light Lens Labs 50mm 1.2 (interesting)

[Warton]

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3 hours ago, pippy said:

By "e3" do you mean the '8 Element'?

If so then I can say that I've been using just such a lens uncoded for two years and the results / images it produces are wonderful. As Arnaud says there might be a smidgen more vignetting present at certain apertures than were it to be coded but nothing very important in real-world terms (IMO).

Philip.

yeah I meant 8e, not sure why it came out as e3.

In canada, it's about 1200 CAD, shipping/tax included, 3 days. Not too bad. I am just a bit nervous about the IQ of this lens.

I checked with some of my friends in China. They would be able to get it with roughly same price. Nothing is cheaper in China anymore I guess.

[pippy]

5 hours ago, Warton said:

...I am just a bit nervous about the IQ of this lens...

If you have not already seen this very informative thread from a couple of years back, Wharton, it might give you a much better understanding of how the LLL 8-E performs;

https://www.l-camera-forum.com/topic/326477-summicron-352-8-element-vs-light-lens-lab-352-a-direct-comparison/#comment-4312043

Philip.

Edited December 24, 2023 by pippy

[hdmesa]

13 hours ago, Warton said:

...I am just a bit nervous about the IQ of this lens...

The LLL 8E replica makes some of the most satisfying images of all the 35mm lenses I've ever used. 

The issues I saw with the 8E having tried/owned several copies: 1) it usually achieves perfect infinity focus exactly at the hard stop of the lens, but the rangefinder may show the focus patch hasn't made it all the way to alignment yet, which is annoying. And several copies I tried were decentered, meaning one or more elements in the lens were offset and/or tilted so that one or more corners at infinity were softer or sharper than the others. Decentering is a real problem and the lens should be exchanged. So you may find it frustrating to get a perfect copy, but it's worth it once you do.

[EddieJ]

Ted has a wonderful demeanor and energy and is always a pleasure to watch.

The most famous lens ever made ... is back!

An interesting observation of the LLL 50mm f/1.2 ASPH *1966*

 

https://lightlenslab.myshopify.com/blogs/upcoming-project/light-lens-lab-50mm-f-1-2-1966-prototype-test-shots

 

[mdg1371]

Received my chrome on brass LLL 1966 today— arrived with leather case, chrome on brass 12503 hood which unscrews to accept filters (with UV filter already in place), and an ND x4 filter.

My initial impression is that I am stunned with the build quality- focus ring is perfectly damped, aperture ring feels great, the engraving is crisper and more precise than I had expected. RF calibration is spot on.

The LLL minus caps or hood on my scale is 550g. The Leica chrome on brass reissue is 490 on the same scale, so a 60g difference even though the LLL is dimensionally slightly smaller. I assume this is due to glass differences.

The LLL has more of an amber coating compared to the Leica which Lena’s toward purple.

Absolutely shocked— I had the LLL Elcan, this is completely in another league, and worlds apart from the speed panchro tried.

Also comes with chrome on brass front and rear caps, but these are nowhere near the quality the Leica chrome ones.

No opportunity to take it out shooting for a couple days, but here are some pics.

 

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[mdg1371]

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[mdg1371]

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With the Leica- the LLL has a bit of debris on it, brushed right off.

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[mdg1371]

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[mdg1371]

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[mdg1371]

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[Pierre68]

Gorgeous! Can't wait to get mine.

Could you post some pictures to compare the rendering of both lenses? 

[theseahawk]

I took delivery of the brass/black paint LLL 50mm ‘1966’ f/1.2 yesterday. Solid build quality and heft. Used it a bit today outside but in less than ideal overcast. We’ll see how the photos edit out. Hopefully better weather tomorrow for a hop over to the bay. 

[Warton]

On 12/24/2023 at 12:50 PM, hdmesa said:

The LLL 8E replica makes some of the most satisfying images of all the 35mm lenses I've ever used. 

The issues I saw with the 8E having tried/owned several copies: 1) it usually achieves perfect infinity focus exactly at the hard stop of the lens, but the rangefinder may show the focus patch hasn't made it all the way to alignment yet, which is annoying. And several copies I tried were decentered, meaning one or more elements in the lens were offset and/or tilted so that one or more corners at infinity were softer or sharper than the others. Decentering is a real problem and the lens should be exchanged. So you may find it frustrating to get a perfect copy, but it's worth it once you do.

I took a delivery of 35, 8e about a week ago from LLL. My observation in terms of focus on infinity is exactly what you described. The infinity arrives a hair-split before the lock is engaged. Not a big deal but it's just a bit annoying, I found the infinity lock is the most unnecessary feature there anyway.

I don't see de-centering problem as you described, on my copy. So maybe the later version (v7 of my copy) gets better QA?

Besides, on my m10-r body it depicts quite a lot vignetting on f/2. On f/2.8 the vignetting is better and on f/3.2 it's almost invisible.

So far, with this price I am happy with the quality. I got the bare brass version, it looks really cool on m10-r black paint.

[theseahawk]

Stopped down to circa f/4 to ensure focus on the trunks to the left. Lens tends to flare easily (see lower left) but is not showing the vignetting as it tends to when shot wide open. I have it coded as a Noctilux-M 1:1.2/50 in the M10-P. 

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[sinjun]

Thanks for this. I'd be interested to see what sharpness is like in the centre wide open and across the field at infinity stopped down to f5.6 or so.

[theseahawk]

9 minutes ago, sinjun said:

Thanks for this. I'd be interested to see what sharpness is like in the centre wide open and across the field at infinity stopped down to f5.6 or so.

Here's one wide open that shows what appears to be drop off in focus as one goes out from the center. I was slightly off parallel from the line of the wall but there is no corresponding area of sharpness out from the center. I'll get one stopped down at infinity and post. 

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[theseahawk]

f/5.6, focused to infinity, ISO 200 -1.00EV

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[Warton]

7 hours ago, Al Brown said:

Everybody is "stunned with build quality" of Chinese lenses, quoting that "they are built like tanks" etc. until you take one apart. Trust me, I had MANY and did open them up. Some even had plastic diaphragm holders inside. You better NEVER drop such a lens. Ask Roger Cicala if you do not believe me.

So "stunned with build quality" is as much a valid moniker a s"king of bokeh" for 35/2 IV.
(This is nothing personal aimed to you @mdg1371, I just see MANY people say how "well" these lenses are built but only feel them on the outside, like judging a book by its cover.)

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So you managed to open any made-in-Germany pieces, including lenses and cameras, lately? And nothing stunned you at all? Everything is metal and to your standard?

Nothing wrong against you but all the things you showed in the pictures are TTArtisan or 7Artisan.

Have you opened a LLL yet? If not, you judged a book by another book.

Edited January 13, 2024 by Warton

[YB Hudson III]

The original was a “Painters” lens, with a signature “wide open” similar to a Velasquez painting. A lens that you could point at the sun and not drown in a vailing flair White-0ut. Not a pixel peeper’s eye bleed rendition of sharpness.

I have a copy of the LLL clone of the original.  I have not tried it on film or on a ccd sensor, I have used it on a FX6 with ProRes raw.  I used a Bloom Gold 1/8 filter to tame the irritating edge sharpness in the field of focus.  
I regret that I don’t have the original, as it was stolen, to compare, but I do have images as examples of my discussion.

The first image, a Velasquez Painting from the National Gallery of Art, open source.  The second and third images taken with a M4/Leica Noctilux f/1.2. The last Image is taken with a FX6/LLL 50mm 1.2 “1966”, please “no inferences” as to the subject matter.  Enjoy 😊 

Snarky note, from a “Grumpy Old Artist”, if one wishes to stop down to f/2 or beyond, I recommend the Leica R summicron 50, v1, 2cam… 

the intended order of the images was flipped, sort of, but they are easily sorted, really, no AI here…🤣

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Edited January 13, 2024 by YB Hudson III

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[YB Hudson III]

The following supports my conjecture as to the signature of the original Leitz Noctilux f/1.2. Lower resolving power, and accentuated micro contrast.  Needless to say the “LLL 50mm 1.2 “1966” is different.

Strait from the “horses mouth”, so to speak… from Leitz literature, courtesy of lens-db.com…

“Because high-speed films - both black-and-white and color - used

for high-aperture "available darkness" photography provide only moderate resolving powers, the LEITZ NOCTILUX was designed to yield an exceptionally high degree of optical contrast, with slightly lower resolving power than the other high-speed 50mm LEICA lenses. Whenever available-light pictures are made with high lens apertures on b-and-w films with indexes of 400 ASA (27 DIN) or higher, as well as when fast color films are used, superior optical contrast weights the scale decisively in favor of the NOCTILUX.

A glance at the

the NOCTILUX is that it has what might be called a "built-in optical lenshood"

• This can be seen by

looking at the front lens surface from an extreme angle, and then slowly moving your eyes toward the lens center. When your visual angle exceeds the NOCTILUX field if view you will see what appears to be a mirror. This is a total reflection of all unwanted light rays from outside the imaging field.”

photo, m4/Leitz Noctilux f/1.2/Kodacolor asa400.

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