Text and Photos: José Manuel Serrano Esparza
In 1967, almost five decades after having used large format cameras ( a 10 x 15 " Rodenstock and a 13 x 18 cm Ernemann Ermanox) in early twenties and thirties, a 4 x 5 " Graflex Speed Graphic, a Zeiss Ikon Contax I during thirties, a 2 1/4 x 2 1/4 Rolleiflex and a screwmount Leica IIIa throughout forties, fifties and mid sixties, Martín Santos Yubero (1903-1994), one of the foremost Spanish photographers of XX Century in the realm of reportage and street photography,
bought one of the new 24 x 36 mm format Leica M4 rangefinder cameras which had just been introduced by the German photographic firm and bearing the serial number 1189576.
It was a departure from the kind of photographic tools and way of taking pictures that he had previously done (publishing images in the newspapers La Nación, Ahora, La Voz, ABC, Estampa, La Tierra, Diario Ya, Diario Luz, etc) in which top priority was to get maximum image quality feasible and the possibility of making first-class very big enlargements on photographic paper from the original negatives.
It had dawned on him that in spite of having accomplished a brilliant career as a photographer during forty-eight years, because of the bulky size and heavy weight of those medium and large format cameras, which were cumbersome to operate, difficult to use handheld and often required the use of a tripod, slow shutter speeds and could only get a 4 x 5 plate or twelve 2 1/4 x 2 1/4 images with a 120 film roll, he hadn´t been able to capture a lot of defining instants.
It´s true that he had previously used a Leica IIIc during roughly twenty years, between early forties and mid sixties, but that camera featured a small viewfinder that wasn´t combined with the rangefinder, so he had to look through two different small round windows (the VF and RF ones) to compose and get accurate focus before taking the picture, unlike the much sharper and bigger VF combined with the RF of the Leica M4 and every model of Leica M manufactured since 1954 and having started with the Leica M3.
Needless to say that this Leica M4 that he bought along with three lenses :
a Summitar 5 cm f/2,
a Super-Angulon 21 mm f/3.4
and a silver chrome Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF, became a revelation full of advantages, and particularly a liberation for him, in terms of :
- Amazing freedom of movements, thanks to the very small and light size of the
rangefinder camera
and lenses, in comparison to the LF and MF cameras mostly used by him before.
- Outstanding quickness of reaction and enhancement of the sense of anticipation to get decisive moments.
- Chance of getting 36 images with each 24 x 36 mm format roll of film.
- Unmatched unobtrusive discretion during the photographic act, thanks to the whispering noise brought about by the rubberized silk and horizontally-travelling focal-plane shutter.
- Possibility of easily shooting handheld and get sharp pictures, even using slow shutter speeds up to 1/15 s and 1/8 s, in vast majority of photographic situations, by means of the symbiosis between the vibration free shutter and the highly luminous f/1.4 and f/2 Leitz primes.
- The optical quality delivered by the Leitz lenses is superb, and in spite of the very small size of 24 x 36 mm negatives in comparison to 2 1/4 x 2 1/4 MF negatives (four times larger than 35 mm format) and 4 x 5 LF ones (fifteen times bigger),
these tiny primes boast such perfection in their design, optical scheme and configuration of their
optical elements and groups, that it is possible to make first-rate enlargements on photographic paper up to roughly up to approximately 16 x 20 " ( 40 x 50 cm) and very good up to 20 x 28 " ( 50 x 70 cm).
- The extraordinary brightness and sharpness of the 0.72x VF combined with the rangefinder in one window, enabling to focus quickly and confidently, even under dim light, using the very accurate RF, a masterpiece of optical and mechanical precision, made up by more than 150 parts.
- Absence of blackout in the viewfinder during the exposure, because on being a rangefinder camera, the Leica M4 lacks a swivelling mirror, so the photographer can see what is happening inside the frame at every moment.
- The great advantage of being able to see what is taking place outside the frame just before and during the photographic act, thanks to the specific bright-line frames for 35, 50, 90 and 135 mm, appearing automatically within the VF whenever any of those four most important lenses are used.
- Remarkable ruggedness of the camera body, meaning a lot of decades of flawless and reliable operation in the toughest professional environments.
- An exceedingly short shutter lag (id est, the delay between the pressing of the shutter release button and when the film is exposed) of 16 ms, a great advantage when it comes to capturing meaningful instants.
1990 : THE CAMERA AND LENSES ARE BOUGHT BY MANUEL DURÁN BLÁZQUEZ, MARTÍN SANTOS YUBERO´S GREAT FRIEND
Being 87 years old and having extensively used his Leica M4 rangefinder camera and three lenses for twenty-three years in a number of photographic assignments (mostly social reportage, coverage of all kind of events and street photography),
Martín Santos Yubero decides in 1990 to sell the camera to his great friend Manuel Durán Blázquez.
Martín Santos Yubero is fully aware of the great value and stunning performance of this photographic gear with which he has made thousands of pictures hitherto.
In addition, this Leica M4 rangefinder and the three lenses are for him a beloved trove, full of good remembrances and special moments lived throughout more than two decades of his halcyon days as a photographer.
This way, he phoned Manuel Durán Blázquez and held with him a meeting inside his house near Antón Martín area in Madrid (Spain), where he explained to him that he was an enthusiast of Leica, but because of his age, it was important to leave the camera and lenses in good hands to guarantee their preservation in future after his death.
And Martín Santos Yubero´s wish was fulfilled, because presently, in 2025, thirty years after his death and fifty-eight years after the Leica M4 serial number 1189576 was manufactured,
the camera keeps on working impeccably at every shutter speed and diaphragm, in the same way as each lens.
A MILESTONE RANGEFINDER CAMERA IN THE HISTORY OF LEICA
The Leica M4 is considered to be one of the best 24 x 36 mm format rangefinder cameras ever made and the last one manufactured according to the purest Leitz philosophy of handcraftedly manufactured product, entirely made with noble metals (specially brass) by highly experienced and knowledgeable technicians and mechanic masters fitting each and every piece in its place.
That´s to say, a mostly artisan way of doing things harking back to the days of LTM39 screwmount Leicas and also to the likewise iconic Leica M3 (1954-1966), Leica MP (1956-1957) and Leica M2 (1958-1967), first three models of the Leica M camera breed which had preceded it.
However incredible it may be, the Leica M4 raised the ante since its very introduction in 1967.
And this was truly praiseworthy, because both the Leica M3 and the Leica M2 were superb cameras that had been tremendously succesful for Leitz firm, with impressive figures of sales (225,000 units of the M3 between 1954 and 1966 and 82,000 M2 between 1958 and 1966 ), consolidating a camera lineage having endured seventy-one years unitl nowadays with the saga of 24 x 36 mm format digital Leica M cameras.
The landmark Leica M3, introduced in 1954, sports a fantastic, very sharp and crystal-clear 0.91x viewfinder with a large rangefinder patch, and is optimized to be used with standard 50 mm highly luminous lenses ( standing out among all the other Leica M cameras thanks to its larger VF magnification and a reference-class combination with the RF really difficult to beat when getting precise focus ), has three available specific bright frame-lines for 50 mm focal length (always visible), 90 mm and 135 mm (both of them selectable and automatically appearing in the VF on being coupled to the camera), though it needs special goggles attached to the VF to use 35 mm wideangle lenses.
On its turn, the Leica M2, introduced in 1958, is also a great camera, offered as a budget alternative to the Leica M3, features an excellent 0.72x viewfinder optimized to be used with 35 mm wideangle lenses, and sports bright-line frames for 35, 50 and 90 mm focal lenghts.
But from mid sixties, change was in the air and the Japanese sway of the SLR market was in full swing and cutting into Leica sales, because though the Leicaflex introduced in 1964 (first slr camera made by the German photographic firm) was very robust, amazingly well engineered and Leica R lenses were clearly superior, it was inevitably very expensive to manufacture, whereas the Japanese slr cameras from Nikon and Canon were excellent, had a wide assortment of very good interchangeable lenses and were accessory laden, all of it often for half the price, so they were stealing the show.
As a matter of fact, the top brass at Leica had realized from late fifties that vast majority of professional photographers would move to slr Japanese cameras in future.
And in mid sixties, the Japanese slr onslaught had already taken a significant percentage of the professional photographic market, so Leica sales in cameras and lenses had dwindled.
Anyway, in the middle of this oriental slr maelstrom and the impossibility of competing against them in price / quality ratio within this product segment, though many people thought that Leica would disappear, the German photographic firm continued to rely on its jewel of the crown breed
of Leica M cameras and lenses, so they decided to create a rangefinder camera that reached a new pinnacle of handcrafted design and performance, merging the best traits of both the Leica M3 and M2.
And they managed to attain it with the Leica M4, which was introduced in 1967, would be manufactured until 1975 and reached a total figure of 59,355 units sold (57,000 made in Wetzlar and 2,355 made in Midland, Ontario, Canada).
Such was the level of thoroughness, accuracy of components assembly and painstaking manual highly qualified labour with which the pretty robust and dependable M4 was built, that Norman Goldberg (one of the most competent Leica technicians ever, who had the first authorized Leica Repair Shop outside of Leitz, New York, and whose amazing proficiency enabled him to convert some experimental screwmount Leica IIIg to Leica M bayonet in 1957) wrote in the Popular Photography magazine of March 1968 :
" The Leica M4 is a workhorse camera, the proverbial ´money camera ´ of the professional. It will last and last, cranking out precise results after others have worn out and given up ... those who appreciate high quality for its own sake will be delighted by the M4 ".
It´s no wonder that this camera is still an analogue benchmark in many sides and has traditionally been called " The Last of the Great Leicas ".
In addition, it incorporated two new and useful features :
- A three prong film takeup arrangement making loading much easier and faster.
- An angled rapid rewind lever (instead of the rewind knob of the Leica M3 and Leica M2), making possible a much quicker way to rewind the film
CONSOLIDATION OF THE 0.72x RANGE-VIEWFINDER KEYNOTES ESTABLISHED BY WILLI KEINER IN EARLY FIFTIES
In early fifties, Willi Keiner, a great optician and matematician working at Leitz Wetzlar,
had created a viewfinder featuring a 0.72x magnification, whose main goal was to be able to add a new bright-line for 35 mm wideangle lenses, something that was not possible with the highly successful Leica M3 boasting a 0.92x VF magnification and only allowing the use 35 mm wideangle lenses with expensive, big and heavy optical viewfinder attachments or an external VF, so that range-viewfinder design was kept in reserve.
In addition, after almost three decades (between roughly 1925 and 1955) in which the standard 50 mm lenses had reigned supreme in the scopes of photojournalism, reportage and street photography, late fifties were a turning point in this regard and a period in which vast majority of photographers were massively using 35 mm wideangle lenses as main primes.
Therefore, Willi Keiner´s 0.72x VF was applied in the Leica M2, which was introduced in 1958 and boasted the wished specific bright-line frame for 35 mm wideangle lenses, in addition to the ones for 50 mm and 90 mm focal lengths, so Leica photographers could easily and accurately leverage their wideangle primes Summaron-M 35 mm f/3.5 (1954-1960), Summaron-M 35 mm f/2.8 (1958-1974), Summicron-M 35 mm f/2 (1958-1979) and screwmount Elmar 35 mm f/3.5 (1930-1950, through adapter).
It turned into general trend something that had been pioneered by Alfred Eisenstaedt in 1933, when he got his famous picture of an absent-minded young woman inside La Scala Opera House in Milan (Italy) during the premiere gala of Rimsky Korsakov´s opera " The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh " with a Leica III and a wideangle Elmar 35 mm f/3.5 lens, which had been introduced by Leitz firm one year before.
A vertical image oozing extensive depth of field that proved the great capabilities of 35 mm lenses to capture great images with much wider coverage than standard 50 mm lenses, from amazingly near distances, even in contexts of dim light, and without being detected.
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And the Leica M4 wasn´t alien at all to the widespread shift towards the wideangle 35 mm lens as the most used by professional photographers in the fields of photojournalism, reportage and street photography, in a comprehensive array of assignments, so it also sported the 0.72x range-viewfinder with the specific bright-line frames for 35 mm, 50 mm and 90 mm, but added the illuminated framing line for 135 mm lenses, visible in the middle area of the 35 mm bright-line frame.
It definitely strengthened even more Willi Keiner´s 0.72x range-viewfinder design, which has been the bread and butter one for Leica M analogue cameras since 1958, having also been adopted by every model of 24 x 36 mm format digital M cameras manufactured in XXI century.
A VERY IMPORTANT CAMERA IN THE PRESERVATION OF THE RANGEFINDER LEICA M BREED
When the Leica M4 was launched into market in 1967, Leica had clearly lost ground with respect to Japanese slr cameras in terms of sales, because those slr from Nikon, Canon and Pentax, though not reaching the extraordinary building quality of the Leica M cameras and being their very good lenses far from the superb performance of most Leica M lenses ( being purer designs, because it wasn´t necessary to save any swivelling mirror on creating them ), offered a very enticing value for money.
And inevitably, the Leica M rangefinder cameras, hand-made by very proficient and experienced Leitz craftsmen, were much more difficult and expensive to manufacture than Japanese slr cameras.
Besides, the attempts by Leitz to compete with the Japanese brands in the slr scope were being fruitless, because they had arrived a bit late to this market and didn´t have at the time the expertise they had gained since late fifties and their sprawling distribution network, particularly the visionary Joe Ehrenreich, President of Ehrenreich Photo-Optical Industries (EPOI), who had been the great promotor of Nikon in United States since 1953, without forgetting the greatinfluence of Herbert Keppler, a preeminent expert on Pentax and Nikon slr, writer, editor and camera reviewer, whose books and articles in Modern Photography and Popular Photography magazines were pivotal for the worldwide spreading of this kind of cameras.
On the other hand, though the Leica M4 sold well, its eight production years between 1967 and 1975 (with a total of 59,355 units made) were hectic, because its manufacture was briefly stopped in 1972 during the starting stage of introduction of the Leica M5 ( whose production had began in 1971, being bigger than the classic Leica M cameras, featuring less rounded contours and the first model of the M rangefinder lineage with an exposure meter), which was a financial failure, bringing about the new start of M4 construction.
But in 1975, sales began lagging again because of the rising cost of metals and components following the worldwide inflation, along with the growing popularity of Japanese single-lens reflex cameras among photographers, so sales of rangefinder Leica cameras dwindled even more and it became exceedingly difficult to make profit.
That´s why that year, the final one in which both the M4 and the M5 were manufactured, there were some meetings at the highest level between Ernst Leitz III, Ludwig Leitz, Theo Kisselbach ( Manager of the Leica Techniques Department, Founder and Director of the Leica School and Leica Schule in 1946, an authority in darkroom techniques and a top-notch teacher of photography and picture technician, who hugely enhanced the 35 mm Leica photography versatility and potential for photojournalists and science photographers worldwide, as well as searching for new scopes for 24 x 36 mm format photography) and other top Leitz technicians at Wetzlar, in which was decided to stop the production of rangefinder Leica M cameras, giving priority to the extraordinary Leicaflex SL2 camera, designed by Georg Mann and produced between 1974 and 1976.
And when that decision was about to be implemented,
Walter Kluck, a genius featuring tremendous entrepreneural know-how and experience, along with an amazing talent to estimate costs with outstanding accuracy, fought tooth and nail to
convince Leitz family in Wetzlar to take the production of Leica M rangefinder cameras to Canada, because labour costs were there lower than in Germany
and they had already a lot of experience assembling that kind of product.
Leitz family owners asked him to be able to guarantee a production of 4,000 Leica M4 per year.
Kluck made a fast tour of Leica dealers in Canada, Germany, United States, Japan and Switzerland, reporting them the future lower price of the new Leica M4 which would be made by Ernst Leitz Canada factory, and more than 9,000 cameras were ordered.
He had risen to the challenge and was granted permission to transfer all Leica M4 production tools to Canada.
That meant the beginning of the Canadian-made Leica M4-2 in 1976, which though not being such a superb camera like the previous Leica M4 made in Wetzlar (Germany), was a very good model and sported two new features : a hot shoe for flash synchronization and the capability of using a motor winder.
Walter Kluck had all the data in his mind, and knew that it was necessary to gain time to save the
Leica M line of RF camera, which was attained making the new Leica M4-2 with a lower production cost based on a cheaper and simpler manufacturing method, reducing the manual adjustments to individual parts and a number of artisan construction stages, introducing a standardized component system, creating a new rangefinder with cheapened optical elements and removing the self-timer.
Therefore, the Leica M4-2, albeit being far from the mechanical reference-class quality of the previous much more handcraftedly manufactured Leica M3, M2 and M4, became the camera that saved the Leica M rangefinder camera breed, in a risky gamble devised by a mastermind of commercial strategy, which paid off and paved the way for the introduction of the Leica M4-P in 1981, and particularly the Leica M6 in 1984, which would definitely save this Leica product division.
THREE LENSES YIELDING GREAT IMAGE QUALITY AND OOZING CHARACTER
The Summitar 5 cm f/2, Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 and Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Version 2 SEEOF bought by Martín Santos Yubero in 1967 along with the Leica M4, were top-class primes at their time and go on being today, even to modern standards, both from a mechanical and optical viewpoint, as well as delivering excellent image quality.
Obviously, on being pre aspherical designs created between 1949 and 1964, they are a far cry from more modern and technologically very advanced Leica aspherical lenses as to resolving power, contrast and uniformity of performance in center, borders and corners at every f-stop and focusing distance.
But they are three very special lenses, boasting amazing mechanical quality, and the image aesthetics they generate exude character, specially the Summitar 5 cm f/2 and the Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Version 2 SEEOF when used at their widest apertures.
a) Summitar 5 cm f/2 :
A legendary 7 elements in 4 groups lens designed by Max Berek in 1937 and produced between 1939 and 1955 in three versions :
- The uncoated one, manufactured between 1939 and 1946, optimized for black and white film and featuring a 10 blades diaphragm.
- The single coated one with magnesium fluoride, also featuring a 10 blade diaphragm, optimized for colour film and made between november of 1945 and 1950.
- The single coated one with magnesium fluoride, sporting a diaphragm with a set of 6 outward curving blades (instead of the diaphragm with a flat set of 10 blades of the two first versions), giving an hexagonal opening similar to the diaphragm of the previous Summar 5 cm f/2 (1932-1939), and manufactured between 1950 and 1953.
The most significant aspect of its optical formula in comparison to the Summar 5 cm f/2 was the new and much bigger front element (5.5 mm larger), split into two thin cemented elements of different glasses, which brought about a major improvement resulting in less flare, much lower vignetting in the corners at widest aperture (thanks to the symbiosis with a rear element that was enlarged nearly 2 mm) and an apparent reduction in some optical aberrations that had affected the Summar 5 cm f/2.
Performance-wise, the image quality delivered by this lens is superb between f/4 and f/8, very good at f/2.8 and good (though soft in the corners) at widest f/2 aperture, but yielding a wonderful bokeh, which is its most important hallmark, being considered among the classic Leica benchmarks regarding the beauty of out of focus areas, often depicted with a unique impressionistic image aesthetics if adequate backgrounds are chosen.
The single-coated Summitar 5 cm f/2 Versions 2 and 3 were the first lenses with which Leica managed to approach very much the image quality (in addition to outperforming them in bokeh)
delivered by the 7 elements in 3 groups Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 5 cm f/1.5 and the 6 elements in 3 groups Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar 5 cm f/2, designed by Ludwig Bertele in 1932, and which had been the best standard 50 mm lenses in the world for twenty-one years, until the introduction of the 7 elements in 6 groups collapsible Leitz Summicron 50 mm f/2 in 1953.
b) Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 :
Manufactured between 1963 and 1980, it features 8 elements in 4 groups and was a stellar performer at the time being, to such an extent that though subsequently beaten by much modern designs like the Summilux-M 21 mm f/1.4 ASPH (2008) and the Super-Elmar-M 21 mm f/3.4 ASPH (2011), it is optically slightly better (although about one stop slower) than the Elmarit-M 21 mm f/2.8 produced between 1980 and 1997, being still currently a top-class extreme wide angle lens yielding excellent image quality.
This lens featuring tremendous depth of field was created by Schneider-Kreuznach according to Leitz specifications, whose most important goals were to improve the previous 9 elements in 4 groups Super-Angulon 21 mm f/4 (1958-1963) symmetrical design in flatter field and less illumination falloff,
as well as begetting a similar but more symmetrical optical scheme with only 8 elements (instead of the 9 of its predecessor, so it achieved a superior transmission of light) in 4 groups and a bigger front element.
On the other hand, the Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 was likewise bettered in its mechanical construction, with a parallel mount which didn´t rotate and enabled the coupling of a very useful rectangular lens hood coming with the lens and not intruding into the frame of the brightline viewfinder.
Regarding the distortion correction, as happened with its f/4 predecessor, it is excellent and praiseworthy for such an extreme wide angle lens.
At normal picture taking distances, the Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 is quite sharp in center, borders and corners, even at its largest apertures, with only a minimal amount of falloff being visible in the corners at f/3.4, which is reduced to negligible levels at f/4.
In addition, the flat field boasted by this lens generates sharp corners with the diaphragm wide open.
Needless to say that it is an excellent all-round superwide lens for the Leica M4 and other Leica M rangefinder cameras, with a remarkable versatility in landscape photography, indoor photography, reportage of events and many other assignments, all of it enhanced by the rectangular shade lacking viewfinder cutoff and making possible the attaching of filters.
The Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 is quite sharp and relatively reflection free at every aperture,
and since it isn´t a retrofocus design, it is possible to shoot handheld with it at long shutter speeds, thanks to the very short distance between its main plane (where the diaphragm is placed) and the film.
That distance is less than half of the one in a standard 50 mm lens, so the Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 can be used hand and wrist in the same light as a 50 mm f/1.4 lens.
That´s to say, where a 50 mm prime might be used shooting handheld at 1/60 s at f/1.4, the 21 mm lens can be used in the same way shooting at f/3.4.
The upshot of it is that the Super-Angulon-M 21 mm f/3.4 is a compact ( maximum diameter x length of 52.5 x 51 mm and a weight of 260 g) and outstanding picture taker, with very good slow shutter speed performance shooting handheld in poor light, remarkable correction of distortion, well controlled reflections and a minimum focusing distance of 0.4 meters, ensuring sharp focus at close distances.
c) Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEOOF :
Created at the Ernst Leitz Canada factory in Midland, Ontario, by the great lens designer Walter Mandler and produced between 1959 and 1979,
the 6 elements in 5 groups and 15 blade diaphragm Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF had a different optical formula in comparison to the screwmount Summicron 90 mm f/2 First Version SOOZI manufactured in 1957, in addition to including a new lighter focusing mount and a built-in extendible lens shade.
Its performance is outstanding, and was the best 90 mm lens in the world during 21 years, until it was replaced in 1980 by the 5 elements in 4 groups and 11 blade diaphragm Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Third Version (1980-1998), also designed by Walter Mandler.
The Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF delivers a great image quality in the center, even at f/2 (widest aperture in which the performance in the corners is a bit soft), reaching its sweet spot at f/5.6, where its resolving power and contrast are excellent.
Regarding vignetting, it is very well controlled, with a little amount of it visible at full f/2 aperture, but disappearing at f/2.8.
It is a very sharp lens sporting big dimensions ( 102.5 mm length with hood retracted, 127 mm length with it extended and a maximum diameter of 65.30 mm, and a weight of 635.4 g).
Anyway, the most defining feature of this telephoto lens is its strong character and the very nice vintage aesthetics of image it exhibits in portraits made at f/2, highlighting the subjects and rendering the out of focus areas with a wonderful dreamy bokeh.
Because to all intents and purposes, this lens was designed for portraiture, a scope in which it excels, thanks to the very wise optical formula devised by the optical wizard Walter Mandler with a unique balance of some optical aberrations intentionally preserved in specific degrees, in symbiosis with the amber and magenta single-coating,
resulting in images oozing a distinct and exceedingly beautiful vintage look at widest f/2 aperture, with skin tones glowing, flaws softened and a kind of oil painting bokeh, both with black and white and colour films, whereas at f/2.8-4 image quality is excellent and superb from f/5.6 onwards, with remarkable microcontrast and lavish detail.
On the other hand, the Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF boasts a very long focusing helicoid, enabling to get fairly accurate focus in subjects faces when doing portraits.
And if that weren´t enough, its utterly metallic mechanical construction is simply superb, made of chromed brass, exuding first-class craftsmanship and ravishing cosmetic beauty,
with the added bonus of a sturdy tripod socket, since this highly luminous lens was also created to harness the Leica Visoflex system turning a Leica M rangefinder camera into a reflex one, simply unscrewing the lens head and installing the Visoflex I or II accessories, to use medium and long telephoto lenses.
The Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF is a good example of how Leica would evolve in terms of progressive reduction of size, weight and number of elements, while significantly improving the optical performance, in its legendary assortment of M lenses for its rangefinder cameras.
Because one of the most defining aspects of Leica M lenses from 1953 hitherto has been their design and manufacture with fewer and fewer elements, along with very small size, weight and incredibly short lens front diameter.
And this is the greatest challenge to create top-notch quality lenses delivering extraordinary
image quality, much easier to design and produce with larger front diameters, bigger dimensions and more weight.
In this regard, the evolution of 90 mm f/2 Leica M lenses has been breathtaking since 1980, year in which was introduced
the Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Third Version (1980-1998),
featuring 5 elements in 4 groups (one element less than the Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Second Version SEEOF), an aperture with 11 blades, a length of 77 mm from flange, a diameter of 67 mm and a weight of 483 g (152.4 g less than the previoius version).
Id est, being smaller, lighter and with a shorter front element diameter than the second version,
this third version of the Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 is a better lens in terms of resolving power — it reaches 100 pairs of lines per millimeter — , contrast and uniformity of performance at every diaphragm and focusing distance, yielding a superior image quality, as well as generating an also very nice bokeh in portrait photography
and likewise boasting a superb mechanical construction.
And in 1998, Leica overcame itself, launching into market the fabulous Apo-Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 ASPH
featuring 5 elements (one of them being a ground aspherical surface) in 5 groups and 11 blades, with a length of 77.3 mm from flange, a diameter of 64 mm and a weight of 472 g.
This is a stratospheric lens delivering second to none resolving power, contrast and uniformity of performance in center, borders and corners, to such an extent that on stopping down, the photographer will only gain depth of field, remaining the impressive image quality practically the same as when shooting at widest f/2 aperture.
All of it reducing 3 mm the diameter with respect to the previous non aspherical Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 Version 3 (1980-1998) and with 11 g less.
The design and manufacture of this reference-class in sharpness lens within its focal length, in which apochromatic correction and an aspherical surface were combined for the first time, was one of the greatest achievements in the history of photographic optics, because it was a clear departure from the previous non aspherical Leica 90 mm f/2 primes, beating them by far in every conceivable side (with the exception of dreamy bokeh at full aperture, in which Mandler´s versions 2 and 3 still have the upper hand), since it was designed by Lothar Kölsch, Director of the Leica Design Department created by him, which worked during 1990-2002 and became a competence center for aspherical technology, and had in its staff three further world-class optical designers : Sigrun Kammans (designer of the excellent Vario-Apo-Elmarit-R 70-180 mm f/2.8), Peter Karbe (currently the best optical designer in the world) and Horst Schröder (creator of the 01, 02, 03 and other analysis programs that were important tools for optical designing).
Therefore, the Apo-Summicron-M 90 mm f/2 ASPH meant a quantum leap in comparison to the previous three versions of Leica M 90 mm f/2, because Lothar Kölsch´s breakthrough design included his signature, the pivotal gist of aspheric metrology he had greatly pioneered at the helm of the aforementioned team of optical designers, who was the best ever.
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