Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/10/17

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Subject: Re: [Leica] PORTRAIT LENS: Summicron, Elmar, Elmarit?
From: Jerald Rosenfeld <rosenfeld@mpdr0.detroit.mi.ameritech.net>
Date: Sun, 17 Oct 1999 06:46:41 -0700

Hay Dan
Whip a Zeiss Softar  on the new 90 and now you got the best of both
worlds.

D Khong wrote:
> 
> Nathan Wajsman wrote:
> >You are in luck, since Leica has just come out with a fabulous new 90mm
> >Summicron Apo Asph. This means two things: you can either buy this lens
> >and have the very best; or if you can live with a lens that is one stop
> >slower, you can buy a second-hand 90mm Elmarit, also an excellent lens
> >which is quite inexpensive now (relatively speaking, we are talking Leica
> >after all).
> 
> If the new 90 Summicron GASPH-APO is as sharp and better corrected as
> claimed, I'd be the first to balk at using it for portraits. Reason? While
> the buffs on one side of the shutter curtain would love to have the
> priviledge of having the sharpest lens that money can buy, their subjects
> on the other side would squirm at seeing their every blemish, pock mark,
> zit and what have you recorded on film for posterity.
> 
> In my experience, female subjects just love to see their pictures taken
> with my humble Kodak Xenon 50/2.8 lens on a 1954 Retina IIc (priced at only
> $200) purely because the images produced with this lens are so "flattering"
> compared to the harsh 50 summicron of current vintage.
> 
> Dan K.
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>      Modernisation is not necessarily in the best interest of mankind.
> ============================================================================
>