for this lens, other that a few prototypes and test units, there would be little inventory available initially. Considering the low sales volume and high cost of maintaining inventory, this doesn’t sound unreasonable.
 

It is also hard to imagine that the actual design is changing after all this time, so what is the likely hold up?

1 Not a Leica priority? with recent sales, stocks on APO primes are generally low. My understanding is all these lenses are produced on the same (slow) assembly line, so priority could given to replenish stocks on current production lenses.

2 Lack of critical parts? Most of the housing, mechanical and electronic parts are shared among all the APO primes. The 21 would have unique lens elements, some of these glass types could be difficult to source or manufacture. If there is a bad lens element batch it could take months to redo which can hold up production of the entire lens.
Years ago, I was visiting the Zeiss factory and it was explained to me how it can take a year or more of stepwise cooling and vibration to eliminate air bubbles in certain types of glass. That some glass formulas were so complex, it was impossible to predict the exact final composition and that for curtain, limited production lenses, the lens elements are first made, the properties accurately measured, and based on those measurements the lens design tweaks finalized. Maybe Leica is having a similar problem. Isn’t this the first ultra wide APO lens? It might be harder to make then expected.

Any other ideas?

 

 

The APO SL lenses (21/24) were never been released. They were shown on a product roadmap in 2018. Roadmap implies development was not completed but Leica thinks it’s viable from a technology and business point of view and have plans to develop.

Since 2018, Peter Karbe has given many comments and hints at the development of the APO SL primes. He had mentioned that the optics department has demonstrated internally that the lens range was achievable technically in the form factor chosen and shared across the primes in the family. There’s also been presentation slides shown 2 years ago with cutaway drawings of the entire lens lineup where it was evident that the 21 APO was the least mature in design where the 24 APO had details shown for the internal mount for lens elements while the 21 APO lacked all details.

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When the rumors for the 21 APO started circulating that it would come out before the 24 APO, I was honestly quite surprised. I know there are some folks here who have more inside info and spoke about the imminent 21 APO release and even showing MTF charts so I was cautiously optimistic but it still wouldn’t surprise me if the 24 APO still ends up being released first. Assuming that the 21 APO release was actually planned for spring 2023, the only thing I can imagine causing plans to change are last minute issues found in manufacturing or performance issues found during testing that required some design changes.

[Virob]

59 minutes ago, beewee said:

The APO SL lenses (21/24) were never been released. They were shown on a product roadmap in 2018. Roadmap implies development was not completed but Leica thinks it’s viable from a technology and business point of view and have plans to develop.

Since 2018, Peter Karbe has given many comments and hints at the development of the APO SL primes. He had mentioned that the optics department has demonstrated internally that the lens range was achievable technically in the form factor chosen and shared across the primes in the family. There’s also been presentation slides shown 2 years ago with cutaway drawings of the entire lens lineup where it was evident that the 21 APO was the least mature in design where the 24 APO had details shown for the internal mount for lens elements while the 21 APO lacked all details.

I never implied that the 21/24 were released, I said announced. When I said  “when a lens gets released “, I meant that in the generic sense of when a lens gets released, sorry if that wasn’t clear. Back in 2018, when Leica published this roadmap, I don’t think I was alone in assuming that enough development had been achieved for Leica to realistically predict that this lens could be released  in 2020. COVID, wreaked those plans to a large extent, but there is clearly more to the story.

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[LeicaR10]

Virob,   I feel you are correct.  There is likely more to the story for the last two SL primes.  Covid certainly didn't help with supply chains, technician health, work environment etc.  I know of only 1 person here in Australia that has actually seen, touched the SL 21.  Most likely a prototype. But who knows, I wasn't invited to withness the event, just store staff and they have signed NDAs.  Last, I would think the Leica rabbit might well deliver a couple of goodies in mid-April. All that's all I know from the rabbit. I am not a great source, I accidently ran over his brother in a car park. He is OK, the vet's got him.  He darted out in front of my SUV.  Good thing he is on the mend.  So have faith in the Leica bunny.  Happy Easter to all from Oz!   r/ Mark

PS...I personally think there will be no SL24 considering all the M 24 lenses are discontinued.

Edited April 3, 2023 by LeicaR10

[helged]

The up-front constraint that all SL-Crons have identical bodies, and at the same time deliver hitherto unknown optical qualities, may have turned the SL21 into a very troublesome lens to produce. Time will tell, but at least one wide, fixed focal length (Leica) SL will eventually enter the shelves. The S-system has the 24mm, corresponding to 21mm on a ff sensor, similarly is clearly expected by the SL-line of primes...

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[LBJ2]

4 hours ago, LeicaR10 said:

Virob,   I feel you are correct.  There is likely more to the story for the last two SL primes.  Covid certainly didn't help with supply chains, technician health, work environment etc.  I know of only 1 person here in Australia that has actually seen, touched the SL 21.  Most likely a prototype. But who knows, I wasn't invited to withness the event, just store staff and they have signed NDAs.  Last, I would think the Leica rabbit might well deliver a couple of goodies in mid-April. All that's all I know from the rabbit. I am not a great source, I accidently ran over his brother in a car park. He is OK, the vet's got him.  He darted out in front of my SUV.  Good thing he is on the mend.  So have faith in the Leica bunny.  Happy Easter to all from Oz!   r/ Mark

PS...I personally think there will be no SL24 considering all the M 24 lenses are discontinued.

I am worried about the SL 24mm for the same reason you wrote. I do hope we are wrong. 

[jplomley]

My take-home lesson on this...never buy into a system based upon a promised road-map, especially from Leica. Won't get fooled again.