Do Leica lenses have "built-in sunshine"?

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chip j

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You mean the EMO Wetzlar Macromax loupe Leica bought the rights to?

Stop obsessing over the mystical properties you are spinning around Leica & get on & use the Contax - realistically there is vanishingly little between those Zeiss lenses & contemporaneous Leica glass. Both are about as good as 35mm lenses get.
yes, it looks like the EMO.
 

ciniframe

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Not sure what this thread is all about but regarding lenses, I'm multi-talented. Hand me any lens, from the 60mm f8 plastic lens on a Holga to a 50mm APO Summicron.....and I can take a banal, formulaic, and just plane dull picture with it.

(but of course, of the two the Leica lens picture will be a more detailed and contrasty banal, formulaic and dull picture, so that's better, right?)
 

Arklatexian

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hi chipj

its just advertising, like "good to the last drop"
(and i've had maxweelll haus that wasn't that great ... )
sorry to hammer the leica mythos but i have seen plenty of
oh-hummm photos made with the german product.

I have made plenty of ho-hummmm photos with the German products but they certainly weren't the fault of the product. It was the nut holding the Leica.......Regards!
 

Arklatexian

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Not sure what this thread is all about but regarding lenses, I'm multi-talented. Hand me any lens, from the 60mm f8 plastic lens on a Holga to a 50mm APO Summicron.....and I can take a banal, formulaic, and just plane dull picture with it.

(but of course, of the two the Leica lens picture will be a more detailed and contrasty banal, formulaic and dull picture, so that's better, right?)

Finally, someone has come up with the correct descriptive adjectives that best describe the results of my Leica technique...........now if I can just learn to make them less detailed....Regards!
 

Ces1um

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Right. And if one has sacrificed a lot of money to acquire it, then there is temptation to see all sorts of (non-existent) magical qualities which help justify the expenditure psychologically.

Cognitive dissonance is a powerful force. I spent 10,000 on this camera therefore my camera/lens must be the best or I wouldn't have spent 10,000 on it....

https://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html


What I like now is when people pick up one of leica's old point and shoot crummy 1980's cameras before their luxury brand restructuring and assign to them the same magical qualities as their new, considerably finer models just because it has a leica red dot. That being said, I'd like a new leica please. :smile:
 

removed account4

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I have made plenty of ho-hummmm photos with the German products but they certainly weren't the fault of the product. It was the nut holding the Leica.......Regards!

i know, but to suggest the camera contains sunshine ?
german, japanese, italian, french, ruskie, american & al. all contain sunshine
the problem is tapping into the sunshine .. its got nothing to do with the camera.
 

Bob Carnie

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Mine has special Leica fairies in them that improve my composition, exposure and always put a halo around my lovely wife's head. The Leica glow is caused by these very same fairies as they refuse to turn their little lanterns off. I'm convinced they are the cause of global warming. They think everything should glow.
You should have had a filter that softened the cottage cheese on the picture in the river.
 

fiddle

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Every time I take mine out in the rain, it stops raining. I think it's true...
 

Saganich

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In certain low light conditions both my oldschool 35 and 50 Lux's seem to slightly amplify the high tones in the center of the frame. For example skin tones are brighter then I generally expect and whites are whiter than I expect.
 

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Kawaiithulhu

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I blame under-corrected spherical aberration and coma, and only in earlier lenses. The only reason I can think of that it became a "Leica lens" thing is that all the early designs had the same kind of imperfections, assuming that other manufacturers' lenses were each different this would make Leica stand out.

Plus Marketing !
 

E. von Hoegh

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I blame under-corrected spherical aberration and coma, and only in earlier lenses. The only reason I can think of that it became a "Leica lens" thing is that all the early designs had the same kind of imperfections, assuming that other manufacturers' lenses were each different this would make Leica stand out.

Plus Marketing !


All nonsense aside, I think the Leica-glow was an attempt to assert superiority over Zeiss' products, which in the 1930s were formulated with a minimum of air-glass surfaces - and not incidentally giving Leitz a real run for their money. Next to a good Zeiss f:2 Sonnar, any uncoated f:2 double Gauss of that era would have a bit of glow. I'm thinking of the Leitz Summar, and later the f:1.5 Xenon made by Schneider but called "Leitz" here.
 

Dan Fromm

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Um, Bill, if I'm not mistaken the Xenon's design was licensed from TTH.
 

ced

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I think there is also some moonshine and butter to boot...
You see what you want to see when you pays the bucks.
 

Wallendo

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When a lens alters the appearance of a scene, it is a Unique Feature of a Leica lens ... and an engineering or manufacturing defect in any other lens.
 

blockend

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When a lens alters the appearance of a scene, it is a Unique Feature of a Leica lens ... and an engineering or manufacturing defect in any other lens.
True. A number of my FSU lenses have the Leica glow. The 3-element Rodenstock on my Zeiss Nettar folders definitely have it. I wouldn't be surprised if the plastic lensed Olympus point and shoot has some too.
 

eddie

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My Holgas and Dianas have "built in sunshine", unless I tape them up really, really well.
 
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