ELCAN replica lens posts

This lens has character. We don't need all 50mm lenses to be perfect. That would be boring to me. I am used to special lenses. If the sharpness loss is symmetric in all sides of each image, and if the center is "nicely sharp", then it is a good lens for some applications, such as portraits.
 
I have been wondering about exactly that, Raid. And I can‘t yet be sure without a really good target. And then also there may be field curvature involved, so a flat target would be confusing.

Perhaps when you get to try the lens …

Ed
 
I noticed in my 1938 Zess Jena 5cm 1.5 Sonnar that horizons are curved more than I expected from a 50mm lens.

I am looking forward to it, Ed.
 
Oh, wow. That's incredibly soft at the edges. Was the original ELCAN like that?

The more "real world" shots above are fantastic, though. Very evocative look... but it's obviously not going to be scoring high in any bench tests!
 
Yes, the original ELCAN had the same fingerprint. My question is whether the copy prototype here (shot at f/2.0) has a symmetrical and therefore predictable „sweet spot“ of high resolution that one can use reliably im making portraits, or street shooting. Or whether the fall-off in resolution trends more in one direction than others, again due to this being a prototype.

I‘d like to „know“ this lens better in this regard, and I don‘t have an optical bench or even standardize optical targets to use.
 
One more attempt at a target shot, here with a newspaper page taped to my garage door. Don't mind the appearance of the upper right corner -- it looks like it has flopped forwards, but this is minor actually.

The shot was taken at f/2.0 at slightly less than 1 meter.

It appears to show that resolution drop off is worse on the left, which had been what I have suspected. There are only 4 lens elements in this lens, and assembly has to be done incredibly accurately.

L1002378 copy by woodswoman57, on Flickr
 
This makes it clear that unless the lens maker applies quality control uniformly to all lenses such that the optics give a symmetric focus falloff, we should expect some irregularities as you have demonstrated, Ed. I don't know anything about the LLL "factory" and operations to produce a lens. Are there computerized designs used or is everything done by hand and one at a time, with the hope that the product is "OK" somehow?

I got the 35/2 replica as a one time buy.
 
Speaking of the 8-element Summicron copy, I received mine back early this month, apparently well-repaired, at the same time as the ELCAN. I posted 3 images with it on the prior 8-element thread, 2 of these full frame, and for all of them I was most pleased. However, no one apparently has looked at them since there is no activity on that thread currently. FWIW. Look see if you want.

Ed
 
One more attempt at a target shot
Click to expand...
Probably best to make sure you have a very flat subject and completely parallel to the subject in all 4 corners and fill the entire frame. A copy stand is good or perhaps use a longer distance..maybe 5 to 10 feet for more room for error.
The LLL 8E I have has proved to be a great lens..just the right balance of color and sharpness.
 
From other images I have made with the ELCAN replica prototype, it appears that the greater softness on the left side of the full frame f/2.0 image of the newspaper may have come from a focus shift (or whatever one might call it).

In other images at f/2 there is definite sharpness in front of where I focused on the left further out in the lens field, while center and right side act as intended. It is subtle and not gross, but it may explain what we are seeing in that newspaper image. Probably this is from an assembly lens element alignment issue not caught by whatever QC they have at LLL.

I have submitted a draft of an article on the lens to LHSA Viewfinder. I will probably do what I did with my review of the 8-element, and give a link here to a download of that draft fairly soon.

Ed
 
ELCAN replica 50mm 2.0 with Leica M10

ELCAN replica 50mm 2.0 with Leica M10

Thanks to Ed I have on loan an ELCAN replica!

I will post images here: https://raid.smugmug.com/Leica-M10-ELCAN-replica-Sept2021/


As a start, I took some photos at home with this lens. It is very small and light. Ed said it is a prototype, so this may explain the low weight. I can focus very quickly with this lens. It snaps into focus very well. I used it without any filter or lens hood.


ELCAN50mm---3-X3.jpg


Ed already has tested this lens well, so I will just look for anything else. I want to check out the OOF rendering and the colors and the usual stuff that we check out when we consider buying another lens. In my "selfie" above, you can see the OOF rings below the window on the right side of the image. The OOF on the left side is not bad looking.
 
Here, I focused on the front row of items on the shelf. These are tea cups. The crystal glasses look nice with the bokeh shown.

ELCAN50mm---16-X3.jpg
 
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