Did Zeiss ever make a Sonnar for the Leica? Which current Leica lenses are Sonnar types? (If any)

-- Frank Horn (owlhoot45@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002

Answers

Zeiss made 50/1.5 Sonnar and 16mm/f8 Hologon for screwmount Leica

-- martin tai (martin.tai@capcanada.com), April 21, 2002.

For what it's worth, I read somewhere that Cartier-Bresson adapted a Zeiss 1.5 50 to his Leica at at time when that lens only fit the Contax. (I think this was the 30's, and Leitz lenses weren't as good. Now they are. ;+)

-- Phil Stiles (Stiles@metrocast.net), April 21, 2002.

There's an 85mm Sonnar as well.

-- Michael Darnton (mdarnton@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

Martin, the 16mm f8 Hologon is a Contax G lens. The original 15mm f8 Hologon was not a screw mount lens either its for M only.

-- Joel Matherson (joel_2000@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

Per Martin Tai's post, during WWII, Zeiss made a variety of Contax lenses in Leica thread mount. Although the Zeiss conglomerate (incl. the Schott glassworks) dominated the German optical industry, the military mostly used Leica cameras & Zeiss was ordered to make LTM lenses to fill the need. You can read about this in Marc James Small's "Non Leitz Leica Thread-Mount Lenses: A 39mm Diversity" (ISBN 3-930359-47-2). In addition, both before & after the war, it was not unusual for folks to have lenses for the Zeiss Contax converted into LTM--HCB's Sonnar could have been 1 of these.

I don't think any of the current Leica lenses are Sonnar types, but I'm not sure.

-- Chris Chen (Wash., DC) (furcafe@NOSPAMcris.com), April 21, 2002.

I have a 50mm f1.5 Zeiss Sonnar in LTM that I use with an adapter on my M cameras. It has a slightly different look than the Leica lenses, and is comparable to the current Summicron as far as resolution from about 2.8 or 4.0 down. Wide open focused on a nearby subject, it produces wild bokeh that some like and other's find distracting. I like the lightweight compact size of such a sharp, fast lens. the ergonomics are odd though, with aperture settings and even the focus mark rotating as you focus! By the way, even though the filter size is 40.5mm -(same as the 40mm Rokkor for CLE), the old chrome 39mm push on Leica caps fit it.

-- Andrew Schank (aschank@flash.net), April 21, 2002.

And there were also several brands of Contax-to-LTM adaptors, some of which are highly collectable and worth much more than the sonnars they adapted: Gandy has a list on Cameraquest.com. Finally many of the LTM Nikkors were straight Zeiss copies.................

-- david kelly (dmkedit@aol.com), April 21, 2002.

The very first Nikkors (50/1.5 and 85/2) were straight copies of Zeiss sonnars, but at a very early stage started on their own path. The Nikkor 135.3.5 is faster that the Zeiss original; the Nikkor 50/1.4 is better. Take a look here (http://www.dantestella.com/technical/nikoleic.html) for some more info. The Pacific Rim Camera site has more info too.

-- Dante Stella (dante@dantestella.com), April 21, 2002.

David Kelly wrote:

"And there were also several brands of Contax-to-LTM adaptors, some of which are highly collectable and worth much more than the sonnars they adapted: Gandy has a list on Cameraquest.com. "

Modern versions of these Contax-to-LTM & Nikon RF-to-LTM adapters are still made in small batches in Japan, but they're also still very expensive (about the cost of a new 50mm Summicron-M!) & aren't readily available for export, @ least in the U.S. (I had to go through someone in HK to get 1).

-- Chris Chen (furcafe@NOSPAMcris.com), April 21, 2002.

Thanks for all the info. Many years ago, I would write to Leica, in NJ; even enclosing SASE. Still waiting for my answer! They'd need a full-time historian/librarian to keep up with all the trivia! The Sonnar has a long standing reputation as world-class. The one I had on my Rollei 35S did great work, although I doubt it is any better than my 50mm Elmar-M. BTW: I note in recent Leica promotional literature that they seem to avoid showing sectional drawings of their lenses, for whatever reason.

-- Frank Horn (owlhoot45@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

My understanding was that the original 180 MM Elmarit R was based on the Zeiss Olympia Sonnar. Great lens but as heavy as a bag of rocks.

-- Seth Honeyman (shoneyma@nycap.rr.com), April 21, 2002.

Yes. There were a series (5 or 6) of Carl Zeiss lenses in various focal lengths (including the 50/1.5 CZ Sonnar) with a factory made Leica screwmount. To my knowledge these 5-6 lenses were issued in relatively small quantities and are expensive collectibles. I've seen the 50/1.5 Sonnar on eBay and there was a dealer a while back who offered the whole set of lenses for a handsome price.

-- Eliot (erosen@lij.edu), April 21, 2002.

...so what kind of design is Zeiss Soonar, is it a triplet, I belive it is not a doublegauss, my books are far now

when just into photography, and the only thing youīre sure about is that you wanna take pictures, you donīt have any experience, but quality of image is something that catches you,

you donīt need to be an expert in optics to be influenced by it,

didnīt you experience during your earlier years and on?, the like or dislike of opticals view in pictures, like variations of contrast at diferent distances, and things that makes you remember youre looking at something through a glass. I precived it a lot, and without knowing that leica existed, I liked pictures that looked like windows, and far from any process

may be 24x36 format followers didnīt want to give the minimum importance to the format and concentrate in optical performace, leica invented the format and their designers have took it as a 24X36 white pice of paper, in this field is where in my opinion leica is the best by far.

To view a picture and realize of optical qualities was something I didnīt and still donīt like, I prefer my pictures were not distracted by optical caracteristics, may leica not be the best lens, just because it doesnīt reach the topest speed in the shortest time, on the other hand Leitz found their way when designing the second and current version of sumilux; as a resut years later the doublegauss gets under a Crown at 2.0 with latest Summicron, with complety diferent goals, I like Leica thinks in the full format, love the picture to looks even, not as just out of the photographic process, like quality not to be notice, but suport a picture.

Soonar tipe of design, where high contrast and definition at the center can be a price to pay, good in low ligth, but using just the center of yhe frame, but not to use the all frame wide open, great stoped down, leica may not reach itīs center resolution, but we have a nice frame wide open for sure.

Hope to be understood.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

ho yes just wanted to know what kind of desing was Sonnars..

-- al1231234@hotmail.com (al1231234@hotmail.com), April 21, 2002.

I got my books, it is a triplet related design indeed, acording to Arthur Cox

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