I would like to know how to start a journey to Leica! I planned to buy a M6 but didn't make up my mind choose summicorn 50mm or 35mm, I usually take on street photography and sometime shooting with my daughter. In the circumstance, I can only afford only one len to accomplish above. I used Contax G1 with 35mm at the moment. So can you please provide me some advice or pic in this relationship.

-- Rachel (klrltl@yahoo.com), September 20, 2001

Answers

Rachel:

This question, or a derivitive thereof, gets asked on this forum about every-other week... If you scroll through the archives, you'll find numerous answers to this question. Since I've gone this far, I'll give you a synopsis of the answers you're likely to receive - and they are all probably equally good in their advice:

1) Get the 35 first. 2) Get the 50 first. 3) Get one or the other first, and it doesn't matter which because you can easily sell it and buy the other later because quality M gear is easy to sell. 4) Get whichever one is closest to the most-used focal-length that you're using with your current system. 5) Go to the camera store, look through the M viewfinder, then play with the frameline lever to bring up the 35 and 50 frames and then pick whichever better suits your style. 6) Don't buy an M at all, unless you are absolutely sure you want a quality 35mm RF camera, because many users find that the M isn't for them and end up selling it at a loss. 7) Have you considered an R? 8) Don't buy an M (or an R) unless you are willing to start down the path of becoming infatuated by Leica's stunning optics and correspondingly being held hostage to the egregiously high prices any future Leica gear will demand.

-- Jack Flesher (jbflesher@msn.com), September 20, 2001.

You are currently useing a Contax with 35mm lens... are you happy with the focal length on that camera? You are about to embark on a learning curve transitioning to the Leica M from an auto everything capable camera, so why not stick with at least one thing you know... the "look" of that 35mm focal length? You can then compare the unfamiliar (camera operations) in terms of the familiar (lens coverage).

Don't over analyze the decision. If you are bitten hard by the Leica bug, within a short time, you will have both of these lenses anyway.

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), September 20, 2001.

I had both but sold the 50mm just didn't like it. 35mm ASPH is very good but I couldn't get the sharpness I wanted with the 50. Maybe I had a duff one, but I know a couple of people who feel the same. Brian http://www.35mmf8.org

-- brian (briandavidstevens@excite.com), September 20, 2001.

I use both lenses equally and believe it a toss up. Either lens would be a good beginning. Another consideration might be cost. Older used lenses can provide excellent results with significent savings. An inexpensive 35mm Summaron would be a good start then eventually purchase a 50mm Summicron when you can afford it.I purchased a 35mm Summaron for $275.00 and find it an excellent wide-angle lens. True, it is not as sharp as the newer version, but it has a certain characteristic I find very pleasing.Besides, the price is right!

-- John Alfred Tropiano (jat18@psu.edu), September 20, 2001.

Jack, wow..... your answer is definately my favourite. Perhaps we are all secretly very boring and enjoy these repetitive and circular arguements. I hope Rachel didn't think you were being too cynical it is actually a very concise answer....

-- Richard (richard@designblue.co.uk), September 20, 2001.

Jack

How did you know I was going to say that? Rachel, Jack has covered the bases. Not really much help I suppose. I like a 50mm -- have you considered an R?

-- Robin Smith (smith_robin@hotmail.com), September 20, 2001.

Just a word or two here because this was the biggest question I have ever had myself (as re Leica; BTW my choice of an M6 TTL has always been my biggest right answer). Also, I too can never beat Jack's outstanding advice!

My first lens was the 2/50 simply because 90% of all salesmen (at least here) always consider it to be the standard lens or normal lens. One month later I traded it in (at the same store) for the new (ASPH) 2/35, because I had in the meantime realized that this is better for me. "Better" is of course subjective and depends on what you are usually going to shoot (with your choice of perspectives, angles and distances). If you work on the statistics here in this forum, you'll see that out of "all" M-freaks, about 50-60% would say that 35mm is their standard lens, and about 40-50% would say 50mm. "Standard" here also means that lens which they would always keep if they had to loose or had to sell every other lens they owned. At the same time I think 35mm is more standard for Ms, while it's more likely 50mm for Rs.

Finally, please don't say 'corn. 'Cron is better.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 20, 2001.

I have both latest 35 and 50 "Corn". I use 50mm lens more but like the image from 35mm better. I think 35 is sharper to my eyes. Either way, you'll end up buying both in the end. That's most M users do - Struggling paying first big bucks for 1 lens, but ended up buying most of them, the latest ASPH then older versions... they're just so good! Have fun

-- Fred Ouyang (yo54@columbia.edu), September 20, 2001.

The first two answers do a lot of summing up that is right on target.

Here is one additional thought: IMHO the 35mm focal length is the 'fulcrum' of 35mm rangefinder 'seeing' (even though it was Leica that 'picked' the 50 as the standard). If you look at a lot of pros who use or have used Leica (Harvey, Salgado, Webb, Franklin, Mark, Freedman) you notice that they pretty much stick to the 28-35-50 range, with the 28 and 50 serving as 'wide-angle' and 'telephoto' to the 'normal' 35. Below the 28 you get into the hassles of accessory finders, and longer than 50 you start to get into some issues with focusing accuracy (note the 'some' before flaming, please!). The longer and wider lenses actually WILL work very well, but the 'comfort zone' seems to be centered on the 35.

I use a 21-35-90 combo. If I HAD to limit myself to one lens it would be the 35, even though that was the LAST lens I bought, not the first.

Watch this space - I hope to post some Leica 35 Summicron pix soon to link to your question and some other recent questions on Bokeh and weddings and other stuff.

(P.S. I traded two G2's and a 35 plus a whole pile of other Contax stuff to get my M4-2/21/90. There is a lot of good to be said about the Contax system, but the Leica journey really is in a whole different plane.)

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 20, 2001.

Richard: Thank you! I was trying to be concise for Rachel, and save her the time of searching the archives. However, I meant it to be cynical to all of you seasoned participants in this forum :-)

Robin: More importantly, how did you know I was thinking of you when I penned that part of the answer? ;-)

-- Jack Flesher (jbflesher@msn.com), September 20, 2001.

Rachel, You are used to a 35 so you can take one of the traditional routes by buying firstly a 35 followed by a 90 and then add a 50 if your style indicates it. I know some say a 90 is usually a lesser used lens but a 35 and a 90 give you a pretty good range and after using them for a while you will know what you want next.

-- Tim Gee (twg@optushome.com.au), September 21, 2001.

I am relatively new around here, so I haven't had a go at this question yet:
For many years I used a Nikon w. a 35mm and a 105mm. I never feelt that I needed a 50mm. At rare occations I would have liked a slightly wider lens, but not badly enough to actually buy one. I used the 35mm 90% of the time and would probably have lived quite happily with that one alone. (that was before I became insane and gave up the joy of photography in favor of obsesion w. equipment)
When I recently bought a leica, I choose a 50 mm summicron, because I wanted only one lens, and this one happend to be included w. the leica which I bought. So far this lens has served me perfectly, like w. the 35mm nikkor there are rare occations I would like a slightly wider perspective, but I don't think I miss any significant shoots.
What I am trying to say is; since you have to ask the question, there is a good chance that you will be happy w. either lens.

-- Niels H. S. Nielsen (nhsn@ruc.dk), September 21, 2001.

You already have a great 35mm in the Zeiss glass. Why not try a 50?

Cheers, a 35mm user who realised a 50 would be great too, if not better.....:-)

-- Simon Wong (drsimonwong@hotmail.com), September 21, 2001.

I went through the same process as you earlier this year. I got the 50 first, then the 35. They are both excellent in every regard.

Here is my advice. If your photography tends toward photos emphasizing people, like your daughter, then get the 50. If your photographry tends toward places, then get the 35. I think of my 35 and 50 in those terms, my "places" lens and my "people" lens respectively. When I grab my camera (usually taking just one lens) I ask myself; am I shooting places or people today, and that is how I choose a lens.

Hope this helps...

-- Dan Brown (brpatent@swbell.net), September 21, 2001.

Bravo, Jack, a brilliant synopsis of everone's "IMHO". I'm a new TTL + one lens user, and I went for the 35cron simply because I was able to get a great deal on a used one. I love it, but for taking people pictures you have to get pretty close, which makes some subjects uneasy. I'm looking forward to my next lens: 50cron or 90E. (Dammit, why don't they make a 75E?)

-- Ken Geter (kgeter@yahoo.com), September 21, 2001.

The 50mm is a compromise anyway. It satisfies most people most of the time. If the 35mm was 'best' it would be the standard lens. the 50mm is suppose to see what the eye sees but I've never had that point explained to me. I have both focla lengths and find the 35mm is diappointing in most instances but brilliant on a few occasions. We did a survey of our Leica club and 91 % of the pics were taken with the 50mm. But - was that because that was the lens on the camera at the time? Most members have more than one lens. Why not rent a 50mm and a 35 and see which you like ?

-- Tony Brookes (gdz00@lineone.net), September 21, 2001.

WAIT A MINUTE! I spent all that money on a body, and now I need a lens, TOO? Is that why all my prints come out white?

I never thought of it, but Dan and Ken have clarified something for me. I'm completely a people photographer--won't push the button if there's not a person prominently in the picture as the main attraction. My fondness for the 50, and dislike of the 35 have been explained!

-- Michael Darnton (mdarnton@hotmail.com), September 21, 2001.

Hmm, uhmm, I don't think I hate people, but I do think I prefer things, streets, architectures, landscapes, and this explains my fondness for the 35 (and 21) and my dislike of the 50. All you gotta know is what you want.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 21, 2001.

". the 50mm is suppose to see what the eye sees but I've never had that point explained to me."

Right. And a Nikon brochure proclaims: "The normal lens: Like your eyes only."

At any moment, what the eye sees sharply is an area bout the size of a dime held at arm's length. From there, how much more you can see depends on how much you look around. Unsharply, both eyes can take in a horizontal angle of close to 180 degrees.

Neither of these conditions matches the approximately 40 degree of view of the 50mm lens, does it?

Somehow, I seem to feel that a 35mm lens matches the perspective of "being there" but this is subjective. I can't prove it. Or maybe a 28mm does . . .

-- Bob Fleischman (RFXMAIL@prodigy.net), September 21, 2001.

When I brought my M about 12 months ago I went for the 50mm Summicron as I was advised that it was the ideal ‘starter’ lens for M cameras. Additionally as we all know the general consensus is that the 50 is quite possibly the best 50mm lens money can buy, and a pretty good price to boot. I did hanker after a 35mm after playing with the frame lines and experimenting with 35mm frame line composition of subjects that I took with the 50. In the end I brought the Voightlander Ultron 35, which is good, but I wish id saved the cash and went for the Summicron ASPH 35. Oh well… however there is a new 28mm Summicron :)

Cheers

Jason www.futurafish.com

-- Jason Vicinanza (jason@futurafish.com), September 22, 2001.

Well, I'm totally a people photographer but I use the 35 and 24 exclusively!

But then I'm not worried about getting close to people to do so.

This is, of course, almost completely irrelevant to the subject of the thread.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), September 22, 2001.

Ahhh, yeah, sorry I forgot to mention this useful rule of thumb (which has recently been mentioned somewhere else here by somebody else). I myself first read it long ago in Osterloh's book. For a 35 mm lens, the distance between you and the object corresponds to the greatest picture width.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 22, 2001.

Does that mean you have to print at least 70cm wide when using a Leica?

What _does_ it mean, actually?

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), September 22, 2001.

It's a snap, Rob. Like let's say if you're standing 6 feet away from the object you are shooting, then the width of that object which will be covered in the shot is also 6 feet. The above posting's "greatest picture width" meant of course the width of the screen when you hold the camera as usual laterally (longest dimension of the viewfinder is along the bottom, i.e. bottom of the camera is parallel to the ground), and not vertically.

Basically not all that useless or even subtle: I take advantage of this "rule" a lot, since I look less and less through the viewfinder, more and more where I don't want the objects (actually they are now the "subjects") to notice that they are about to be shot. So to employ again the above example, I don't have to look through the viewfinder to incorporate how wide the picture will be (and/or how close I have to get up to or away from the subject). All I do is say... "okay, I'm 6 feet from the center of the subject... this shot will cover him/her plus 3 feet to the left and 3 feet to the right".

Again, this rule of thumb is "only" for a 35 mm lens. As a matter of fact, when you have the time, you can of course -- at least in theory -- work out a similar trigonometry for any other lens.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 22, 2001.

Thanks Michael, don't know why I found that hard to understand.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), September 23, 2001.

Hello again, Rob! New improvements (although nothing I have written above is basically false, I hope).

(a) All that which applies to "feet" here also applies to "meters". (b) For "laterally", I could have written "horizontally". (c) Now that we're into format, I'd say you could of course also apply the whole rule to "height in vertical format" just as we did to "width in the horizontal". (d) Take again our example in my last posting above. That guy standing up who is 2 m tall can be shot in full -- with your 35 mm lens and so that he will appear in your photo from head to toe -- when you hold the camera 2 m away from him.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 23, 2001.

Rob,

I've written about this technique in other threads in this forum, and I got the formula from the same source as Michael, the Osterloh book. To reinforce Michael's comments (not to step on his toes), the formula simply stated is:

The distance from the subject with a 35mm lens is equal to what is captured on the long side of the negative or slide.

If you can mentally visualize how far you are from the subject, and take that distance and mentally rotate it 90 degrees and place it at the subject plane, then you will have a good idea of what will be captured by the long side of the negative. No actual numbers in feet or meters are needed... just the physical space from there camera to the subject. It takes much more time to read the above statement than to use it in actual practice. When I walk around with a zone focused 35mm lens, I am constantly aware of my proximity to my potential subjects, and therefore can fire from the hip with very accurate framing. I have done this with wider lenses, but only the 35mm lens has this very easy to apply formula, so I get less surprises on film when I do candid photography on the fly. After you try it and see it works, it is hard not to mentally be doing the framing, even when you don't have your camera with you. This is another of the little tricks (like calibrating the focusing tab angle for distance in your mind) that add to the legend of the Leica speed for dynamic environmental people photography. It is simple and it works!

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), September 23, 2001.

Actually (way OT), Al and Mike's technique can also be used with a 24mm lens, except that it's then the field of view of the SHORT side of the picture frame that corresponds to subject distance.

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 23, 2001.

Rachel: Here are links to some people pictures taken with the Leica 35mm f/2 (the one made from 1979 - 1995, which, if you DO start the Leica journey, you will come to know as the pre-ASPH Summicron).

A street picture

Wedding snapshots

This is the lens Contax more or less copied optically for the G1/G2.

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 24, 2001.

I'm thinking about buying an M6 0.58. I had an M3 some years ago and didn't care for its DR Summicron, which seemed to be very soft in contrast. Of course, it did need some cleaning, I think.

Often when I'm using a 35 mm focal length, I wish I had a 28. Usually when I have 28, I use it for 80% of pictures and a 50 for the rest. (This with an SLR) I recently went on vacation with only my Bessa L and the 15 and 25 mm lenses.

However, if I have to take a tiny APS camera somewhere .. like on a super light backpacking trip, I do just fine and I think most point and shoots have about a 35 mm equiv. focal length.

I've been thinking of buying the M6 with the new 28mm f/2 and the 50 f/ 2. But I seem to be out in left field with this idea. And, I worry that I really will want a 35 too. My wife already thinks I'm bonkers for considering spending the big bucks on the M6 and two lenses.

Of course, I could just buy the 28, which I really want, and use my old screw mount 50 f/3.5 Elmar till I decide on a second lens. The Elmar has given me some nice results.

So, I'm just thinking out loud here. Any comments would be appreciated, though

-- Thomas Herbert (therbert@miami.edu), October 02, 2001.

Very dificult to advice on wich lens to chosse, is like; wich colors to buy,I want to paint? And 50/35 are so close, but at the same time so diferent. If 35mm format diagonal is 43mm, both are at the same distance, longer and shorter,(don´t pay much atention to this) I´m just supersticious. If you want to isolate things when getting closer then 50 is your lens, if when getting closer you also want to include the around, then 35 or wider, at infinity I can´t find much of a diference at use betwen this two lenses. But well every one has their own story...

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), October 03, 2001.