rscheffler Offline Upload & Sell: Off
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rscheffler wrote:
I've only tried this and the Canon 50/1.4 LTM from this era of Canon rangefinder lenses, and have been impressed with both for the reasons you noted. The 50 exhibits similar characteristics, IMO. It too is very sharp once stopped down.
I do feel that both consistently trend to the cooler side of WB compared to other lenses I've shot against them. Their saturation is also a bit muted, but perhaps it's unfair to compare them against modern glass for this characteristic.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Ron, what I have found with the color after shooting a color checker in the studio and a white card for color vignetting correction is that my copy is slightly warm in the center(100K warmer with a very slight magenta cast measured off a color checker) compared to some of my other Pentax SMC and Minolta MC/MD lenses. There is a blue/cyan drift outside of the center when focused at infinity. Here is a central neutralized white card shot under strobe showing the drift with the lens set at infinity and F8. It's enough of a drift that images can appear cool on FF I think unless a correction profile is created for the color vignetting.
Another point about this lens is that it was produced over a ten year period from 1962 (version 1), 1963-1972 (version II). It's possible I guess that slight coating changes were made over that time. I think you mentioned that the one you tested was likely from the early 60's and I'm guessing mine is a late sample given it's serial number. Sure wish there was an exact way to tell when the lens was produced but Canon did not put a date code on the rear as they did with many of their SLR lenses.
With a lot of these 40+ year old Canon rangefinder lenses, I'm guessing the condition of a specific example will play quite a role in it's performance. Many of these lenses will have slight haze, dust, and looseness/ play from deteriorated lubricants. My copy is in nice shape overall but would benefit from a complete CLA as it has slight play in the barrel.
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Thanks for the info. Maybe my recollection of a cooler color quality is actually for that of the 50/1.4, now that I think about it more. I've shot the 50 against the Nikkor 5cm/1.4 and old Summarit 5cm/1.5 and when tweaking DNGs in LR, the Canon files were always colder when all were set to the same WB.
My 35/2 is serial # 361XX and generally seems to be in pretty good shape. Maybe it's not as old as I've thought? I've heard these, or maybe it's many of the Canon LTMs, are relatively fragile and don't fare well if they get gummed up. It certainly doesn't seem as well made as an old Leitz, Zeiss, Nikkor.
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