I guess I’d be curious to hear about what specific problems there were in manufacturing the ‘Elcan.’ Considering that LLL are producing the 50/1.2 and might produce a 35/1.4 aa - two lenses that ceased their Leica production runs because of the cost/difficulty in making the aspherical elements, it’s kind of surprising that a four element, spherical lens proved too much.
_jim_ wrote:
I guess I’d be curious to hear about what specific problems there were in manufacturing the ‘Elcan.’ Considering that LLL are producing the 50/1.2 and might produce a 35/1.4 aa - two lenses that ceased their Leica production runs because of the cost/difficulty in making the aspherical elements, it’s kind of surprising that a four element, spherical lens proved too much.
Maybe there’s more to the story…maybe not.
My guess would be they discontinued it for a combination of reasons:
– Lukewarm reception of the Elcan clone compared to the 8-Element clone
– Effort required to make it with the above and below reasons in mind
– Making room and time on the production line for new lenses
I’m glad I got an ‘Elcan.’ It’s so wonderfully small and well made (in fact, I wasn’t totally prepared for how much the undersized lens + oversized tab would click with me). The unique vintage signature is quite pleasing to my eye.
I spoke with a tech/repair person that worked on a titanium ‘Elcan’ (perhaps it was yours, HDM). They pointed out an obvious/not so obvious point (at least for me). None of us (most likely) have the KE-7A that this lens was designed to be married with. The lens mount is made to a slightly different spec than other Leica 50’s. I’m sure the LLL ‘Elcan’ is a near perfect copy of the original (especially in regards to the mount). There must have been a reason that it was designed this way for KE-7A…I don’t know what that was…but it is a little strange that they wouldn’t have ‘fixed’ it to be more compatible with more common cameras (though it has no issues mounting/unmounting on my Zeiss Ikon ZM).
Too bad it is being discontinued, but hopefully this frees up more production capacity to make more new, cool lenses.
First SPII photos in the wild taken with a production unit I've seen. This is not the same rendering as the prototype at all. LLL said they would update the coatings to be more like the original, but dang, this is different. Looks like a 50mm version of the 35 Lux Steel Rim wide open.
Go to post #76 on the last page, not sure why this link goes to the beginning of the thread:
Dan Chang wrote:
I guess the Elcan does not have enough market demand to keep it on the production line
I'm not sure that's entirely the reason; apparently it is very tricky to make the first element so it's quite labor-intensive. But demand must be a factor: the Speed Panchro is likely to be a big seller plus they are working on their Hologon (https://lightlenslab.myshopify.com/blogs/upcoming-project/light-lens-lab-15mm-f8-in-prototype) so they've shifted their priorities.
15mm f8 has been in trouble for a few years, It seems LLL is unable to produce the center piece without produce many junky pieces. I remember somewhere I read Zeiss made these optical elements by glued it together. It is an extremely small market, the most successful is the 8E.
I like his videos but the problem with this one is it rates the lenses on purely one metric. Min focus distance w test subject slap bang in the middle.
Fred’s testing with that group shot of kids at mid distance showed significant distortion/smearing to those kids on the side.
Desmolicious wrote:
I like his videos but the problem with this one is it rates the lenses on purely one metric. Min focus distance w test subject slap bang in the middle.
Fred’s testing with that group shot of kids at mid distance showed significant distortion/smearing to those kids on the side.
I agree. I think you either are someone who reviews based on a type of photography (portraits in his case) or you actually test the lens thoroughly. A single test isn't even a middle ground.
I can tell he's not used the Elcan for more than five minutes because he hasn't yet discovered how soft the point of focus is away from the center at f/2. He disliked that about the CV 35 1.5, and the Elcan is much worse.
