Anyone have experience of the Summitar 50mm f/2 collapsible lens?

[2Monkees]

I'm wondering what the contrast and flare are like with this lens?

Should I get a hood to use with it? How about a yellow filter and what is the filter size?

Thanks for any info/ advice 🙂

HAGD all!

 

[peterm1]

I like to use a yellow filter (or orange or red for more dramatic impact) whenever I shoot black and white landscapes. For portraits an apple green (i.e. lighter green) filter is better as it gives nicer skin tones. I would hazard a guess that many do not bother for street shooting where the extra stop that comes from not using a filter is handy. This goes for pretty well any lens I would say.

The filter size on the Summitar is somewhat odd. It looks like a kind of funnel shape with the attaching thread at the narrow end and the filter glass at the other. Check out eBay and you will soon get the idea. The Summitar is a little behind the Summicron in era and technical proficiency but there are many like me who think it is its equal in character. Its pretty sharp stopped down a bit. I have not much noticed any specific tendency to flare but if you wish to use a hood, a bog standard clip on Summicron hood works fine. These are available on eBay - copy ones are cheap or you can pay a little more for an authentic one of that era.

Here is my Summitar on my M3 body... not that you can see that much except that you can correctly infer that I like it (and while I have other Leica 50s including a couple of Summicrons this one is a little special somehow as I like the results it provides - that 1950s look I suppose.)

 

[mr_phillip]

Some good advice from peterm1. I'm a big fan of the Summitar; it may not have the more modern glasses of the 'cron but it makes up for it with a beautiful character and tonality all its own. Mine mostly stays attached to my Canon P these days as my main LTM shooter.

Leica made a special hood for the lens that was a huge barn-door affair – pretty regular on eBay. I just use an old battered Summicron hood on it and that seems to work perfectly well.

The filters are kinda fun. It's a 36mm screw, but they taper down from a wider front so you really do need to use the special Summitar filters. I once bodged an adaptor from a third-party Summitar filter with damaged glass – I took the glass out and tapped the end to take standard 39mm filters. I only really use that with specialist items like IR filters, which are harder to find in the Summitar mount.

Here's a couple of shots, the colour one is both of and by the Summitar:

 

[kbg32]

Though I don't have any files here with me today, it produces wonderful files with the M8.

 

[iridium7777]

borrowed one from a friend

borrowed one from a friend

really liked it, will consider getting it in the future. it does flare more and to me produced a little softer image when compared to my zeiss 35. loved the smallness of it, when collapsed, i could fit the camera into my jacket pocket.

here are some examples of it:

you can see the flare and dirt on the lens in this one.

 

[john neal]

Great lens - wonderful circular sweeping bokeh on most examples shooting wide open. I have just sold mine and wonder if I have done the right thing.

A hood id a good idea if you shoot in bright conditions (less so on a coated example). I had a 42mm clamp-on one made by Minolta that worked quite well - cheaper than the barn-doors too.

I never bothered with filters, so cannot comment.

 

[sirius]

You should do a search for this lens. There are many threads here about the summitar. cheers

 

[Todd.Hanz]

The summitar tends to have that "Leica glow" (IMHO)...

as far as hoods go, I used a Leica IROOA which clips on the lens, not the original hood but it works well.

Todd

 

[oscroft]

I've just been scanning the first shots from my uncoated Summitar, and I'm very pleasantly surprised by them. I was doing a comparison between it, my Elmar-M, and CV 50/2.5. The Summitar, believe it or not, seems to be very close to the CV in terms of sharpness and contrast, which is very good (with the Elmar-M giving much greater contrast than either). It can flare badly though - I'll try to post a few comparison shots later this evening if I get a chance.

As for a hood, I've been looking for one that will fit, so it's good to hear that an old Summicron hood will do the job (I've watched a few barn door hoods go on eBay, but they look horribly intrusive and I really don't think I want one.)

 

[Joe Vitessa]

One of my favorite lenses! In fact I have three of them. (Not sure how that happened.) I'll be parting with two of them soon. $175, if anyone is interested! I'll even throw in a Russian rectangular hood that does the job controlling flare.
(Sorry to turn this thread into an ad...)

Joe

 

[LeicaTom]

Here`s a sample of one of my shots with a Summitar.....

The beautiful Emilia Maria
shot here on Fuji color 100ASA @ 500/sec f2.0 *wide open* using a uncoated "wartime" 1940 Summitar on a 1945 Leica IIIC "Kugellager" ball bearing shutter
-non K stamped serial number camera - I DO use the original "barndoor" folding hood when using it

Tom

 

[mr_phillip]

As for a hood, I've been looking for one that will fit, so it's good to hear that an old Summicron hood will do the job

You might want to try before you buy if you're considering purchasing a 'cron hood for the Summitar. There's a bit of variation in the design of the front of the Summitar mount and not all versions will allow the Summicron hood to lock securely in place. Mine is a coated example from 1946 and has the Summicron-type groove just behind the front edge of the lens.

 

[sirius]

When you click on search in the horizontal menu at the top of this page, select advanced search. You can search thread titles on that page. There is a page and a half of different threads all about the summitar with many examples and gushing love for the lens. Mine had very nice rendering but was soft and flared. It also causes a pastel look in the colours. It's a unique lens with some great character. Note that if you took a picture of someone in a suit it would look like a photo taken 50 years ago.

Taken with Ilford XP2 and it was close to wide open.

 

[oscroft]

You might want to try before you buy if you're considering purchasing a 'cron hood for the Summitar. There's a bit of variation in the design of the front of the Summitar mount and not all versions will allow the Summicron hood to lock securely in place. Mine is a coated example from 1946 and has the Summicron-type groove just behind the front edge of the lens.

Ah, thanks - I've just checked mine, and there's no groove. Oh well, I have various Russian hoods that I'm sure I can modify to fit.

 

[oscroft]

Here's three shots taken at the same time, all on Tri-X, all at the same exposure, all developed in HC-110 dil-H for 15mins at 20C. Scanned with a V700 and no adjustments made. From left to right: Uncoated Summitar 50, CV 50/2.5, Elmar-M 50. The differences are more apparent in the full size scans on a big monitor, but even with these small versions you can hopefully see the essential differences in contrast and tonality.

 

[John Shriver]

The Summitar has wonderful tone in B&W. My experience is with a mint coated one. If there's no groove, you need to get the earliest screw-clamp version of the hood, which is harder to find, but not much pricier.

The contrast is low wide open, but increases rapidly over the next 2-3 stops. The swirly bokeh wide open can be a bit much with dappled light through leaves, but it is otherwise nice.

Not as extreme in nuttiness as the Summar, but larger and heavier.

 

[oscroft]

The contrast is low wide open, but increases rapidly over the next 2-3 stops.

Yes, I was just thinking that myself (I haven't used mine much yet) - in some shots at wider apertures it is less contrasty than the same CV 50/2.5 shots (though it does seem to produce very nice mid-tones) but stopped down more it is very similar to the CV. I haven't experimented with the "swirly bokeh" yet, but I might try some slow colour film this coming weekend and see what I get.

 

[2Monkees]

Thanks for all the info/ suggestions.....

Thanks for all the info/ suggestions.....

AND photos, gents! An invaluable amount of experience and advice! I'm still waiting to receive my Summitar and then I'll try it out with some color film to start with 😀

HAGD All!