Leica SL 50mm APO Summicron.
Everyone who enjoys photography has a different opinion about lenses. No matter what camera system they currently own. And not everyone can find a "one size fits all" lens to satisfy them. But I'd conjecture that those who don't shoot sports, birds and ambush paparazzi photos fall into the same category as me right now. Based on the demographics I've been able to assess most readers of the VSL blog are within ten years of my age, on either side, have a college degree of some sort and have worked and saved long enough to be somewhat financially secure; if not truly affluent. Some are retired and some are not. But nearly everyone likes to take their camera out on adventures that are more or less wrapped around the desire to make photographs.
And most could likely be served by one camera and one lens. I hate acronyms but OCOLOY was an acronym made up by Michael Johnston years ago when he posited that a good exercise for a photograper would be to use: One camera and one lens for one year. I'm more flexible than that. I understand that there might be times when it's good or practical to step away from the one, one, one experiment. But at its heart the OCOLOY is a good way to get really, really proficient with a very pared down set of tools. Simplicity sometimes equals transparency in the process.
As a working commercial photographer, during my career, I never succumbed to the OCOLOY idea. I always felt that I had to have enough focal length variations and choices to handle any of the work projects that clients needed done. We needed very wide angle lenses to show off vast warehouse or factory spaces, macro lenses for product work ---- especially with very small products --- we also needed longer lenses to photograph speakers at podiums in big convention halls. Fast, medium telephoto lenses for traditional portraits and medium-wide lenses (think 35mm and 28mm) for event imaging that required a bit of documentary skill. Or zooms that provided the same coverage. And reasonable proximity to the participants.
After I passed along my 30+ year position as a theater photographer for a regional theater it dawned on me that the only type of work I had been doing with longer zoom lenses was shooting live stage productions. After a few months I gathered up the long zooms and sold them off. Never looked back and never needed the zany 70-200mm f2.8 lenses for anything else. It was fun to see them go...
The same thing seems to be happening with wide angle lenses in my "work kit." I look at the lenses I've accrued for corporate work with a big mirrorless camera and started separating out the lenses I never really used for any of my personal photography. I started looking seriously at them and wondering when was the last time I pulled X lens out of the drawer to stick on a camera and take out just for fun. Amazingly, the selection was pretty easy. They could nearly all go. Now.
I have two main camera systems. One is built around the Leica M mount cameras and the other (always thought of it as my "commercial" system) is built around the Leica SL cameras. mirrorless.
In the M mount system raw performance is balanced by portability, reliability and compactness. Great glass and easy to carry around. In that system I have lenses from 21mm to 90mm and those aren't going anywhere. Most are Zeiss or Voigtlander lenses and they work remarkably well when I want to downsize the overall package; and they shrink the total volume and weight when mounted on an SL camera as well. But, as I said just above, that M system, and those lenses, aren't going anywhere. They are too much fun. Especially the two APO lenses from Voigtlander (35+50). Perfect for casual shooting.
But in the "work" system (SL) I've got way too many choices and way too much duplication and overlap. I pulled out a cardboard box and started pulling out the lenses I kept for clients but haven't had fun with in years. There are lots of contemporary wide angles but also a hodgepodge of older legacy 50mm lenses from Nikon, Canon, Zeiss and Voigtlander. A handful of semi-wide to semi-long zoom lenses from a variety of makers and lots and lots of neglected filters and adapters to fit everything.
Nearly every single prime lens in the collection isn't quite as sharp as the individual focal lengths represented by one Leica 24-90mm SL zoom lens. Why keep them? Size? That's what the M rangefinder lenses are for.
So, what will I end up with if I really want to downsize the lens collection; in addition to the M mount lenses? Two Leica zoom lenses, one Leica 50mm (the one above), one Leica R 135mm f2.8 ROM lens and.... perhaps... the Sigma 45mm f2.8 for those times when small and light but AF and auto are part of the fun.
Why the zany APO 50mm f2 SL Summicron? I always thought it would be fun to own the best 50mm lens ever made for consumer cameras --- at least once. How am I liking it so far? Really great optical performance is as addictive as it gets. It's amazing. Incredibly expensive but amazing.
The "end of client work" mentality is interesting. For the first couple of months there was a running sub-current of disbelief. A sense that at any minute I'd drop back into the work mode and would need all the stuff I'd pieced together over the years to get stuff done. That an amazing project would surface which might call for some combination of the un-fun, but highly practical, stuff in order to complete. But over time, as I turned down more and more routine work and said "goodbye" to clients, I became more and more resistant to the idea of spending any time which was out of my complete control. And, at a certain point a month or so ago, it was like a switch in my brain clicked and the idea of ever going back to actual, paid work became a non-starter. I'd been spoiled by doing only what I wanted to do... on my schedule. For my own amusement and satisfaction.
At some point I think everyone who cuts the strings with a photographic work/career comes to understand that the fun quotient that drove us into the field was situated in the primeval early days of one's rapturous first embrace of photography. The fun times always seemed to be those first carefree years when one could only afford that entry level SLR and that 50mm lens that came as part of the kit. And amazingly all the things we shot with that primitive kit had more energy and sparkle than anything that mountains of gear eventually provided. Mostly because we had limited choices and never thought to try a throw money at a creative challenge. Because, well, we really couldn't.
At least that's my sense of it. So, for me, the idea of a really cool 50mm, and one really cool camera body as an every day combination pushes me to remember and appreciate how easy it was to make photos I really loved back in the day. When no other choices clouded my intentions.
It may be just me but distilling down gear seems fun and clarifying. Purging. Freeing.
Works for lights, light stands, modifiers and lots of other stuff as well....
I understand that many photographers don't love the 50mm focal length as I do. I'm sure it's partially nature and partially nurture ---- as in what you learned on and what you became most comfortable with. You may feel about the 28, 35 or 85mm choices the same way I do about the 50mm but I have a sneaking suspicion that, even if you protest my basic assumption, there's one focal length lens that holds a special place for you and if you didn't have external constraints gnawing at you it's the lens you'd pick nearly all the time. And the one you do your best work with. And that's something fun to learn, even this far into life.
From yesterday's first excursion into mono-lensing.
photographed on South Congress Ave. with a
Leica SL2-S and the 50 APO SL Summicron.
A nice and ?practical? combination...
