A Gratuitous Equipment Review. Totally Unscientific. Just Observational.

 

I started out my long connection to photography with a rangefinder camera. A Canon Canonet QL17iii. It was the long time historical precursor to digital cameras like the Leica Q and Q2. A smallish body, solidly built and fitted with a permanent, unchangeable lens. In the case of the Canon the lens was a just right focal length of 40mm. And, like the much later Leicas, the Canon lens featured an f1.7 aperture. 

At some point, a few years after my "initiation" into serious photography via both the Canonet, and time spent in a black and white darkroom, I moved on to other rangefinder cameras. Rangefinder cameras with the ability to change to different lenses. And eventually I entered the cult of Leica cameras via inexpensive, used screw mount (Barnack) and M series cameras and lenses. 

The first was a IIIf. Then an M3 with a 50mm Summicron. And after that a collection of lenses from 35mm to 90mm. Heady times. But cheap enough back then for even a student on a tight budget. My choice in college was between cameras and a car. I always chose the cameras. Having a car in Austin didn't help you shoot better in Mexico City, or somewhere else you reached by airplane (or bus). 

There are tradeoffs everywhere in photography gear. The original Leica M3 was blessed with a .91X viewfinder. Current M cameras have either .68X or .72X viewfinders. The vastly better magnification of the M3 finder made for easy use of 75mm and 90mm lenses and even made working with a 135mm lens somewhat practical. The higher magnification of the finder also increased focusing accuracy for every focal length. The tradeoff? The finder only showed bright frame lines for 50mm, 75mm, 90mm and 135mm lenses. Nothing for the wide angles. If you wanted to use 28mm and 35mm lenses with your M3 you'd need an external bright line finder sitting in the accessory shoe of your fine camera. 

The Leica M240 cameras (all variants) use a .68X viewfinder which is just barely wide enough to accommodate frame lines for a 28mm lens...if you can get your eye close enough. But what it "gains" at the wide end it throws away at the long end. I find the lower magnification finders unusable for 135mm focal lengths and barely adequate at 90mm. The image in the viewfinder is just so small. So, for me, the sweet spot, or point of less pain, when using lenses longer than 50mm is the 75mm focal length. The bright lines in the finder are easy to see and pretty easy to compose with while the rangefinder is still accurate enough to provide sharp focus even at close distances with the aperture at wide open. Of course, this is all dependent on your camera's rangefinder being accurately calibrated and using lenses that were manufactured with the right mechanical tolerances.... (caveat emptor!).

When I bought a 90mm lens for the system it was mostly as an "emergency" focal length for those times when I had convinced myself that I could do any sort of project with just my M series cameras and lenses ---and then got stuck needing something a bit longer than my normal range. But in my brain I presumed (and accurately so) that I'd get a lot more use out of an M mount 90mm lens adapted to an SL or SL2 than I would in getting daily use out of it on an M240. For some even more extra reach there is always the option of putting the 90mm lens on (via an adapter) one of the CL cameras and then taking advantage of a (cropped) 135mm equivalent. But from experience I knew that unless I was shooting film and using an M6 with a .85X finder (an option available back in the film days when Leica made three different finder magnification bodies for the M6 line....) or an M3 with its .91X finder, that I'd never be really happy with lenses longer than 75mm on a rangefinder camera. 

Once I'd acquired a second M240 body I presumed it was safe to start buying more lenses for the system. I already had the 28, 35, 40, and 50mm focal lengths in hand and I started looking around at the 75mm options for M. There are used 75mm f2.5 Summarit lenses from Leica but I reviewed the Summarit lineup when I was reviewing the M9 camera for a commercial website (back in the day) and I was never really blown away. Good lenses but a lesser build quality than other Leica optics and I never experienced the maximum optical performance that other Leica lenses can delivery.

I looked at the Leica APO Summicron, which I am certain is a great lens, but I didn't feel like dropping nearly five grand for what is, basically, a secondary system lens for me. Ditto the $14,000+ 75mm APO Noctilux f1.25 lens. I looked at the Voigtlander catalog and narrowed down my choice to that between the 75mm f1.5 (bigger and bulkier + pricier) and the much more recently introduced 75mm f1.9. Reading all the available reviews the consensus seemed to be that by the time you had each lens at f2.8 (which is where you'll probably spend your most time...) both lenses were nearly identical. Maybe even a slight nod to the f1.9 model. Which is much smaller, lighter and ... cheaper. I bought one. 

Judging the lens separately from the Leica M cameras by putting it on an SL2 I find that the lens is sharp enough at f1.9 to be quite usable for portrait work and most situations where center sharpness is key. That being said, everything gets better at f2.8 and by f4.0 the lens is as good as anything I currently use across the systems. Maybe the Sigma 70mm Macro Art lens is sharper. But if it is my eyes have a hard time seeing much difference at everyday f-stops.

As I expected, the 75mm focal length is harder for me to use on an M240 than is a 35mm or 50mm lens. My eyes are older, the frame lines are smaller, and judging the exact point on which the rangefinder is measuring takes perhaps more day to day practice than I have brought to the fore recently. 

There are no real downsides to the lens that I can see. There are plenty of charming attributes that I appreciate and became more aware of while photographing at the Eeyore's event yesterday. The lens is very small and light for its focal length and speed. The focus throw is fair short so I don't spend time cranking the focusing ring around and around (see the Milvus 50mm f1.4 lens --- it takes an afternoon to get from the closest focusing distance all the way around to infinity...).  And, as I can see from taking a bunch of photographs at f2.8, the lens provides very sharp images when used correctly. Focused close and using wider apertures you can get dreamy good background areas of near zero focus. It's pretty charming. 

My takeaway? If you have to use a focal length longer than 50mm with a .68X mag. viewfinder on a Leica M you should not waste your money on buying the finest or fastest. You'll likely be using whatever long lens you put on your M Leica in a more casual and considered way. And you have to admit to the physics limitations of  focusing triangulation with lower magnification baselines in current rangefinder cameras. While a great rangefinder systems beats the socks off most AF cameras in the 21mm to 50mm range the advantage of through the lens focusing and image magnification in the EVF quickly beat the coupled, mechanical rangefinder for focusing accuracy from 75mms on up. In fact, my favorite use of the 75mm and 90mm lenses from Voigtlander, both M mount products, is with them sitting on the front of an SL camera and me punching it to make sure I've nailed the focusing stuff down to the eyelashes. Or the pupils. 

With this considered I think of the 75mm VM f1.9 as a hybrid-capable lens. Happy on an M camera and even happier on an EVF mirrorless Leica. At around $600 it's a bargain. And, as it has no other features than good optics and a smooth focusing ring there is substantially less to go wrong with it. Here's some images from the lens that I took yesterday. I tried to find skyscrapers and mannequins but none were available at this location. I had to settle for images of real people. Quelle Horreur. C'est la vie.