1953 KMZ J-3 on the Leica M8.

Sonnar Brian

Sonnar Brian

Product of the Fifties
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And it's a great match. The Jupiter-3 is a great lens, the least expensive way to get a Fast Sonnar look for your Leica camera. HOWEVER: it is built to the Zeiss standard, and "usually" has to be shimmed for close-up and wide-open work. This lens is optimized for F1.5 and close-up work. The focal length is longer than the Leica standard, so it does not quite focus to infinity. You have to stop down to F4 or so. The Sonnar focus shift pushes the focus backwards.

My close-up focus test.

F1.5:
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100% Crop:
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At F4:
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100% crop:
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You can see the Sonnar focus shift in the image above. My scanner could not really pick up this much detail from the negative.

Back to F1.5:
color.
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Something flat:
at F1.5
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Pretty good flatness for a Sonnar formula lens. I;ve seen some that are like SIN waves.

At F4:
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Infinity at F1.5, soft due to the residual error:
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and at F4:
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This one is "on the better side of good".
 
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F1.5 Again, strong Backlit Subject. (The Sun is behind the leaves)

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F1.5, more Off-Center Backlight.

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I like this lens. I still believe that the KMZ J-3's have the edge on "most" of the others. I could not pass this near-mint one up, because an RFF member sent me a mint KMZ lens to work on that was better than anything I owned. AND HE MADE ME SEND IT BACK TO HIM!

This lens needed a good bit of work: the grease was solid. AND: it had some slop in the focus action. Relubed, Cleaned, and changed the guide screw. It's my best J-3, and equal to the one sent back to a very happy J-3 user.

http://ziforums.com/showthread.php?t=374

This lens was $140 On Ebay, inclusive of shipping. The description was accurate, most of the FSU sellers are fairly accurate, but YMMV. Check the feedback! The Seller noted the uneven focus. Also had an accurate description of the glass.
 
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Starting to use mine a bit in the studio. But had to use a ND filter on the front of it to use it wide open. But here it is. I think these might have actually been at f/2.

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Very nice test shots. I should be getting a J3 from Fedka next week and can't wait to give it a shot. Hopefully Yuri has made all the adjustments to it (I believe he does.)
 
Thanks. And I always like to take the opportunity to thank Brian for guiding me through the selection of my lens - and then working on it for me after I got it.
It's been a fantastic purchase.
 
It was very hard for me to send that lens back to Tim, and ended up costing me...

I ended up buying another 1953 J-3 in LTM...

The new one On the M8:
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Wide-Open at F1.5, closest focus.

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There was lots of snow in Brian's neighborhood, Robin.


Brian, I may have a 1953 KMZ J-3 too. The KMZ route seems to be the safest to get a very sharp J-3.
 
The Jupiter-3 is a Sonnar formula lens, based on the War-Time Zeiss 5cm F1.5 Sonnar "T". The focus mechanism is simplified, and easier to work on. The 1953 J-3's still have German Glass in them.

AND: we has two blizzards in one week. Mountains of Snow! The shot of Nikki sledding was from the prior snow, only 6inches. We could play in that one.

My Back-Yard after the Second Blizzard last week.

Carl Zeiss Jena 5cm F2 Sonnar "T" now in LTM.
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Become a Zivity photographer

Become a Zivity photographer

Great images Tim. Have you or your model thought about becoming Zivity.com artists to get some revenue from these great photos?

tbarker13 said:
Starting to use mine a bit in the studio. But had to use a ND filter on the front of it to use it wide open. But here it is. I think these might have actually been at f/2.
Click to expand...
 
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