I wrote of my sad saga with my new Konica Hexar RF elsewhere in the forum. Konica replaced my body; the replacement focuses properly with a Konica lens.

However, I bought a Leitz 90 f/2.8 elmarit-m to go with the camera; this lens focuses past inifinity, I regret to say.

So, two questions to Leica and Konica owners: 1) Have any Konica owners noticed a focusing difference between Leitz lenses and Konica lenses? Konica said to me on the phone that Leica lenses wouldn't focus properly. And 2) have Leica owners/users noticed that different lenses focus differently on their M-bodies (that is, does someone have a 35mm f/1.4 that's dead-on accurate at infinity, but his 90 f/2 focuses a little past)? Being new to this system, I'm trying to sort out whether this a Leica/Konica interface problem, or is there always some variation among Leica lenses when mounted on the camera.

Or maybe I'm jsut being too picky?

thanks

-- john beckman (john.beckman@nyu.edu), August 22, 2000

Answers

All of my Leica lenses focus the same at infinity on my M3, and so does the 40mm Rokkor from my CLE. I thought about you when I read this article http://www.photoshot.com/articles/hexartest.html which you probably already have seen. The writer was annoyed that the camera couldn't focus any of the lenses right at infinity. Have you tried shooting with the lens (the 90) wide open in the 4 to 6 feet range to see if the images are back or front focused? At infinity, depth of field will of course mask any minor problems, but wide open at close range (where I use my 90 Elmarit a lot) is where you see what the Konica can do. My CLE doesn't compare to my M3 when using the 90 in this way, and I have a feeling the Konica will be hit and miss like my CLE, even if the split image is lined up at infinity because of the effective range finder base.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), August 22, 2000.

I said it before, the Leica lenses focus fine on my Hexar. I will ask the critical question, are they focusing OK? Lots of lenses focus slightly past infinity, and the question here is whether they focus properly at infinity. (Who shoots at infinity anyway?) Looking at the focus distances doesn't seem too relevant to taking photographs. Either it works or it doesn't.

The effective rangefinder base of the Hexar is sufficient for 90mm at f2.8. It is insufficient for 90mm at f2.

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), August 23, 2000.

Jeff, I do truly take your point. But the precision of rangefinder mechanisms is critical for accurate focusing. The issue is not how often one focuses on infinity -- probably pretty rarely, I would agree -- but is instead this simple fact: if the camera can't focus accurately and consistently on infinity, it cannot be relied upon to focus accurately at any distance. That is MORE important at shorter distances. The review to which Andrew alludes -- which I had not seen before, regrettably -- would seem to confirm my concerns.

As I said, I'm not a fussy guy about camera stuff. However, I honestly don't think that precision and consistency is a great deal to ask for the money they are asking for this camera. Leica seems able to achieve it, albeit for a bit more. Frankly, I would have bought an M6 if not for two things: film-loading is unduly complex, and doing four things to get every shot -- focus, set aperture, set shutter, advance film -- just seems like a lot to me.

I don't suffer from the syndrome of waiting for the next great camera, but in this case I think I will have wished that I had waited for the M7.

-- john beckman (john.beckman@nyu.edu), August 23, 2000.

I have a mix of lenses from different sources, and find that they aren't all consistent in lining everything up at infinity. I've also measured my LTM to M adapter rings (mixed brands, again), and found that THEY weren't consistent, either, in their effective thickness. I finally settled on a strategy which has worked well for me, but would undoubtedly be hard for the normal (dare I say, compulsive) Leica owner, and that is to get everything zeroed in for my most fussy lens--an 85/1.5-- and let all the other cards fall where they might. This is the only lens I habitually use at longer distances wide open (the most critical focus combination--you'll notice that an inch error at three feet is something like a thirty-foot error at 100 feet), and the others seem to do OK with the compromise. Even when I had more Leica lenses than I do now they weren't always singing together, and I've come to think that perhaps even temperature changes (and the resulting expansions and contractions of metal parts) conspire to prevent total precision in this regard, 100% of the time.

-- Michael Darnton (mdarnton@hotmail.com), August 24, 2000.

michael -- that's very helpful and reassuring to hear, thanks.

John

-- john beckman (john.beckman@nyu.edu), August 24, 2000.

Re your second question, the phenomenon you described indeed happens to M-mount leicas, used with screw mount adaptors. I use an M3 and most of my lenses are either Leica or Canon screw mount lenses. The discrepancies occur with the shorter lenses, but not with lenses above 50 mm. I did have some problems with the 85mm 1.9 canon on the M3, but the focussing errors were not too great. I suppose that focussing errors are tolerable with the shorter lenses. With Konica Hexars, the same could probably apply as well.

-- jay javier (nikitakat@edsamail.com.ph.), January 01, 2001.

In my case, it seems to be an issue with individual lenses rather than a particular Konica/Leica problem. I can't say this with 100% accuracy, as I sold my m6 body awhile ago, but what I can say is that some lenses seem to behave with minute variations when focussing to infinity.

50mm/f2 Hexanon -- focus at infinity is 100% accurate 75mm/f1.4 Summilux -- focus goes slightly beyond infinity 50mm/f2.8 Elmar -- focus goes slightly beyond infinity 35mm/f2 Summicron ASPH -- focus at infinity is 100% accurate 25mm/f4 Voitlander -- not applicable as it's not coupled 135 Hektor -- focus at infinity is 100% accurate

The good news is that even at close distances with the 75 Summilux wide open the focus seems to be dead on when viewing the photographs. All of the other lenses also show very accurate focussing and I'm very, very picky and shoot wide open with complete confidence.

-- Tim Swan (timswan@blazenetme.net), March 24, 2002.