Leica SUMMICRON COLLAPSIBLE LTM - internal barrel reflection and lenshood

[Colin Clarke]

Hello.

A newbie question, in a way ... About a new to me c1952 SUMMICRON LTM 50 2.0 Collapsible.

I used it this past weekend on a IIIf with some FP4 and the lens was sharp although low in contrast I found (but predicted when I read up about this lens). I chose not to use any filters or shade because I wanted to see a "raw" result. As it happens, although lowish in contrast under my normal development, there is an annoying internal barrel type circular flare at the bottom right hand of the negs, but only when the lightest part of the sky was at my left shoulder. Looking into the lens, I see there is a thin chrome ring right before the aperture leaves although the rest of the lens internal is black. Seems to be a strange decision to have this reflective piece.

Anyway, I'm thinking that a lenshood is a must have for this lens, for flare and for contrast, and although it is the "thorium" glass I'm thinking a Yellow filter too, more or less as a fixture for my Ilford range of BW.

I don't want the older style collapsible shade, so I guess I'll go for a slightly newer clip on?

Would appreciate comments about the lens in general, the flare issue, and especially a recommendation for the lenshood.

Much obliged.

 

[Brian]

I have one that is the same vintage- "Hot Glass", ie "thoriated". There is a thin chrome ring on mine as well, hard to tell if it is where the glass meets metal. Mine also has some spots where the camera-black on the glass is separating, making for some reflections on the side of the glass. I always use a shade on mine. The inexpensive 39mm vented hoods on Ebay work well, I've never noticed a problem. These lenses were subject to intenal haze: mine is clean. Shine a flashlight through the back of the lens and look for haze. This is not a hard lens to get to the major surfaces BUT set the aperture to F2 and NEVER turn it upside down. The aperture blades will fall out if turned upside down with the front section unscrewed.

And welcome to the forum!

The collapsible lens is similar to the original Rigid Summicron.

Summicron_type1_disassembly by fiftyonepointsix, on Flickr

The front section unscrews to get to the optics on each side of the aperture blades- usually where haze occurs.

 

[Colin Clarke]

Thanks, Brian. Great comment and descriptions. I tried the flashlight and I don't think there is any haze (to a visible degree). I'll shoot another roll, lenshood (from my M rigid Cron) and I think a light yellow filter. Then, I'll soup it identically, just to compare on a baseline. I know later I can tweak developing to improve contrasts. Appreciate your time and kind words. Colin. (As for cleaning it if necessary, I'll probably defer to a specialist - horses for courses.)

 

[Brian]

The flashlight makes haze stand-out, yours sounds like it does not have that problem. The Hood should make a big difference.

This is with mine, wide-open with the Yellow filter and hood.

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Marine Museum, May 2016 by fiftyonepointsix, on Flickr

It's great on the M Monochrom.

 

[Colin Clarke]

The flashlight makes haze stand-out, yours sounds like it does not have that problem. The Hood should make a big difference.

This is with mine, wide-open with the Yellow filter and hood.

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Marine Museum, May 2016 by fiftyonepointsix, on Flickr

It's great on the M Monochrom.

Thanks! That's really nice, especially for wide open. The area of focus is just right. Quite sweet bokeh. Yes, Hood plus yellow seems the way to go.

 

[Lawrence A.]

I have the same lens, same year, and have not had an issue with reflections, but I almost always use a hood with it. My is clear too, with just a few cleaning marks on the front element that do not seem to cause flare or reduce sharpness. I use it a lot on my digital E-M5 and Pen-F with good results too. Here's one shot at an old cemetery I was documenting. The Summicron gave me the open shadows on this shot that I just couldn't get to my liking with newer, multi-coated, digital lenses. These old lenses have their own virtues.

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[Colin Clarke]

Thanks, Lawrence. Yes, no problem with your lens. . I don't use digital at all, except of course, here I am on my iPad, with my iPhone (camera) at my side... Heheheh. You can see from the two attached images from my first test roll that there is no flare/reflection in the footprint, but bottom right hand of the other (raw scan no dusting etc) you can see a barrel reflection. (No shade, no filter, sun over left shoulder). Just showing for demonstration purposes - the images are junk. ;-)

 

[Lawrence A.]

And spotting it out on a print would be torture. Although I still occasionally step into the darkroom, one of the things where digital files (at least in Photoshop) have an advantage is spotting them.

I need to start shooting more film again. I have some terrific enlarging lenses, as well as a great Nikon 9000ED scanner -- old by wonderful. I keep an old XP machine up and running in order to use it with the Nikon software, which I prefer to VueScan.

There is something about the rangefinder experience that nothing else comes close to, the reason I keep asking Olympus to issue a digital version of their 35SP, one of my favorite film cameras, with a lens on it that does not take second place to anyone.