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newbie lens advice

F

faz

Guest
Hi everyone

I need a little help as I'm struggling to decide on which lens to buy for my rangefinder, I recently purchased a zeiss zm and I'm looking for a great lens to go along with it. I kind of narrowed it down to the following

35 2.5 leica summarit
35 2 zeiss biogon
35 1.2 voigtlander nokton
50 1.5 zeiss sonnar
50 2 leica summicron
50 2 zeiss planar

I suppose these are quite a few len's to consider so I'm not making it very easy for my self but recently i decided against the 50mm 1.5 zeiss sonnar due to focus shift. I'm quite new to the whole rangefinder world so focus shift is something I'm not very comfortable with.

I suppose this is a shot in the dark to ask what you would recommend as again its a pretty long list but if i can get some input from people who may know quite a bit about rangefinders and len's i can cross some more from my list to begin to have a more refined idea about what i want.

any way i look forward to your input ... thanks in advance :D
 

Paratom

Well-known member
it depends ;) ;)
how important lens speed is for you vs portability.
I own a 50/1.4asph, 50/1.5 Sonnar and a 50 Summarit (which I recently got).
I find the Focus shift not as much an issue with the 50/1.5. The Zeiss is an interesting lens, slightly colder color, less perfect than some other lenses with a special character. Like a mixtire of a modern lens design and more classicel.
The 50/1.4asph is the most flexible lens, fast, very good optics.
However I now often carry the 50 Summarit, it is so nice and small and handles very nice. F2.5 is fast enough for many things. It is a little less contrasty than the 50 Summilux but its a very fine lens IMO.
I can not comment about your other options.
One advantage of the Summarit is then if you ever get focusing problems you can send lens and camera together to Leica to let them fix it.
If you get the Summilux yo also have the advantage that it is coded and yo have the data in the exif .
Tom
 
F

faz

Guest
Its funny that you ask me about speed and portability because i had a pentax which had f3.5 and i hated it because it was so slow it forced me to use quite high iso film when i didn't really want to and shooting indoors was a big no no.

then i bought a 5dii and with it i got a sigma 1.4 which i absolutely loved the low light capabilities but its a beast of a lens i suppose it might be a bit wrong for me to moan about the weight of that package since i was using the strap that came with the canon so after a while i would find it really uncomfortable.

In a perfect world I would love a summilux i've seen what it can do but its a little on the expensive side for me.

do you have any samples of stuff you have shot using the summilux and the summitar? i would love to have a look!

but to conclude i am swaying more towards leica but I'm just trying to keep my options open to see if I'm missing out on a little gem out there
 

cmace127

New member
Think about what you want to shoot. If you want to capture group shots 35 is probably a little easier but 50 can work well for both portraits and a getting some details on the street. Personally I prefer a 35 for street photography but you really do have to get closer and so if you're not comfortable with that, 50 might be better.

As for the aperture, if you shoot in low light or are in a part of the world where its overcast often, think about going for one of the faster options. The difference between the f1.5 and f2.0 isn't huge but its pretty decent. If I could choose one lens for myself it would be the 50 cron, nothing has quite felt as good for me with its combination of size and performance (that was until I got my 50 lux last week).
 

rayyan

Well-known member
Hi Faz. Welcome to the forum

Which Zeiss lens have you purchased?

What do you shoot mostly, or intend to with the RF?

Best.
 

Paratom

Well-known member
.....

In a perfect world I would love a summilux i've seen what it can do but its a little on the expensive side for me.

do you have any samples of stuff you have shot using the summilux and the summitar? i would love to have a look!

but to conclude i am swaying more towards leica but I'm just trying to keep my options open to see if I'm missing out on a little gem out there
I didnt see that you are also not decided between 35 and 50mm.
I guess this only you can answer. Some years ago I would have decided for 35, today I would go for 50mm. But thats me.

If you drop me an email ( tho.strengETTgooglemail.com ) I can send you some sample images from the lenses.

The Leica f1.4 are fast AND still not big - but they are expensive.

I think it really depends how often you shoot in very low light.
The Summarits are much underrated IMO.

Keep in mind this is a ff sensor which makes FOV shallower than a dx sensor.
So a 35mm/2.5 wide open gives you about the same shallow DOF as the Zeiss 24mm/1.8 on the Nex7, or a 20mm/1.7 on m4/3.

They are also a nice compromise between the older "Mandler" look and the more modern lenses.
 

wells_dc

New member
I have been very happy with the Zeiss Biogon 35mm f/2 on my M9. It is a great all-rounder, from portraits to groups to landscapes, both for field of view and rendering. I have a 28mm, two 50mm and a 90mm in the bag, but the 35mm probably gets 60-70% of the work.
 
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