Leica LTM Leica NOOKY

[Rich Silfver]

I ended up buying a Leica NOOKY from the 30's for some time ago and it arrived today. Shot a roll of film with the adapter on and here are some sample shots from that roll.

It seems like a very fun device and I'm looking forward to using it more later this week. The photos below are full frame, un-cropped.

Anyone else here have one and care to share their experiences?

(I wrote up a fairly lengthy entry on Batteries Not Included for anyone who wants to read/see more).

Sample shots:

 

[jkelly]

Rich, that's very interesting stuff. I've wondered how the close-focus works in practice, because I have considered getting the equivalent attachment for the Summar. However, I've got plenty of work to do mastering the basic lenses before I'll be in the market for some NOOKY.

I'd be very interested in seeing the portrait shots you're thinking about trying.

 

[Marc-A.]

Jkelly,
he Nooky is easy to use, so you shouldn't have any problem.
Rich, Very nice pictures; very sharp, your Elmar performs incredibly well.

Just one sample from my records;
Leica III (F), Elmar on Nooky, TriX

 

[rxmd]

How does it work?

 

[John Shriver]

The NOOKY is basically an variable extension tube for one of the 50mm Leica lenses. It includes a wedge prism that goes over one rangefinder window, causing the calibration of the rangefinder to match the focusing distance of the lens. There's also a sliding metal mask that goes in front of the viewfinder window to simulate the parallax error.

There's the NOOKY for the Elmar 50/3.5, NOOKY-HESUM for Hektor 50/2.5, Summar 50/2, or Summitar 50/2, and the much rarer SOOKY for the collapsible Summicron 50/2. There were also some rare M versions.

They are different versions because you don't screw the lens into them, you mount the bayonet at the rear of the collapsible lens tube into them, and those are different sizes or registration distances. (Summicron is the same size, but different distance.)

While the ELPRO close-up lenses probably give sharper results (due to them being two element lenses that correct well), the ability to do normal rangefinder focusing makes the NOOKY and friends a big practicality boost.