Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/09/17

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Subject: Re: [Leica] new Asph 90
From: "Martin V. Howard" <marho@ida.liu.se>
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 16:24:41 +0200

Dan Cardish wrote:
> 
> How can a lens be *too sharp*?

For the example I provided, you could argue that the 100mm Macro is
too sharp for portraiture.

As I see it, it boils down to application area.  Any lens, or anything
else for that matter, is designed with an intended use in mind.  The
100mm Macro lens in the R-range is designed for macro work, although it
can be used for other types of photography.  The 90mm APO Summicron-M
ASPH is obviously not designed for macro work, considering its intended
camera.  The most common usage of 90mm f2 on an M camera is, to the
best of my knowledge, portraiture.  Many have commented on the 90/f2's
very flattering, slightly soft rendition at the widest setting.  So, I
thought it a little odd that Leica would deliberately take that out of
the design, and make the comparison to the 100mm R-Macro that they did.

It's no big deal: Like I say, I'm not about to rush out and buy one.  I
could care less about what Leica introduces, since I have no hope in
hell of affording the current stuff.  I just thought it a little odd.


M.

- -- 
Martin V. Howard, Application Systems Laboratory,     | 
Dept. of Comp. & Info. Sci., Linkoping University,    | Just DOHH it!
SE-581 83 Linkoping, Sweden.  Tel +46 13 282 421,     +----------------+
Fax +46 13 142 231; marho@ida.liu.se; www.ida.liu.se/~marho