Dear All,

With the Trr-Elmar, I have found it useful at times to take a meter reading at the 50mm focal length setting, even when I intend to take the shot at 35mm or 28mm. It gives me a more precise spot reading. Of course, you can do that with other lenses than the 3E but it means swapping lenses. Just another advantage of the 3E!

-- Ray Moth (ray_moth@yahoo.com), March 21, 2002

Answers

Ray, I do this technique all the time. After perhaps 50 rolls of slide film all exposures dead on. After getting the TriElamr, I now have a bunch of surplus lenses.

-- George L. Doolittle (geodoolitt@aol.com), March 22, 2002.

I still wish the 3E was a little faster. What do you think? :0) scott

-- Scott Evans (scottevans@attbi.com), March 22, 2002.

If they could possibly get the Tri-Elmar to F2.8 (even a slightly iffy 2.8) and bring the close focus down to 0.7 meters in line with the other lenses it would be a lot more appealing. That extra foot at close focus makes a big difference.

It does seem a real bargain considering the amount of work going on inside, although when I tried one it had that well known problem of needing "twiddling" to bring up the correct frames. That exposed coiled spring at the rear mount looked a bit odd too!

-- Giles Poilu (giles@monpoilu.icom43.net), March 22, 2002.

The biggest problem is that it isn't 35-50-90. F:4.0-5.6 would be just fine, please.

-- Willhelmnh (wmitch3400@hotmail.com), March 22, 2002.

Not me. I won't buy anything slower than f/2.8 from now on for rangefinder photography.

-- Tony Rowlett (rowlett@mail.com), March 22, 2002.

A 3E would be nice, but I want f/2.8 or faster ...21/35/50 would be perfect too. Ah, pipe dreams...

-- Godfrey (ramarren@bayarea.net), March 22, 2002.

how many options do we leica M photographers need or want; let me see... variospot metering is a good reason to consider the TE, but who donīt need f/2 once in a wile and even often.

Perhaps, M leica photography, can be a minimalist system, a single lens and a single body can be enough to deeply selfexpress, camera becomes least important, inner perception of what can be seen is owr sixth scence, therefor a simple and comfortable camera system can be so suitable, from another side, spaces in the street changes fast and not programable as in a studio, options are welcome, diferent lenses is a plus, and so extra bodies, but how many extra lenses do you need? ...after a 28/35/50 f/4 I personaly would need a 1.4 or 2, in a 35 and a 50, and so 28/2 would become part of it, I have read from some TE users the use of 35/1.4 as second lens, that you know... it becomes first when you least you think of it.

Personaly Iīve been learning from use of focal lenghts as owning and therefore using them, 35,50,90 at 2.8/2/4 have been the bases of my M experience, 135/4.5 has been a lense with not much use, 21/4 came later, with a lot of use, three years ago I had the oportunity to update it to a SA 21/3.4, now all have been up dated, and TriEmar can in my dreams be a future choice, 35/1.4 asph as my pricipal focal length has been too a next option from time ago,

focal or īlux versatility?,

or both at a co$t of course. Only you can know the focals you need. For me is important to have diferent combos for diferent places to go. I feel Tri-Elmar is a lens for day ligth, and itīs shadows of course we can always use asa 6400 or 1/2 shutter speeds, I wouldnīt if I had a faster lens at hand.

Leica philisophy lives!

Thankīs for sharing such use Ray.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), March 22, 2002.

To be fair to the 3E, if you think of it as the RF equivalent of an SLR zoom lens then it's not all that slow. Lots of SLR zooms are f/4, including Leica's own 35-70. However, as many have said, the 3E is best suited to outdoor walkabout photography in daylight and within that category it does its job really well. For low light use, unless you want to use flash, you need something faster and, in my case, it's a 50/1.4 Summilux.

It's true that the minimum focus of the 3E is only 1 metre but that's not quite as bad as it sounds. Don't forget depth of field. You can include subjects closer then 1 metre and still render them acceptably sharp if you take advantage of the DoF given by a small aperture. For example, a 50mm lens focused at 1 metre has a DoF that starts at 0.85 metres if its aperture is set to at f/16. Using lenses close up often calls for a small aperture anyway, to maintain good resolution.

-- Ray Moth (ray_moth@yahoo.com), March 24, 2002.

Oops! Forgot to mention one more thing.

A well-known author of Leica books is reputed to have claimed that different spot metering angles could be achieved with an M6 using the frameline selector lever on the camera body, regardless of which lens was actually mounted! (I'm not sure which particular frameline from a selected pair he thought would be used for the metering: if, for example, one selected the 35/135 frameline pair, did he think the size of the spot would be based on the 35mm frameline or 135mm?)

Well, with the TriElmar lens you can virtually do what he was suggesting but, of course, you must change the lens focal length to select the different frameline, NOT just move the selector lever on the camera body! In each case, the spot is based on the larger frameline of the pair (28mm, 35mm or 50mm).

-- Ray Moth (ray_moth@yahoo.com), March 25, 2002.

For me, the Tri-Elmar is not suitable to carry as a single lens because it lacks a Tele setting. If I want a minimal outfit, I use a two lens combo: 35/2 or 28/2.8 and 90/2.8 Tele-Elmarit. This gives more versatility and lens speed than a Tri-Elmar. I don't care that it may be as good as the equivalent single focal length lenses. It lacks versatility and speed.

-- Eliot (erosen@lij.edu), March 25, 2002.

I'm with Eliot here,

The Tri Elmar is 1/3 heavier, sicks out further and in some circumstances F4 just won't do it. If you can live with that and light isn't a problem well and good. For me it's another good lens but not a replacement for the 35 and 50 Chron or Lux. (even though 28mm is a bonus). As ever, horses for courses.

Cheers

-- Tim Gee (twg@optushome.com.au), March 25, 2002.

f4 is too slow for me as I shoot 100 or slower slide film. But, I think Leica have done the right thing with this lens as it has a lot of fans. f2.8 unfortunately is not practical as the lens would have to be very large.

-- Robin Smith (smith_robin@hotmail.com), March 25, 2002.

non lens is capable of all kind of pictures, and Tri Elmar is not out of this, otherwise a perfect lens for a sunny day, one M body and not tele needed.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), March 25, 2002.