Why 50mm/2.8 collapsible "Elmar" instead of "Elmarit"?

[Robert Blanko]

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When searching for details regarding this lens here https://classic.leica-camera.com/at/de/lcc/Leica-Elmar-M-2.8-50-black-11831/35020-3 after reading about the new collapsible trend, I was wondering why Leica named this lens "Elmar" instead of "Elmarit". I thought that an aperture of 2.8 should usually qualify for an "Elmarit". 🤔

Did Leica mess up their own sophisticated nomenclature? 🤔

BTW, I also have this tiny lens which I bought some years ago for curiosity...

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[adan]

When the original 50mm f/2.8 was introduced in 1957, the trademark "Elmarit" did not yet exist. Since that 50mm f/2.8 retained roughly the same simple 4-element "Tessar-copy" design of the f/3.5, it got the same design-name (Elmar). The whole name=aperture thing was not yet fully developed.

Compare similar-era 35mm Summarons f/3.5 and f/2.8.

The first Elmarit was the 90mm f/2.8, in 1959.

When the 50 f/2.8 was reintroduced in 1994 as part of a limited-edition historical commemorative set (40 years of Leica M, with an M6(J) body tarted up to look like an M3, and a 0.85x viewfinder), keeping the 1950s name was part of the whole "aura of history." "It's 1957, all over again." 🤪

https://cameraquest.com/leicam6j.htm

And once that f/2.8 Elmar-M was put into the regular production catalog, it was just too much of a PITA to rename it again.

Edited February 24, 2024 by adan

[dpitt]

Thanks @adan for shedding some light on the mysterious ways of Leica.

Do you happen to know, how Leica came to re-use the Leica SL and CL name in their digital products? They could have named their first digital M... M3 🫣 if the goal was to confuse everybody.
But I am happy someone had the sense to use M8 instead.

OTOH they now have 2 Leica products named CL and SL and even SL2. 😱

Edited February 25, 2024 by dpitt

[UliWer]

vor 12 Stunden schrieb adan:

the trademark "Elmarit" did not yet exist.

Well, they might have invented it two years earlier. There was already  a tradition of using "...it" for lenses with higher opening than a previous one: Summar (f/2), Summarit (f1.5). 

Though "Elmar" was a household name, almost like "Leica". Since the Elmar with f/2.8 still had the optical design of the original Elmar and looked like its predecessor with f/3.5 the reasons for upholding the old name were stronger than renaming it. Same for the "retro" Elmar of 1994. The 90mm Elmarit of 1959 was a different design and had its own look and as they still had the 90mm Elmar with f/4 they used the new name. 

 For the same reasons Zeiss didn't give the f/2.8 version of the Tessar a different name. 

[RexGig0]

Let us not forget the origins of the Hektor and Summarex:

 

[UliWer]

Though Summaron always means wide angle - for photographic lenses. There were many „Elmarons“ with f/2.8 for projectors which had  long focal lengthes. 

When they reintroduced the name „Summarit“ for M- and S-mount lenses the last f/1.5 Summarit had disappeared for 50 years. So it was reasonable to think that nobody would remember the old glass - unfortunately there were also people who frequented some forum or other. The alternative would have been „Elmarit“, which was sort of standard for the R-system having been ditched just recently - „Hektor“ with a f/2.5 some 80 years ago and a completely different optical formula was certainly ruled out. And dogs of millenials wouldn‘t be called neither  „Hektor“ nor „Rex“.

[Robert Blanko]

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vor 2 Stunden schrieb UliWer:

Though Summaron always means wide angle - for photographic lenses. There were many „Elmarons“ with f/2.8 for projectors which had  long focal lengthes. 

When they reintroduced the name „Summarit“ for M- and S-mount lenses the last f/1.5 Summarit had disappeared for 50 years. So it was reasonable to think that nobody would remember the old glass - unfortunately there were also people who frequented some forum or other. The alternative would have been „Elmarit“, which was sort of standard for the R-system having been ditched just recently - „Hektor“ with a f/2.5 some 80 years ago and a completely different optical formula was certainly ruled out. And dogs of millenials wouldn‘t be called neither  „Hektor“ nor „Rex“.

That's the current convention as stated by Leica itself: https://leica-camera.com/de-DE/photography/understanding-leica-lenses According to said definitions, a Summaron seems to be indeed a wide-angle lens.

[dg4mgr]

Leitz stayed with the name Elmar for a certain type of optical design. Elmar is Leitz' version of what Zeiss called a Tessar: A Lens made from four elements, the last two cemented together. 

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tessar

So both the 3,5/50 and the 2,8/50 are Elmars in this sense. Elmarit is used for 2,8 lenses of other optical designs.

[UliWer]

vor 34 Minuten schrieb dg4mgr:

Leitz stayed with the name Elmar for a certain type of optical design. Elmar is Leitz' version of what Zeiss called a Tessar: A Lens made from four elements, the last two cemented together. 

That's true for the 50mm and 90mm Elmars - though there was also a 90mm Elmar with only three separate lenses 

Then the  Elmar had its revival with the 1.3.8/24mm with an optical design far away from a triplet:  eight lenses in six groups with an aspherical element. And they also invented  "Super-Elmars" ...

So the only common feature is: aperture smaller than 1:2.8 - with the exception of the 1:2.8 Elmar...

 

[adan]

11 hours ago, UliWer said:

When they reintroduced the name „Summarit“ for M- and S-mount lenses the last f/1.5 Summarit had disappeared for 50 years.

But the Leica Summarit 40mm f/2.4 (on the Minilux, 1995) was fresh in everyone's minds.

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Let's face it - when it comes to naming lenses, Leitz/Leica took the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson to heart:

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds...."

 

[Jeff S]

16 hours ago, Al Brown said:

 A Summarit can be f1.5, f2.4, or f/2.5. And so on...

And an f/2.5 Summarit can really be an f/2.4 Summarit in disguise. Naming not exactly a Leica science.

Jeff