RE: [Leica] 35mm Summilux-M

[Marc James Small <msmall@infi.net>]

At 11:56 AM 7/31/02 -0400, B. D. Colen wrote:
>
>While there seems little questions that
>the optical quality of the latest generation of lenses represents a marked
>improvement over earlier generations. But while build quality is still
>probably the world's best, the build quality of today's Leica lenses doesn't
>match up to the build quality of earlier Leica lenses - but what does match
>up in today's world?
>
>As to the contention that they are constantly improving the cameras - I
>don't think so. Yes, they put a meter in the later versions of the M4 and
>called it the M6. And, yes, they added some features to the M6 to make it
>the M7. But were those "improvements," or were they changes? I am not for an
>instant arguing against the changes made - I use M6s after all, and would
>certainly not turn down an M7 if given one a year from now when the bugs are
>out of it. But I don't believe that the cameras have been "improved,"
>despite what Erwin Puts says. There are some things about the M6 and M7 that
>are definitely inferior when compared to, say, the M3 - rangefinder flare
>being one, the plastic/Teflon film gate being another.
>
>Have the products evolved? Sure. Have they improved? Don't bet on it.
>

BD

Yes, but ... Old-timers on the LUG will recall this argument, between Eric
Welch and Erwin Puts and I, back in the relatively early days of the List.  

Seth is correct.  Everything Leica makes today IS improved from former
types.  I don't want to get distracted into discussing the evolution in
production techniques and philosophies over the past century, but we have
enough engineering types on the LUG to fill in the blanks.  In short, there
were strong economic and efficiency reasons for producing complex cameras
of the sort of the M3 and M2 in the 1950's, and these same reasons apply
today for the production of the relatively simpler M6 TTL or M7.   Money is
money, in the long run, and let us not forget that the Leitz family
buggered the fortune they had made by supporting an attempt to stay too
long in the older concept of what a camera should be.  And the retirement
of the war-wounded in the later 1960's dramatically affected Leitz'
production techniques.

Simply put, production techniques in the 1950's allowed a lot of precision
work to be done on cameras, both while they were being made and while they
were in service.  Simple economic realities dictate a different approach
today.  (Yes, I realize that Seth and I have argued over this in the past,
and that he has even dragged Jim Lager as a source into the argument.  Seth
and I can continue THAT argument at a different time.)  In the end, my M6
is as well-built as my M3 or my IIIc, and will provide equal service life.
(One minor personal note:  my M6 has been in the shop precisely twice in
its 16-year life, once for a major overhaul, once for a minor tweaking.  My
M3 has been in the shop, to my knowledge, seven times in its 45-year life,
a comparable figure, thrice for major work and four times for adjustments.)

The same argument applies to the lens mounts.  Early Leitz M lenses had
magnificent and strong brass, steel, and chrome mounts, with lenses having
inadequate and short-lived coatings.  Modern Leica lenses have mounts which
will last your lifetime and mine, and the coatings will outlast the
mountings on my early M3 optics.  You pays your money and you takes your
choice.  No man worries much about the situation after his own demise, and
that 2/90 ASPH Apo-Summicron I got from you will outlast me and thee.  Is
the mount as sturdy as that on a first-generation Summicron?  Hell, no.
But, as Gianni Rogliatti reminded me a decade back, Barnack and Berek
decided, early on, that, due to Leitz' fiscal limitations, they would
produce cameras and lenses "good enough for the job", and that philosophy
from the 1920's still permeates Solms as it did Wetzlar.

Now, in terms of optical quality, there has been a quantum shift over the
past generation:  Leica now wants to have the best possible optics and so
they have done.  I have scads of Leitz stuff and even more Zeiss gear, and,
in terms of modern production, Leica certainly can hold their heads high,
something they couldn't do back in the years when the Zeiss 2/50 Planar for
the Contarex was the benchmark for the industry and the 2/50 Summicron-R
was an also-ran.

And, to keep the record straight, while I am a committed Ilford user, I was
delighted at your response to Dan on the qualities of Tri-X..  Truly, to
each his own, and there is no absolute "right" in this business.  You are
learning, butterfly!   (And that is noted in all friendship, BD.  Despite
our differences of perspective, I find your comments often weighty and
often worthy of great regard.  But when you break bad, well .... )

Marc

msmall@infi.net  FAX:  +276/343-7315
Cha robh bąs fir gun ghrąs fir!

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