Is there an M (or LTM) lens that 'renders like' the Zeiss 45mm/f2 Planar for Contax G-series?

[Godfrey]

I guess I maybe could or should have been more clear here: I was asking about the "overall look" including (but not limited to) the colour response.

I suppose, with digital, and with sufficient work and skull sweat, you could simulate more-or-less anything (at least to a point, and to some level of precision). I'm more interested in (if I can) just changing lenses to change the 'look' rather than shooting with whatever comes to hand then trying to simulate what I'm after in digital post-processing. In this particular case I was merely wondering "is there any Leica RF lens out there that, to some degree or other, renders things the way the Planar 45mm/f2 renders things for film?" For film, I guess, but I'm thinking more for digital. If I'm using film anyway, then I might as well just use my G2.

Perhaps there isn't. If not, then I need to think on what (if anything) I might do about that.

...Mike

Hmm. Digital ... "sufficient work and skull sweat" ..?? You use a profile creator and a reference chart ONCE to create a camera calibration profile that matches the color output you want, that suits your desires, and then you're done. I pick lenses on their non-changeable attributes; with digital capture, what the colors look like is always a matter of the body's calibration and profiling.

I owned a Contax G2 system, switched to it from my Leica M in the late '90s, and had the 28, 45, 90 mm lenses. It didn't work the way I liked ... I used it for a year and a half, trying to do what I did so easily with my M and take advantage of its autofocus. Didn't work. I sold the whole kit and replaced it with another M, brought me back to normal. The Contax's Zeiss lenses were good, but they didn't do anything particularly special to my eye that was worth the cost of converting them to M-mount (a one-way trip).

No disparagement to you intended. If you see something special in the Contax G and Planar 45 that you like, well, keep using them. Trying to get something else to do exactly that without having to put any effort into it is likely not going to work.

G

 

[Bob Michaels]

Now, the (very) obvious answer to this might well be "the ZM 50mm/f2 Planar, of course". If that's so then tell me - I've not tried that lens, thus I've no idea if it renders like the one for Contax G-series or not.
...Mike

I shot with a ContaxG as my primary camera for about 5-6 years. This included the 45mm Planar. Then I shot with Zeiss Ikon for some 6-7 years. This included both the ZM 50mm f2 and a Konica Hexanon 50mm f2 at times.

Edit: the only reason I had both the ZM and the Hexanon was that one was stolen and I replaced it with the other. They were so identical that I can't remember which I had first.

I guess I am just a photographer and not much of a camera guy. I cannot see any differences looking at prints made from negs created by any of those lenses. But then I can't tell differences in prints made from Tri-X, HP5, or Neopan 400 negs either. So consider than with my lens comparisons.

 

[newst]

That's kind of my concern with going ahead with anything but converting an actual G 45mm/f2 planar - that I might buy something (most likely the ZM 50mm/f2 Planar) then find it doesn't do what I want anyway. (In addition, I wonder/worry about the logistics of getting and converting said G-series Planar).

I also worry, more than a bit, about buying yet another Leica RF 50mm-ish lens (I already have 7 😱 seven! 😂) of which I mostly use three with any regularity (for the record, my Elmar-M 50mm/f2.8, my M-Hexanon 50mm/f2 and my Canon 50mm/f1.4 in LTM .. in descending order of frequency). It doesn't seem, well, efficient to buy another 50 if I won't use it. Decisions, decisions 🤔

...Mike

I don't understand your problem. My LTM 50mm lenses start with an uncoated 3.5/50 Elmar with a Topcor 3.5/50 as another Tessar type, then expand into other Planar types (Topcor 1.8/50, Canon 1.4/50, Minolta 1.8/50), a Topcor 2/50 Biotar, a Topcor 2.8/50 Heliar, and a Konica 1.9/50 Ultron. I sold off my non-Soviet LTM Sonnars after buying the Amedeo Contax to LTM adapter that lets me use the Zeiss 2/50 Sonnar on the Leica IIf. I certainly don't see anything untoward in buying another LTM 50mm lens. Not at all. 😉

 

[Bill Blackwell]

Popflash has a 50mm Planar ZM for sale - it won't beak the bank and it's 6-bit coded!

Look here.

 

[jsrockit]

Sometimes, you just have to enjoy a lens on the camera it was made for... but also, you can buy adapters with focus built in (MF and AF) for G mount to various digital cameras.

 

[Archiver]

What camera are you shooting with?

If digital, this is simply a matter of tuning the camera color profile used with whatever 50mm lens you might have to match the color profile you're looking for. A lens might have a particular color response that you like on a particular film, with a film camera, but the same color response can be tuned in pretty easily by manipulating a digital body's output with profiling to meet your spec. Lens qualities that cannot be so easily tuned by a camera profile are more resolution, contrast, geometry, etc. Color is almost entirely the province of body profiling/tuning with a digital camera.

Godfrey, is there a particular process that you would recommend to replicate one camera's colour profile on another? Still trying to get M9 colours and tone curve with my Panasonic S5 and G9 - I'm close, but in many instances not so close.

 

[Godfrey]

I create a reference file with the source camera of an Xrite Color Checker with a calibrated lighting setup, then i create a tuning file with the target camera and lens in the same setup. The source camera file is analyzed and the RGB values are listed out for each Checker square, then i use the Adobe DNG Profile editor to adjust all the target values to suit, and save out a CCP from there.

Haven't done one of these in a long while, and it is tedious, but once done the CCP is installed into LR and i set it to be the default for all raw files from that camera. from that point on, it should all be as wanted.

I know a lot of people love the M9 color rendering, but it's always looked a bit odd to my eyes so i actually went the other way when i had an M9 and matched it to my Olympus E-1, which made the very nicest JPEG files of any camera i've had.

G

 

[Freakscene]

I create a reference file with the source camera of an Xrite Color Checker with a calibrated lighting setup, then i create a tuning file with the target camera and lens in the same setup. The source camera file is analyzed and the RGB values are listed out for each Checker square, then i use the Adobe DNG Profile editor to adjust all the target values to suit, and save out a CCP from there.

Haven't done one of these in a long while, and it is tedious, but once done the CCP is installed into LR and i set it to be the default for all raw files from that camera. from that point on, it should all be as wanted.

I know a lot of people love the M9 color rendering, but it's always looked a bit odd to my eyes so i actually went the other way when i had an M9 and matched it to my Olympus E-1, which made the very nicest JPEG files of any camera i've had.

G

I knew there was a reason that I stuck with monochrome.

 

[Erik van Straten]

gelatin silver print (planar 45mm f2) contax g1

Prague, 1996

Erik.

 

[Freakscene]

gelatin silver print (planar 45mm f2) contax g1

Prague, 1996

Erik.

View attachment 4826321

I’ve said this before, but I could be in that photo. I probably wasn’t, because it is daytime, when I was usually in the darkroom. Opletalova, where I worked, was just to the right off Václavske Námeste. But maybe I’m in there, running to get some lunch. Velmi hezké!

 

[Godfrey]

I knew there was a reason that I stuck with monochrome.

I do about 80% monochrome myself... 😀

G

 

[Bob Michaels]

I'm just wondering whether there's a Leica RF-mount lens which renders like the Zeiss 45mm/f2 Planar AF lens I have for my old (now much unused) Contax G2. If there is, could someone tell me?

Now, the (very) obvious answer to this might well be "the ZM 50mm/f2 Planar, of course". If that's so then tell me - I've not tried that lens, thus I've no idea if it renders like the one for Contax G-series or not. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't, and maybe there's something else similar or closer.

I just realized that you said you had a Konica Hexanon 50mm f2. I had one and found that identical to the ZM 50mm Planar I used to replace my Hexanon when stolen.

I suggest you get two identical rolls of film and shoot the same scene identically with your ContaxG / Zeiss 45mm Planar and then your M-mount camera with your 50mm Hexanon. Process both rolls together or if you use a lab, have them process both rolls together. Make identical prints from both sets of negs. Compare the prints.

Now comparing the prints is quite old school and low tech. Maybe not as much fun for some techies as a scientific approach. But that is easy to do and requires no equipment purchase. But if you are wanting to achieve "the same overall look" isn't that the ultimate test? Or, am I just no fun?

 

[mfunnell]

I just realized that you said you had a Konica Hexanon 50mm f2. I had one and found that identical to the ZM 50mm Planar I used to replace my Hexanon when stolen.

I suggest you get two identical rolls of film and shoot the same scene identically with your ContaxG / Zeiss 45mm Planar and then your M-mount camera with your 50mm Hexanon. Process both rolls together or if you use a lab, have them process both rolls together. Make identical prints from both sets of negs. Compare the prints.

Now comparing the prints is quite old school and low tech. Maybe not as much fun for some techies as a scientific approach. But that is easy to do and requires no equipment purchase. But if you are wanting to achieve "the same overall look" isn't that the ultimate test? Or, am I just no fun?

This kind of brings me back to where I started this from: when I first started using rangefinders I was using film because there wasn't much available in the way of a digital RF (the Epson RF-1 was about it, the M8 hadn't been released - and I couldn't afford it anyway). I started with a Hexar RF (with the M-Hexanon 50mm/f2), then an M3 (which I mostly used with either that Hexanon, or with an Elmar-M 50mm/f2.8) then the Contax G2 (which I mostly, but not exclusively, used with the 45mm/f2 Planar). This was when film, and C41 film processing (including decent scans) was much more readily available, much cheaper and much more convenient than it is now.

What had me start this thread was looking back at some old photos (prints; then scans from the same film) taken with those three outfits and thinking "I got results I liked from all of them, but there's a distinctive 'look' to some of the shots from that G2/Planar kit". Not better or worse, per se just distinct and different.

So I had an idle thought to ask whether there's a lens I could use to get similar results on something other than my G2 (because I was thinking 'digital', colour film being way to inconvenient for me these days).

To my eye, none of my current lenses (including the M-Hexanon 50mm) do that: or at least won't do that unless I went out of my way to simulate or at least emulate that through digital processing. Or to get a G-mount 45 Planar converted to work with a camera I have (most likely M-mount). I'm not at all sure I'm sufficiently motivated to do either of those things.

I do thank everyone for responding thoughtfully to what, really, was a more idle question than perhaps I conveyed.

Thanks, again...

...Mike

 

[froyd]

Went through most of my planar-related posts until 2013 but could not find the one where I posted the side by side comparison of the g$5 and the ZM 50. I did find some comments in other threads from a decade ago that I can summarize with G45 > ZM 50 mostly because of the color rendering which was warmer. I also disliked the ZM ergonomics quite a bit, but in fairness a G45 might also be not too much fun to use on an M body, depending on the conversion.

 

[JMF]

In case this helps, there is a 45/2 G Contax Funleader M converted for sale here :

Contax Carl Zeiss 45/2 Monture Leica M transforme par FUNLEADER | Photo Vincent

Contax Carl Zeiss 45/2 Monture Leica M transforme par FUNLEADER

leica-opera.com

Best
JM

 

[JMF]

Shot on a M3 and Ektachrome 100
with the above mentioned lens :

 

[mfunnell]

In case this helps, there is a 45/2 G Contax Funleader M converted for sale here :

Contax Carl Zeiss 45/2 Monture Leica M transforme par FUNLEADER | Photo Vincent

Contax Carl Zeiss 45/2 Monture Leica M transforme par FUNLEADER

leica-opera.com

Best
JM

I am probably madder than a meat-axe for doing this, but I've just ordered the lens you referenced. I can only🤞that it will deliver what I'm after.

I received some more money than I thought I would for recent (and somewhat difficult) work in my "semi-retirement", so it won't bust my budget. We'll see how it all works out...

...Mike

P.S. "semi-retirement" isn't proving to be as "semi" as I'd prefer. Still: any money I receive from that work I can treat as "free cash" to do with as I will. So it has it's benefits as well.

 

[Freakscene]

Lenses for labor should be the name of your consultancy. If it’s just subsidizing Planars, you’re not charging enough!

 

[mfunnell]

Lenses for labor should be the name of your consultancy. If it’s just subsidizing Planars, you’re not charging enough!

I am contemplating (without committing to) one or more latest-and-greatest Summilux lenses. I don't think I can charge my residual work enough for those 🤔😱😂

I think I've given away my idea of an M Monochrom (of whichever generation) as a way of spending some funds I might be receiving. So I've moved my thoughts on to lenses. While the converted G-Planar I've just bought is expensive enough, it doesn't even come close to modern new Leica pricing.

I've also been running through my stable of 50mm lenses and wondering: "just what, exactly (!!) would a modern Summilux do for me that isn't done almost as well by a lens I already have?" To which my only rational answer is: "very little". So I think a 50 is off my list. At least if I pretend to rationality.

However: I don't have a faster-than-f2 35mm - so I'm allowing myself to be tempted by the latest Leica 35mm/f1.4 ASPH, despite the eye-watering price-tag. That might well be my next irrational purchase. (If the funds come through, and if I depart enough from sanity.)

...Mike

 

[Erik van Straten]

Just look for a nice looking Summar.

gelatin silver print (summar 50mm f2) leica ll

Amsterdam, Museumplein, 2020

Erik.