Just got an SL w/h 24-90 usead, need advice on some primes.

[kuau]

There are at least four Elmarit-R 28mm f/2.8 II available on Ebay at present. BIN prices are currently from $1650 to $2900. I'm sure it will perform well.

Myself, I would try the Elmarit-R 24mm f/2.8. You can find them for $650-750 in near mint shape and it's a delightful performer. Tamarkin.com has an early one (1974 vintage by the serial number) with hood for $495.

G

Godfrey,
Yes I have been watching those on ebay yet I am looking for some conformation that the Elmarit-R 24mm f/2.8 is indeed a good performer on the SL. One thing that does scare me about R lenses in general is buying into a mount that has been dead for some years.

The 24 you mentioned I know is a very good lens, just a little to wide for me for everyday use. 28mm FOV seems to be most favored when 99% of all cell phones all have the same FOV and 28mm is what the Leica Q uses. One has to wonder why Leica chose 28mm over 35mm for the Q...

 

[TimothyHyde]

I have had my SL for about a year and now use the M (240) mostly as a backup. I rarely use the 24-90, in part because of its size and in part because it is slower than my M lenses. I went back through tens of thousands of images taken with the SL and figured out that roughly 35% were taken with the 28 f/1.4, 40% with the Noctilux f/0.95, and 25% with some other M lens. Less than 5% with the zoom. As a night shooter, I guess this isn't surprising, but I'm clearly very pleased with the M lenses on the SL.

 

[scott kirkpatrick]

The SL is big enough that it doesn't feel unobtrusive and leads to a longer working distance, even with a tiny M lens mounted. So I tend to use it with longer lenses, or with a 15 SuperElmarit that would be almost impossible to use on an M. Two candidates among the longer R lenses that would do something that the 24-90 cannot are the Macro-Elmarit-R 100 and the Summilux-R 80. The particular portrait-style signature of the Mandler 80 is a look you won't get with the current Karbe generation of zooms. The Macro-100 is outstandingly sharp, and works much closer than any zoom, or than the 80-R and 90-R short telephotos. Both are frequently available on EBay at modest prices.

One other R lens that is worth considering is the 21-35 Vario-Elmarit Asph. There is still no announced date for a wide SL zoom, and this excellent lens covers the end of the 24-90's range in which there is the most software correction going on. It has some distortion as well, but much less than the 24-90. There is also a very late model 28-90 Vario-Elmarit available, but it is expensive and doesn't seem to offer any advantage beyond its smaller size. In fact the used 28-90 Vario-Elmarit-R is now listed for more than some report that the 24-90 Vario-Elmarit-SL is selling for.

scott