Their Heliar 75mm 1.8 for Sony E is the most desirable and gorgeous lens I saw them produce in quite some time.
I think it would be an excellent new series to have a trio of 35, 50 and this 75 with their adjustable aberrations ring for Leica M mount.
Keep the body langage of the Sony E because it’s really great.
It would be fresh, also it gives a good reason to update the Heliar 1.5 that is a bit lacking.
I'd love an Apo Macro lens for Leica M, in the 60-65mm or 90mm focal length. With M11 and Visoflex 2 this could be useful for tripod and copy stand work. Lots of otherwise great legacy macro lenses have rather severe longitudinal color error.
Steve Spencer wrote:
It will be interesting to see what Cosina does, but it looks like they might be moving away from f/2 Ultrons. At 28mm they have the f/1.5 Nokton, the f/2 APO Lanthar, and the f/2.8 Color Skopar. At 35mm, they have the f/1.5 Nokton and f/2 APO Lanthar but the Color Skopar is f/3.5 instead of f/2.8. They also add the faster f/1.2 Nokton, and the classic f/1.4. At 50mm they have the f/1.5 Nokton and f/2 APO Lanthar like at 28mm, but the Color Skopar is f/2.2. They also add the two super fast Noktons at f/1 and f/1.2, the super small f/3.5 APO Lanthar, and the classic f/1.5.
What is notable is that at 28, 35, and 50 they no longer make any f/2 Ultrons. In fact, they no longer make any plain Ultrons for M mount. They do make the 90 f/2 APO Ultron, but that is the only Ultron they make. They make no Ultrons for Sony E mount, and only the 35 f/2 APO Ultron for Fuji X mount and Z mount and the 27 f/2 Ultron for Fuji X mount. Those are the only Ultrons they make these days. It seems Cosina is moving away from making Ultrons. It is always hard to decipher what Cosina is doing, but it seems they are moving away from making lenses like the 28 f/2 Ultron. I could easily be wrong, however, and I hope I am....Show more →
Interesting observation regarding the f/2 Ultrons.
Historically a lot of Ultrons have been f/1.8 and I could see them going that direction again. Not really a meaningful difference except for marketing - a 35mm f1.8 Ultron sounds less boring than a plain 35mm f2 Non-APO.
But I could also see them abandoning that line (at least for now). Maybe they realized people want either f1.5 or faster, or APO, or ultra compact and the f/2 Ultrons were in some place in-between and maybe not as popular?
I also think that they might have discontinued the VM Ultrons as an effort to streamline their lineup for now since they have quite a lot of different lenses and lens lines in production and there might have been too much overlap between various lines. They also have never prioritized Ultrons in their FF mirrorless lineups that are a bit less crowded to start with.
But if they do plan to bring back new versions of some of the VM Ultrons soon, they would probably pre-announce any new ones at CP+ that kicks off from Feb 26th. It will be very interesting to see what they'll have in store for this year's event.
There is also a chance that they might announce something new for February release on 1/15 even prior to CP+.
In the meanwhile, many of the discontinued Ultrons are still available to buy as new in Tokyo, though mostly only through Fujiya Camera. They still sell 21/1.8 as new though it was discontinued 3 years ago. They also still have 28/2 Type I and both colors of Type II, black 35/2 Type II and 75/1.9 (SC only). Quite often they seem to have the biggest remaining stocks of discontinued lenses here.
I'd most like to see a pair of pancakes for E-mount & other FF mirrorless at ~40mm and ~28mm (kind of like the 27/2 and 18/2.8 in X-mount but for FF), and wish they would be fully usable at hard infinity (like those X-pancakes) without allowing focusing "beyond infinity". If they could meet the sweet spot between small size and reasonably bright aperture (hopefully a bit brighter than f2.8), that would be ideal. They'd need to have very nice rendering at wide apertures and also ability for very good corner-to-corner sharpness stopped down a bit.
I have a feeling that if Voigtländer announced weather-sealed versions of their lenses, it might prompt many to upgrade. I have no idea how feasible this is, but my understanding is that currently none of their lenses are sealed.
As a Fuji shooter, I have a selfish wish to see them produce a competitor to the Laowa 23/.95, but with
EXIF.
I wonder if Voigtländer might produce some halo lenses akin to the Nikon 58/0.95 as a way of moving upmarket, to avoid going head-to-head with the Chinese manufacturers selling cheaper lenses.
Juha Kannisto wrote:
I'd most like to see a pair of pancakes for E-mount & other FF mirrorless at ~40mm and ~28mm (kind of like the 27/2 and 18/2.8 in X-mount but for FF), and wish they would be fully usable at hard infinity (like those X-pancakes) without allowing focusing "beyond infinity". If they could meet the sweet spot between small size and reasonably bright aperture (hopefully a bit brighter than f2.8), that would be ideal. They'd need to have very nice rendering at wide apertures and also ability for very good corner-to-corner sharpness stopped down a bit.
Couldn't agree more. Ideally I would love a compact 35/2 but I think a 40 and 28 would be more realistic. I would love Voigtlander to transport some of the skopar/ultron/heliar ideas to E mount. One of my favourite lenses to use on my A7C is the CV35/2 Ultron despite its flaws. Most of the time I don't need the features of the APO or NOKTON lenses, and prefer a compact lens that balances sharpness and character.
shinyobject wrote:
I wonder if Voigtländer might produce some halo lenses akin to the Nikon 58/0.95 as a way of moving upmarket, to avoid going head-to-head with the Chinese manufacturers selling cheaper lenses.
As I've mentioned before, this would make some sense given their strong reputation and the massive price gap Leica left unfilled since the discontinuation of their Summarit-M lenses.
Of course the Summarit lenses were 'boring' for the price point given it was Leica's entry level series. For Cosina it would instead be a premium product. Potentially halo products, if they were to address the USD ~2,000+ range and expand on their 50/1 that already exists in this space.
Therefore, I believe it makes some sense for Cosina to focus in this area, at least with M-mount lenses. With respect to the other mirrorless mounts, it's less clear cut because they will bump into other options such as the Zeiss Otus lenses (which I believe they make for Zeiss) and many excellent OEM lenses that also feature AF. I suspect in FE, Z and RF mounts, at such price points, a vast majority of buyers want AF. Additionally some of the Chinese brand are already offering AF lenses, including some very interesting options. It feels like Cosina/Voigtlander are being boxed into a fairly narrow niche of manual focus lenses. Sure, there will always be some demand for such lenses, and maybe Cosina is happy to be in this niche if it remains sustainable.
On the CV 110mm Macro APO my wish is they either move the aperture ring to the front of the lens (where it can be seen!) or add a larger knurled ring to the existing ring so it would be more tactile. As it is right now it can be difficult to find without taking your eye off the viewfinder.
Second, I really, really wish they would print the focal length of their lenses more prominently. As it is now the FL is printed small and placed at the bottom of the lens it is sometimes hard to find which lens you have in your hand.
So far there are no clues about what Cosina will bring for 2026. There are usually no rumors at all, and if past patterns hold, they will probably surprise us with something nobody was even thinking about.
