Super-Vario-Elmar — Daily Dose of Chemo

I had always been fond of wide-angle photography. It gives a different perspective and captures the essence of what was going on surrounding you better than just a standard lens. That also explains my preference to 35 mm to 50 mm as my standard prime lens.

I have a few selections of other lens for my Sony - the Batis 18mm f2.8 -, Fuji - the 10-23mm f4 - and the GoPro.

The famous crossing in front of Pavilion

A couple of months ago, I acquired this wide-angle zoom for my CL - the Leica Super-Vario-Elmar-TL. The range was 11 mm to 23 mm on the crop factor sensor, delivering the equivalence of 16 to 35 mm on full frame. Not exactly the fastest lens with aperture ranging from f3.5 to f4.5. But you are supposed to use this lens at f8 anyway. So that would do.

How good is this lens? It was amazing! I reckon that it had easily out-resolutioned the CL sensor at f8. At wide open, it gives this lovely distortion which screamed wide-angle. Add to that the secret sauce which only Leica could deliver in terms of colour rendition. And you have a winner.

It was not the most compact of zoom lenses but attached the CL, it gives a nice balance. Leica managed to cut the weight down by not having any image stabilisation on the lens. Autofocus is snappy and accurate. The zoom ring is typical Leica with enough give.

Unfortunately I feel that the construction should be better. This lens was made in Japan rather than Germany. The hood which came with the lens also feels cheap and plasticky. The focusing manually is also done by wire rather than mechanical. I therefore use this lens on autofocus most of the time.

I can't fault the results however. And certainly with the amount of money I invested in this lens, it certainly brought back in the value.