p.13 #1 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
tri_fin wrote:
I’m not very good at understanding how or why a lens behaves but I think one of the many good characteristics of the Heliar is the single coating. I don’t think it relates to the glow but I do think it deals with light in a sensitive manner. I bought the 35 1.4 SC after using the Heliar. I had previously used the MC version but so far the SC seems a reasonable partner to the Heliar. I believe the 35 1.4 SC sold well in Japan as the Heliar is doing…
It’s quite interesting to see how lens design and coatings effect pictures…
As far as I could tell there aren’t any wide triplet lenses.
Also the kistar 40mm 2.4 is quite like the Heliar but I think it might be MC. I believe it was designed to glow.
I’m looking at a trioplan 100mm 2.8 as a long lens…
I also think 40/1.4 and 35/1.4 S.C. versions have sold pretty well in Japan overall, They have a reputation of being better for B&W shooting vs. the M.C. versions. I personally have the 35/1.4 classic in E-mount which is M.C. only and I haven't bought the 40/1.4 in VM as I had a few other 40mm lenses already and didn't see much need for it.
When I was first studying about Kistar 40mm f2.4 I read somewhere that it is single coated, but I can't find the original source anymore now. There's no information about the coating on the official product page. I also think its rendering has a lot of bleeding like the Heliar 50/1.5 classic does especially at longer distances. I find the Kistar to be less useful as a general purpose lens though as I can't get very satisfactory corner-to-corner sharpness with it even when I stop it down a lot. I use mine mainly wide open and sometimes at f4 mainly for bokeh and for its rendering for close and mid-range shots but I don't generally use it for infinity shots. I'd like it even more if it could also work as a decent infinity shooter stopped down further like the Heliar. An M-mount version of Kistar 40/2.4 is also getting closer to being released (https://kinoshita-optical.com/kistar/1928) though there is no official release date or price information yet. It looks quite nice too.
p.13 #2 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Interesting. I'd never heard of Kistar. The M-mount version sure looks nice and small! Interesting character, though I think I like the look of the 50/1.5 Heliar better.
Is the Kistar 45mm or 40mm? I only see a 40mm on their site. Here's its MTF, which seems to correspond to Juha's description of its performance:
The Kistar line of lenses look seriously like Contax clones. I guess that is intentional.
OK, I had a look at all the Kistar lenses and these are very interesting. I really like the character of the 85/1.4.
p.13 #3 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
rscheffler wrote:
Interesting. I'd never heard of Kistar. The M-mount version sure looks nice and small! Interesting character, though I think I like the look of the 50/1.5 Heliar better.
Is the Kistar 45mm or 40mm? I only see a 40mm on their site. Here's its MTF, which seems to correspond to Juha's description of its performance:
The Kistar line of lenses look seriously like Contax clones. I guess that is intentional.
OK, I had a look at all the Kistar lenses and these are very interesting. I really like the character of the 85/1.4.
This Kistar is actually 40/2.4 and not 45mm. Not sure why I referred to it as 45mm. I edited my post to fix it now.
Kinoshita Optical are mainly a manufacturer of industrial and prototype lenses and these Kistar lenses are kind of a hobby project for them rather than their main business.
They first made 3 Kistar lenses in Contax Yashica mount (since 2015) starting with 55/1.2 which is a recreation of Tomioka Optics' Tominon 55/1.2 which is apparently a famous sought after old lens from 1970 with nice bokeh rendering.
The original founder of Kinoshita Optical was Tomioka Optics' original designer of the Tominon 55/1.2 lens and the current president is his son. They used Contax / Yashica mount on their first 3 Kistar lenses (55/1.2, 35/1.4, 85/1.4) I think because Tomioka Optics had been involved in Contax lens manufacturing and they had the know-how about that mount. Then they made 40/2.4 in E-mount and Fuji X-mount since it's meant to be a "pancake" style lens and using an adapter would defeat the purpose of keeping it small and compact. Next up is that 40/2.4 in M-mount (their first in M).
These days those 3 Kistar lenses with Contax Yashica mount are no longer available in the market as they were sold out and production was completed but I don't know if there is still a way to buy them directly from Kinoshita Optical. I never had any of those 3 though I was tempted to get especially the 55/1.2 when it first came out.
p.13 #5 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
(I think I need to accept responsibility for the kistar length confusion… if you check my post I said it was 45mm not 40mm… I’m terrible at details…)
Juha, thanks for the info on Kistar a m mount 40mm. My only e mount lens is the kistar 40mm. If you happen to see when these go on sale please let me know. I am not sure I’ll get a m mount one - depends on whether I can sell my e mount version but I am interested…
What do you guys think about lens design? I mean that a lot of the initial interest in Heliar lenses are that they are triplet derived. That said I am sure how much of a triplet the 1.5/50 actually is? From my understanding triplet designs are clear and sharp in their nature. I’ve used the CV 2.8/40 and 3.5/50 and they were both clear and sharp.. I didn’t find them glowy at all and the boken is quite normal compared to the 1.5/50. Whereas the kistar 40mm and the CV 1.4/35 are quite glowy with crazy bokeh - similar to the 1.5 Heliar. I think the kistar 40mm is a tessar design. It seems to me that sometimes lens design can tell you about character - other times it doesn’t mean much? From my reading there are no wide angle triplets.
I have Trioplan 100mm on order as a long lens. That is a triplet with glow, low contrast and crazy boken…I’ll see how that works out…
I have found that photography is a lot about using the right tool at the right time. But this is a simple statement that I find incredibly hard to apply in the real world. Understanding how lenses work helps…
I walked to Meguro-fudōson Ryūsenji Temple and found some New Year festival action there.
Really nice man. You have a good eye and use that Heliar superbly. I enjoy your view of Tokyo but they are also excellent photos in their own right. Happy New year buddy.
p.13 #7 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
tri_fin wrote:
(I think I need to accept responsibility for the kistar length confusion… if you check my post I said it was 45mm not 40mm… I’m terrible at details…)
Juha, thanks for the info on Kistar a m mount 40mm. My only e mount lens is the kistar 40mm. If you happen to see when these go on sale please let me know. I am not sure I’ll get a m mount one - depends on whether I can sell my e mount version but I am interested…
What do you guys think about lens design? I mean that a lot of the initial interest in Heliar lenses are that they are triplet derived. That said I am sure how much of a triplet the 1.5/50 actually is? From my understanding triplet designs are clear and sharp in their nature. I’ve used the CV 2.8/40 and 3.5/50 and they were both clear and sharp.. I didn’t find them glowy at all and the boken is quite normal compared to the 1.5/50. Whereas the kistar 40mm and the CV 1.4/35 are quite glowy with crazy bokeh - similar to the 1.5 Heliar. I think the kistar 40mm is a tessar design. It seems to me that sometimes lens design can tell you about character - other times it doesn’t mean much? From my reading there are no wide angle triplets.
I have Trioplan 100mm on order as a long lens. That is a triplet with glow, low contrast and crazy boken…I’ll see how that works out…
I have found that photography is a lot about using the right tool at the right time. But this is a simple statement that I find incredibly hard to apply in the real world. Understanding how lenses work helps…
Thanks! Sure, I'll let you know when I see any info about the Kistar 40/2.4 M-mount version coming out to market. I suppose it should be sometime this year. Apparently they are still working out some issues with regards to rangefinder focusing accuracy before they are ready to release it. I'm curious to see how they price it and how close it can focus but I'll probably stick to my E-mount version.
I also have a few other Heliars (50/3.5 current in-production VM version, 50/2 Heliar classic, 40/2.8 and Topcor 5cm 2.8 which is also a 5 element Heliar by optical design). I also think 50/3.5 is really different from this 50/1.5 classic in lots of ways and traditionally Heliars are supposed to be f2.8 or slower. 50/2 classic was already some kind of stretch design where the rendering is a bit funky at f2 but this 50/1.5 classic is going much further into character lens territory. It's also a bit modified from the original Heliar design (5 elements in 3 groups) with an additional element. I don't know how its unique rendering relates to the optical design being Heliar-based as I'm not that well versed in optical design from technical perspective but I like it's qualities a lot in actual use more and more
p.13 #8 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
tri_fin wrote:
Really nice man. You have a good eye and use that Heliar superbly. I enjoy your view of Tokyo but they are also excellent photos in their own right. Happy New year buddy.
p.13 #9 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Juha Kannisto wrote:
These days those 3 Kistar lenses with Contax Yashica mount are no longer available in the market as they were sold out and production was completed but I don't know if there is still a way to buy them directly from Kinoshita Optical. I never had any of those 3 though I was tempted to get especially the 55/1.2 when it first came out.
Thanks for the backgrounder. I searched Kistar here and found a thread in the Sony forum. I get the feeling I miss a lot of these interesting tangential threads now. They used to be posted in Alt but now seem to mostly appear in the Sony board and are rarely crossposted in Alt, which IMO they should be...
But in any case, I stumbled across the Map Camera interview and found a bunch of their posts of the various Kistar lenses with sample images. Since Map no longer had sales listings for the 35, 55 and 85, I figured they were limited run and sold out. I can understand why, but it's also unfortunate. The MTFs for those three lenses really intrigue me. Wide open performance is not amazing, of course, but I was impressed by how flat the curves are and without much sagittal and tangential diversion across the image. This implies to me that someone cared about how the image would render, rather than just focusing on achieving high sharpness/contrast. It's an interesting trio of lenses that would probably make a nice set with a similar look.
I walked to Meguro-fudōson Ryūsenji Temple and found some New Year festival action there.
Thanks for these. I also enjoyed them
tri_fin wrote:
What do you guys think about lens design? I mean that a lot of the initial interest in Heliar lenses are that they are triplet derived.
I have to admit I have not given lens design types much consideration in my buying habits and I wouldn't buy, or not buy, a lens specifically due to its design type. Well, not usually. Admittedly, I am drawn to Sonnar designs/variants. But that's because I like how they render. And it would be the same subjective consideration of a combination of factors, depending on expectations, for any other design type. If it's modern, I would like high sharpness, contrast, flare resistance, minimum field curvature and relatively neutral rendering. If a lens is intended to be 'vintage' in performance, then I want to see what the tradeoffs are for the character resulting from the various aberrations.
p.13 #10 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Juha Kannisto wrote:
The original founder of Kinoshita Optical was Tomioka Optics' original designer of the Tominon 55/1.2 lens and the current president is his son. They used Contax / Yashica mount on their first 3 Kistar lenses (55/1.2, 35/1.4, 85/1.4) I think because Tomioka Optics had been involved in Contax lens manufacturing and they had the know-how about that mount. Then they made 40/2.4 in E-mount and Fuji X-mount since it's meant to be a "pancake" style lens and using an adapter would defeat the purpose of keeping it small and compact. Next up is that 40/2.4 in M-mount (their first in M). ...Show more →
Back to Kistar again. By some weird coincidence, I just stumbled across this blog post by a Japanese optician (I think) who apparently makes custom eyepiece correction lenses for Leica Ginza customers. The one photo in the post was made with the M version Kistar 40/2.4. Either it's available, or he has some inside line through his connections to access a preproduction copy...
p.13 #11 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
rscheffler wrote:
Back to Kistar again. By some weird coincidence, I just stumbled across this blog post by a Japanese optician (I think) who apparently makes custom eyepiece correction lenses for Leica Ginza customers. The one photo in the post was made with the M version Kistar 40/2.4. Either it's available, or he has some inside line through his connections to access a preproduction copy...
I don't think it's commercially available yet because Kinoshita Optical hasn't written anything about commercial release on their website (https://kinoshita-optical.com/) yet. They last posted about the M-mount lens on 26th of October (https://kinoshita-optical.com/topics/blog/1949) and in that article they wrote that:
"As you can see from Mr. Sawamura's blog, the prototype has been completed. (See Mr. Sawamura's blog for a detailed review. Kistar the other side 35th Prototype is finally assembled! | Kinoshita Optical Research Institute | Lens design and production (kinoshita-optical.com) )"
...
"We will solve the problems in the future. Please wait for a while for the release date."
They would normally always announce new commercial releases on their website before release and so far they haven't posted anything about commercial release. Their main sales channel has been Map Camera, and there are no listings for the M-mount version there so far either. Additionally it's possible to order the lenses directly from Kinoshita Optical through their website (within Japan) once they are available. Currently the M-mount version is not yet shown on their products page where you can order or send queries about their products directly to them either (https://kinoshita-optical.com/ready/kistar).
So I think maybe the person who wrote the blog post probably had access to a preproduction prototype through some connection to Kinoshita Optical. Anyhow, that implies that prototypes might have been in wider circulation now and the commercial release date may be getting close.
p.13 #12 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Really cool to see these blog posts etc - that shot from the opticians blog says +8mm - I wonder if he was using an extension tube or had it mounted on a mirrorless cam with a close focus adapter.... I might have a problem but I am thinking about getting the M mount version. Anyone want a E mount copy?
I too would like an 85mm but they are heavy and M42.
I am glad they have sold out as I was worried they would not continue to make lenses if they didn't sell. I really like them and small party lens makers in general.
Re lens designs. I have tried to learn and apply what I have learnt but it is difficult as each lens seems to write its own rules! I mean the Heliar design is noted for clear simple images but the 1.5/50mm is not that at all. Similarly there are some really interesting Sonnar lenses but also some very normal Sonnars. I have also noted that coatings are not just Single coating = flare with low contrast or Multi Coating = no flare & high contrast. Some MC are awful with flare. To me it seems like a combination of many (unknown?) factors leads to a unique lens character. I have also noted that I am not very good at understanding when a lens is good for me or bad. I have to try and try and try to see what works or not! Keeps me entertained I guess.
Bit off topic...
I am now looking for Voigtländer Heliar 50mm f2! There are a couple on eBay but I would really like a black one and the one on eBay is listed without a hood. Anyone have any ideas where I could find one? I tried map camera and they don't have any...
p.13 #13 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
tri_fin wrote:
Really cool to see these blog posts etc - that shot from the opticians blog says +8mm - I wonder if he was using an extension tube or had it mounted on a mirrorless cam with a close focus adapter.... I might have a problem but I am thinking about getting the M mount version. Anyone want a E mount copy?
I too would like an 85mm but they are heavy and M42.
I am glad they have sold out as I was worried they would not continue to make lenses if they didn't sell. I really like them and small party lens makers in general.
Re lens designs. I have tried to learn and apply what I have learnt but it is difficult as each lens seems to write its own rules! I mean the Heliar design is noted for clear simple images but the 1.5/50mm is not that at all. Similarly there are some really interesting Sonnar lenses but also some very normal Sonnars. I have also noted that coatings are not just Single coating = flare with low contrast or Multi Coating = no flare & high contrast. Some MC are awful with flare. To me it seems like a combination of many (unknown?) factors leads to a unique lens character. I have also noted that I am not very good at understanding when a lens is good for me or bad. I have to try and try and try to see what works or not! Keeps me entertained I guess.
Bit off topic...
I am now looking for Voigtländer Heliar 50mm f2! There are a couple on eBay but I would really like a black one and the one on eBay is listed without a hood. Anyone have any ideas where I could find one? I tried map camera and they don't have any......Show more →
Voigtländer Heliar classic 50mm f2 black or silver and the later different nickel version with same optics appear in quite limited numbers in Japan 2nd hand market. The black and silver lenses were only sold together as limited edition sets bundled with Bessa R2M & R3M film cameras and not as stand-alone, and they are more often resold with the original cameras. When sold as full set with all original contents including the camera, box etc. they can be quite expensive (around 200K to 450K yen). They appear less often as stand-alone, and then the typical price level can be more manageable (around 80K yen if in good condition when priced reasonably). I managed to buy a black one in fine condition including the hood from Yahoo Japan auctions for around 80K a couple of years ago but it took time to find one. I'm not planning to sell my own copy as I like it pretty much.
Nickel version usually sells at higher price than the Black or Silver when they appear as stand-alone as the Nickel one was released in even more limited volume.
Map Camera occasionally gets these but it might be just 1 in several months and they usually get sold without long delay.
p.13 #15 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Thanks alot for those links. Nothing really stands out. Patience will be required.
Checking eBay completed sales - 80k/ 100k yen is fair. I think I would pay a bit more but I won't allow myself to spend too much. A used Zeiss ZM 50/1.5c or a new Light Lens lab 50/2 go for 80k/100k yen.
Right now the Heliar 50/2 is top of my list. I really like the Heliar 50/1.5 and as I do alot of mid to long range stuff I am so curious to try the 50/2 Heliar.
p.13 #16 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
What’s the coating on the Heliar 50/2? I had a look online and couldn’t find anything. I am now assuming it is MC which isn’t ideal for me..
I have noticed they do the VC 50/1.5ii in SC….
Edit: I have been looking at pics of the 50/2 Heliar and maybe it’s single coated? Can you tell by the colour of the coating? My SC lenses are kind of browny whereas my MC lenses are blueish but I am not certain the colour means anything…
p.13 #17 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
tri_fin wrote:
What’s the coating on the Heliar 50/2? I had a look online and couldn’t find anything. I am now assuming it is MC which isn’t ideal for me..
I have noticed they do the VC 50/1.5ii in SC….
Edit: I have been looking at pics of the 50/2 Heliar and maybe it’s single coated? Can you tell by the colour of the coating? My SC lenses are kind of browny whereas my MC lenses are blueish but I am not certain the colour means anything…
I assume 50/2 might be multicoated like regular CV lenses since nothing was mentioned about it but can't be sure. It's not very strong against bright light (e.g. sun) but I've just assumed the coatings weren't as good back in 2006 as they are now with some of the CV lenses.
I checked the color of the coatings on these based on color of reflections from my bedroom light and outdoor light. It's hard to say exactly what the colors are but they seem different on each lens.
Heliar 50/1.5: Purplish
Heliar 50/2: Blueish but mixed with yellowish/brownish
Nokton 50/1.5 II (MC version): Greenish but mixed with Brownish/Reddish
p.13 #18 · Official: Voigtlander Heliar Classic 50mm F1.5 VM
Thanks for that info.
Shame lens manufacturers don't publish more info on lens coatings. I guess they have to protect their IP but it would be quite useful. I would interested in what they are composed of and if different manufacturers all use similar compounds... Similarly it would be interesting to know how they have changed over the years - we all assume they have changed (improved) but how much have they? I think I read a criticism of a recent CV lens saying that the flare handling wasn't as good their other recent lenses. Do they change coatings from lens to lens (besides the MC or SC)?
Sometimes I think coatings don't really mean that much then 5 minutes later I do. They make SC & MC variants so it must be significant, right?
