I’ve used their Kiboko 30L bag for some time (my review here), and while this bag is great when I need to carry everything but the kitchen sink, there are times where it is not the ideal bag. One of these instances is when I need to fly on regional jets, carry a basic camera kit, laptop, and also desire to carry my clothes on the plane in my carry-on. With the Kiboko, I am either forced to put my laptop in a sleeve in my carry-on, which is less than ideal, or carry a separate laptop bag and check my clothes.

The Gura Gear Chobe 19-24L deals with this situation nicely, especially when I don’t need to carry my entire camera kit on the plane.

The Gura Gear folks sent me out a bag for review right around the time that I was covering an event, which required me to travel on a regional jet. This was the perfect opportunity to see how the bag faired as a travel companion.

My conclusions about this bag are nothing but positive, and I will save you the re-posting of specs about the bag because you can read them easily on Gura Gear’s excellent website. In this review, I want to focus my time on specific reasons why this bag should be on your shoulder, rather than a simple rewriting of specifications and metrics about the bag itself.

But before we begin, I should give you a brief introduction to the bag. The Chobe is a shoulder bag about the size of a laptop briefcase. There is a nice rear compartment that is padded and will fit up to a 15” MacBook Pro.  There is a center section that holds a removable padded camera insert. If the camera insert is not used, the bag can be compressed using a zipper. When the bag is compressed, the internal volume is 19L. When it is expanded, the volume is 24L. This is where the 19-24L comes from in the title.

In addition to the laptop and camera sections, there are two pouches on the front that have lots of pockets, and some depth to hold chargers, memory cards etc. The bag is very lightweight, thanks to the fabric that is used in its construction.

So, after arriving back from my trip using the bag, I can safely say that this is the best shoulder bag I have ever used (camera or otherwise), and would highly recommend picking one up.  As a general reaction, here are 10 reasons why this bag deserves A+ marks in my book.

10. The Chobe is a tool for multiple tasks
Because this bag has both a removable divider and can be compressed, it can take the place of two bags in your closet: A dedicated photo/laptop bag, and an everyday laptop bag. Anytime I can replace two items with one, I am happy.

9. It is small enough to utilize as a “personal item” when traveling by plane
Airline regulations are getting ever more strict, and photographers everyway have nightmares about the dreaded “gate check” when traveling on small planes. The Chobe is small enough that it will fit underneath the seat of the smallest plane (see picture below). You gear will never be far away from you, which is a good thing.

8. It has a padded laptop sleeve doesn’t require a separate sleeve
Simplicity is good. I like that I can slide my laptop in the Chobe without needing to use or purchase a separate sleeve. Extra sleeves and fabric means more weight, and my bag is heavy enough when I am carrying my full camera kit and laptop.

7. The iPad can fit in the back pouch
The Chobe has a back pouch that allows you to slip the bag over rolling luggage. It also conveniently fits an iPad. This allows me to have quick access to my iPad without having to dig around in the bag. This is especially useful on a plane.

6. A Water Bottle pouch is found on the outside of the bag
This is a nice touch. I am already carrying my carry-on and this bag, having to carry around a water bottle or soda in my hands makes it difficult to navigate getting things in and out of my bag, or dealing with my tickets. Being able to slip my water into a pouch on the side of the bag and have both of my hands free is a very good thing.

5. It is lightweight
Camera and computer gear is heavy, especially when you try to load it all up in one bag. The Chobe weights 3 lbs, or 4 lbs with the insert. This is 2-3 lbs lighter than most other offerings. Every pound of savings is worth its weight in gold when you are running around the airport.

4. It holds 70-200mm lens with hood reversed
The camera divider will accept my 70-200mm telephoto lens positioned straight up and down. Many other bags like this have a difficult time dealing with this particular lens. Since this lens always comes with me to events, I am happy that the Chobe can accommodate this lens easily.

3. It’s easy to work out of
The zipper that allows access to the photo divider is easy to grab thanks to its grippy rubberized pulls. Once the bag is open, it is easy to grab lenses out, or place them back in. This is true even when the bag is on my shoulder.  It is a rare treat that a bag made for transport can also pull double duty as a shooting bag (try that with a backpack!).

2. It holds a TON of stuff
On my test trip, I carried way too much in this bag: 2x D700 camera bodies, 24-70mm, 70-200mm, 20 and 50mm lenses, a SB-900 flash, extra AA batteries, CF cards, an iPad, MacBook Pro 15”, chargers, cords and tons of accessories. Everything fits inside the Chobe. I could make the bag too heavy before I could max out the capacity.

1. It doesn’t look like I am carrying thousands of dollars of camera equipment
I believe this is probably one of the biggest reasons to check this bag out. It looks like an ordinary business bag from the outside. That is a good thing. It is stylish enough to wear or carry while wearing a suit, and casual enough for a pair of jeans. It will blend into your surroundings and not draw too much attention. And just because it looks conservative on the outside, doesn’t mean it isn’t protective either. At no point in my trip did I every worry about the safety of my gear.

So there you are: Ten reasons that you are going to want to get this bag. I highly recommend you read more about the Chobe and consider picking one up. It is one of the few bags I’ve used that I basically have no complaints about. Well done, Gura Gear.

The image below was shot during Erica and Nathan’s wedding. I used two off camera lights bounced off the side walls of the ceremony site to add some nice directional light and offset the strong backlight coming from the windows up front. Without off-camera flash and an understanding of balancing light, this image would not have been possible. The key to consistently using off-camera flash is to have a dependable flash, power, and modifier system that you are comfortable using every time you shoot. In this article, I’ll walk you through one such system.

Zack Arias’ top notch One Light DVD seminar and supplemental field guide are high quality photographic lighting resources and I highly recommend you picking them up. After watching Arias on his Creative Live lighting seminar (I watched it live, but you can purchase the course at this link), I wondered: What was the actual total cost to put together his recommended kit?

So I worked my way through it…

[If you want to purchase any of these items I've provided direct B&H links. I appreciate if you use my links, the small income generated by the link helps to keep allowing me to write articles like this - Thanks!]

Lightstand – Bigger IS better

Zack first talks about getting a sturdy stand. I couldn’t agree more. He recommends an Avenger 10.5′ stand. At B&H this is the Avenger 35 Baby Aluminum. There is nothing baby about it though. It’s in 4 sections so it folds down pretty small.  It is $138.80.

Umbrellas – The value modifier

Zack next talks about the umbrella modifiers, he uses a 60″ convertible umbrella. I also like to use a slightly smaller 45″ shoot-through. The umbrellas are reasonably priced at $40 for the 60″ and $25 for the 45″.  I actually recommend buying two 60″ umbrellas and keeping one in bounce mode and one in shoot through mode. This makes for easy on-location lighting modifier choices. They are so inexpensive, why not. Thats $105.00 in umbrellas.

Softboxes – Ultimate in lighting control

Zack likes to use the Westcott softboxes, both the 28″ and the 50″ Apollo. These are nice because they are relatively inexpensive and fit on a umbrella adaptor. The 28″ is $114.95 and the big 50″ is $252.50. They are on my short list of things to buy – especially the big 50″.

To mount your strobe on the Avenger stand you need the Manfrotto umbrella adaptor ($33.10) and a stroboframe cold shoe ($8.95). These two items are absolutely mandatory. Do not try to save money by buying cheaper stuff than this – you will be sorry.

Triggers

To trigger your strobe you’ll need Pocket Wizard Plus IIs (at least 3 of them, 1 as a backup). These are $169 each for a total of $507.00. To connect the pocketwizard to the strobe I suggest using Flash Zebra locking PC Cables. It’s good to have 3 of these too. These will set you back $45 dollars – Total $549.00.

An alternative to using pocket wizards is the very capable Phottix Strato triggers (Check out my review). A set of four will set you back a grand total of $170 which includes shipping and 4 locking PC Cables. You need 2 receivers and 2 transmitters, a backup of each in case something breaks. Going this route is $379 different from the PW Plus IIs…that’s a tough call because $379 is the price of an Alien Bee 1600.

While Pocket Wizards are the industry standard, the Stratos are very very good.

A bag to keep everything organized

To keep everything organized I suggest checking out the largest sandbagger roller – the 13 model. This is $94.95. This fits the umbrellas, softboxes, and lightstand.

The damages.

So the total cost (not includes your 2 strobes) is – $1300.25 which is about the cost of a used 50mm f/1.2 or 70-200 f/2.8 IS/VR I lens. If you go with the Stratos instead of the PW Plus IIs you are looking at $921.25.

Now on to the flashes.

For flashes you have a number of options. Zack recommends getting a used Nikon SB-80dx (Ebay, etc). This is good for studio work where you are solely using manual flash, but for wedding work, you really need to have the flexibility of on-camera TTL some of the time. This puts you at either getting 2 used SB-800s or 2 new SB-900s

I say 2 because you need a backup in case anything goes wrong.

To power the SB-900/800 I highly recommend checking out Al Jacobs’ “Black Box” flash battery and companion Quantum cable. This is what batteries are suppose to be like. The sealed lead acid cell is separate from the camera – and the quantum cable replaces the AA cells in the flash for better heat dissipation. No more dealing with tons of rechargeable AAs that need to be replaced every year.

Al Jacbos sells his batteries for $200 including re-wiring a Quantum cable to work with his pack. The Quantum cables are a tab pricey, though (like everything Quantum makes). Two Quantum cables will set you back $156. This puts the battery pack for two flashes running around $356. Not bad.

Just park the off-camera flash connected to the battery pack and pocketwizard and you are set for the night.

Storing it all

All of this gear now fits neatly in my Gura Gear Kiboko Backpack – Review Here. I’m trimming down my stuff even more, so I’m dropping the lumedyne light and going with the 2 SB-900 flashes and the external battery pack for everything except family formals (I’ll keep the lumedyne in the car as a backup).

I can carry all of these items in my backpack and sandbagger by myself to a shoot. This is very efficient and only needs one trip to the car.

Al Jacobs also markets and sells his “perfection” bracket, a double-strobe mount bracket that is perfect for the reception. By putting two flashes on the bracket instead of one, you can run each at a lower power meaning recycle times are lower and batteries last longer. The Black Box battery can power two SB-900 flashes from the same cell and both triggers can mount on stroboframe cold shoes.

Adding this rig to your lighting setup will require another cold shoe as it mount directly to the Manfrotto umbrella adaptor.

Bigger Lights

For a larger studio strobe, Zack suggests using Paul C Buff Alien Bee equipment. This is too big for me, personally. I’d rather use my small lumedyne setup – the 065 pack with micro battery, 800 Ws head and coiled cable. The downside of this unit is the limited power settings – you only have 50, 100, or 200 Ws, meaning you may have trouble turning the power down low enough in some situations.

As a result, I only use this light to fill in shadows/balance outside, and for family formals, when I want to shoot at f/5.6 ot f/8. The rest of the day I’m using the SB-900 flashes.

I would look around the usual places (Ebay, FredMiranda, KEH, Getdpi) for used Lumedynes. I got my entire system for a very reasonable price.

Summary

I wanted to take the time to write a few words about one of my favorite purchases last year and certainly the product with, IMO, the best cost/value ratio of any products in its class.

I’m talking about the Phottix Strato wireless flash triggers. These triggers are 2.4 GHz wireless RF flash triggers and consist of a “transmitter” unit which sits on your camera’s hot shoe and a “receiver” unit which attaches to your flash in a number of ways.

If you read on you’ll find out why these particular units are special – and it’s not just their $83.00/pair price.

This review will cover the triggers, an outdoor distance test, as well as a test of the trigger’s max sync speed.

Where to I get them?

The best way to purchase these triggers is directly from Phottix, who are based in Hong Kong. They accept paypal, and ship them out quickly. It took around 10 days to get from HK to my house here in Omaha, NE. Not too bad.

Why should I buy them instead of the industry-standard Pocket Wizards?

Well, only you can decide that, but I have found that the Phottix Strato triggers are as reliable as the Pocket Wizard Plus IIs (which I have since sold) at a fraction of the price. Pocket Wizard Plus IIs (B&H) are $169/each. You need a minimum of 4 to trigger 2 flashes (3 units + 1 backup, so that is an investment of $676). If you purchase 3 sets of Strato triggers (3 receivers, 3 transmitters), your investment is $249.

That’s not the whole story though. With pocket wizards you need to purchase lanyards, and sync cords separately and there is no way to attach an on-camera flash while also triggering an off-camera flash without mounting the Plus II to the bottom of your camera, or velcro’d to the top of your flash. The Phottix Strato kit comes with EVERYTHING you need to trigger you flash. It’s really a substantial savings.

For me, I’m all about maximizing the quality of my dollars spent on camera equipment, and the $500 + savings of the Phottix vs. Pocket Wizard system was a no brainer for me.

Well, let’s take a look at what comes with your Phottix Strato trigger kit.

What’s in the box?

Above: Here is how the box looks when you get them from Phottix. You need to make sure that you pick the right version to match that camera that you wish to use the triggers with, to ensure that you get the proper cables from Phottix.

Above: What’s in the box. You’ll notice right aware the the triggers come ready to use, with everything that you’ll need to get up and running and triggering your flashes. Unlike Pocket Wizard Plus II triggers, which are transceivers (i.e. the trigger can be used for triggering or receiving the trigger), the Phottix Strato triggers have a dedicated transmitter and receiver module. Normally, units like this will require the transmitter unit to need a special watch battery. This is very very bad IMO.

This is the main reason I will not buy the Cybersyncs, for example. The Pocket Wizards are the best because they use AA batteries, which I carry tons of during a shoot. The Stratos have the next best thing: both the trasmitter and receiver use AAA batteries, which I can charge in my 15-minute charger on location so no worries. This is a logical design parameter, and I’m glad Phottix got it right.

You’ll also notice that cables and lanyards are included with the kit. This is a nice touch. The Strato kit includes 2 lanyards, a LOCKING-PC cable (details below), a 1/8″ TS (tip-sleeve) cable for studio strobes (with 1/4″ TS adaptor) and a dedicated shutter trigger cable. That’s a lot of stuff to include for the $83 price.

Above: Here is the transmitter. The plastic that the unit is made out of is very nice. Nothing feels cheap and the trigger mounts to your camera with a metal hot shot plate. This is awesome. SB-900s flashes are very heavy, it’s good to know that everything is metal. That’s the other special feature of these triggers while I’m thinking about it – you can mount a flash on-camera and the Strato transmitter will pass through TTL info WHILE TRIGGERING A MANUAL STROBE. This is awesome!

This means for a wedding reception, I can set up a manual strobe and trigger that at the same manual power level every time while keeping an on-camera TTL SB-900 which will adjust to my foreground lighting needs. Fantastic.

You have the choice of 4 transmission channels and also the options of transmitting the trigger signal on all 4-channels. This is another awesome feature because it means you can set up different groups of lights on different channels, set the power levels of your strobes individually, and then when you are happy flip the “All” switch on and fire all channels.

Above: This is the transmitter unit with the battery door removed. Both the transmitter and receiver operate on standard AAA batteries. Very smart, Phottix. You can also see the substantial metal shoe and thumb screw to lock the trigger to the camera. Everything is very well made.

Above: Here is the receiver unit. It is a little bit different than the transmitter. It has a plastic shoe as well as a 1/4″ threaded metal tap for mounting on a monopod or light stand. On the right you can see 3 1/8″ ports: 1) an external 5v power supply port, 2) the PC port for triggering a flash and 3) the shutter release port if you are using the trigger to trip a remote camera. You can’t see it the best but on the side there is a slider switch to pick which channel you’d like the receiver to operate on as well as an on/off switch. You need to turn off the receiver when you’re not using it or you’ll drain the batteries. This is not the case for the transmitter.

The LED on the top of the receiver will blink green when it is ready to be triggered (on). Also you can see where I’ve mounted a piece of velcro to the battery door. I velcro the receiver to my strobe to keep it from hanging and possibly putting strain on the cable.

Above: Attention to detail makes the Phottix Strato trigger a step above the rest – if you have a strobe that need a PC sync cable (a light that can’t mount to a hot-shoe, for example), the threaded PC cord allows you to lock the cable to the PC port. Thank you. All PC cables should be like this.

All and all, there is nothing that I would change about the triggers. Obviously having a transceiver module would be better, but we can’t have everything…

So all of this build quality and included features are all well and good, but that doesn’t really mean anything if they don’t perform…

Performance

“Scientific” test method for determining useable triggering distance was as follows: I set up a Nikon SB-900 (B&H) on my trusty Avenger Baby 35 stand (B&H) with the Phottix Strato receiver and triggered the flash, moving back 50′ each time. I stopped when I was no longer to get 3 out of 4 shutter releases to trigger the flash. Here is one frame from trigger-distances from 50′ – 450′.

At 450′ I was unable to get 3/4 of the shutter releases to trigger the flash. 450′ is a mega-operating-distance and exceeds what Phottix specs the distance at (100 meters, 328 feet). Pretty impressive.

Flash Sync Speed

Another important performance test is that I should be able to get a clean sync at 1/250s shutter speed (the max sync speed of my d700 camera). Anything less and you are severely comprising the usability of a flash (especially a AA-powered one) to overpower daylight as shutter speed controls ambient light.

I apologize for the boring subject matter but this shows the max sync performance – the left frame was taken with a shutter speed of 1/320s and the right was at 1/250s. You can see the shutter in the left frame (because we are operating past the max sync speed). At 1/250s we have a nice clean sync. Perfect.

The amount of frame darkening at 1/320s is not that bad either, and if you turn the camera upside down so that the shutter darkening is in the sky where your subject would not be lit with flash, that would be perfectly acceptable. You might look a bit funny though with an upside down camera…

Conclusion

These triggers are brilliant. They work perfectly, they have robust construction, and they are a true value. They use AAA batteries, they come with all the cords you need right out of the box, and they will pass TTL info through a camera-mounted flash.

I think they are the perfect wireless trigger for anyone, UNLESS you really, really, need the wireless TTL control afforded by the new Pocket Wizard TT1/TT5 system (B&H) or need to work with a bunch of other photographers that already have a Pocket Wizard Plus II system (event work for example). I wouldn’t waste my time on any of the other off-brand wireless triggers – unless you have Alien Bees lights that have the plug-in cyber-sync receiver, or if you are lucky enough to have a Phase One Air Grip that triggers Profoto Lights. Mmm Profoto…anyways I digress.

Buy them.

I just received a new photo backpack for review from the good folks at Gura Gear. If you know me, you know that I am a bit picky about my luggage, especially my camera bags. Will this bag pass the test?

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko Backpack: A large and lightweight camera bag.

My current gear that I travel to each wedding or photo shoot with is in two bags: The Think Tank Photo Airport Airstream (Camera + Lenses), and the Tamrac 608 (Lighting Kit). Now while I do love the Airstream, being a wheeled bag, it is quite heavy when loaded up.

When I first picked the Gura Gear backpack out of the shipping box I was stunned just how light this thing is: 4 lbs. The Airstream (Think Tank’s smallest roller) is over 10 lbs – more than twice the weight of the Gura.

So before I get into to my personal opinions about the Kiboko let’s go over some of the basic specs:

Kiboko Bag Specs and Features:

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko front view.

Now what is cool about the Kiboko is that the bag actually has a butterfly opening which reveals what is in either half of the bag. This is different than other bags where the full front opens with a giant flap that has the potential to pick up dust or dirt from the ground. The Gura Gear’s fabric on the flaps will never touch the ground.

Gura Gear keeps the weight of the bag down by using very cool materials. The fabric that they use for the bag is Dimensional Polyant VX-21 sail cloth – the same material that is used for America’s Cup race sails! Pretty cool! The material is very comparable to high-end ultra-light backpacking packs – think Osprey or Arcteryx for example.

The material has a slight sheen to it and has a hatched pattern – the hatching reinforces the material and makes it more durable. This is a small thing but the material will not pick up dust in the same way that 1000d Cordura (which has a slight texture to it) will. I believe this will help the Kiboko continue looking good for years to come.

Harness System -

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko backpack harness.

Usually light weight means giving up on the backpack harness. Also, I have pretty much sworn off of photo backpacks because of their abysmal harnesses.

Even heavy weight packs from such vendors like lowepro, tarmac, and think tank have much to be desired in terms of designing a harness that will fit my rather long torso (I am usually a long torso in a hiking backpack).

I am glad to say that the harness on the Kibok0 is both very high quality, includes load-lifter straps and lumbar support.

While the fit is not perfect (I would certainly get a long torso model if they offered it) it is much better than nearly every camera backpack I’ve tried.

The Kiboko includes two well-padded and reinforced grab handles both on the top and on the side of the pack. When the backpack harness is not in use it can be very neatly stowed in the back of the bag.

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko padded and angled grab handle.

The harness unclips from the load lifers and hip straps (using 6 high-quality buckles) and tucks neatly into a zipped pouch. This means when traveling or working out of the bag you don’t need to worry about the straps catching on anything. Also, having the harness stowed provides additional padding to the gear inside the bag.

Zippers are large and very high quality – zipper pulls are rubberized and rigid to create a loop. These make the opening and closing of each pouch easy, even with gloves on. These are the same, or nearly the same zipper pulls that Osprey uses on their packs. They are used to allow opening of the zippers with padded gloves on.

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko top handle and zipper pulls.

Pockets -

The bag includes two large pockets with plenty of high-quality velcro dividers for cameras, lenses, and even lighting equipment. It also includes two smaller pockets on top which fit triggers, flashes, memory cards and misc. items. The right pocket includes a deployable rain cover.

There are two side pockets which can fit a water bottle or a tripod/monopod or even small light stand.

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko front view.

Use for the Wedding Photographer -

The Kiboko is able to handle very large glass and pro camera bodies – for example you can fit a Nikon D3 and 500mm lens in one side and a Nikon D3 and 600mm lens in the other! Most wedding photographers will not carry glass that large, but rather use the ample space for a full assortment of camera, lighting, and backup gear reducing the need for multiple bags.

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko details of pockets and zippers.

I am currently carrying in my Think Tank Bag (B&H Links):

and In my Tamrac 608 Bag

I am happy to say that I am able to store the entire contents of BOTH bags into the Kiboko. That is incredible to me. By doing that I am saving nearly 10 lbs. Not having the roller or tarmac 608 means 10 lbs. less of stuff to carry around. Also having 1 bag means a free hand to carry my light stand and modify bag.

I am able to carry my lenses with the lens hoods reversed, something I was not able to do in the Think Tank Airstream Bag.

In Think Tank’s defense, there are several advantages to the Airstream bag, namely:

This is not a 100% fair comparison, as each bag is meant for a different purpose but for me, I am at a crossroads: do I sell my Tamrac and Think Tank and replace them both with the Gura Gear?

Well the answer for me is a solid yes! I am also trying to find ways to get the same job done with less gear, so having 1 item that takes the place of 2 and saving 10 lbs in the process is reason enough for me to switch. Also knowing that a Wedding is a fast-paced environment that often has me packing up quick and moving fast, having a single lightweight backpack that is also EASY TO WORK OUT OF will make me more efficient, less stressed, and serve me better.

Video Overview -

Here is me going through unloading my Gura Gear backpack loaded up with the above equipment listed (which was currently residing in the Think Tank and Tamrac bags):

http://vimeo.com/18331570

What about your laptop?

One thing I should note is that the Gura Gear Kiboko DOES NOT have provisions for holding a laptop, an item I bring to every wedding (for backing up cards, making slideshows, posting sneak peaks to Facebook etc.). This is a good thing, though,  as adding a padded laptop sleeve would have added more weight to the bag and made the bag less versatile.

I have a nice Brenthaven laptop bag that holds my laptop, charger and computer items separate from my camera items. This bag stays in my trunk until the reception typically.

So long story short, the lack of a laptop pocket does not bother me – this is a camera bag and a very fine one at that.

I highly recommend this bag for Wedding photographers as well as other photographers. It is one of those products that just gets everything right. Well – almost everything.

Above: Gura Gear Kiboko logo and bottom.

My one small suggestion would be to add 2 reinforced d-rings to the side of the bag with the handle to give the photographer the option of carrying the bag like a large briefcase or carry-on bag.

This small addition would make the bag nearly perfect in my eyes.

The Gura Gear Kiboko is available for 399.99 from the Gura Gear website. While 399.99 may seem steep it is very comparable to the price of high quality backpacking packs made of similar expensive fabric. I do not believe it to be overpriced.

A big thanks goes out to Andy Biggs the creator of the bag for sending one out for me to review.

Plug -

Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

It’s very easy for you to build up an off-camera flash kit that’s efficient enough to work in the darkest of reception halls, yet portable enough to bring anywhere.

For a minimal investment you can really  increase the quality and consistency of your photos.

Off-camera flash does not need to be hard, complicated, need AC power, or confusing.  Hopefully this article can help. Products that are listed are based on what I have experience with, what I know works and what I suggest. Feel free to modify the system based on your specific photographic needs.

Off-camera lighting used for this wedding portrait. I had a 43" shoot-through umbrella boomed camera right on a monopod.

Look at the above portrait from Ben and Meghan’s awesome Omaha Wedding at St. John’s Church on the Creighton University Campus. These are the types of things you can do with off-camera flash. Many times your bride and groom will want a portrait in difficult or harsh light and all you can do is get them in the shade, control the light and then sculpt it to your liking.

Get them in the shade!

This was in the harshest light of the afternoon sun and I knew it would be difficult to expose for the couple without blowing out the doors of the church.

I used an off-camera flash boomed on a monopod firing through a 43″ shoot-through umbrella. It was to the right of my camera pointing at their faces. I went right to my max sync speed (1/250s on my Nikon d700) and tried f/8. Too bright. Quick flip of the aperture dial to f/10 and we were spot on! This took a total of 30 seconds and we got a great shot.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

It’s time for you to go shopping!

It’s really super easy for you to put together a portable off-camera kit to work for your wedding photography. This is a minimal kit that can get you through a full wedding with just one light. Simple and minimal means you’ll use it more and maybe forgo on-camera bounce flash for your next wedding.

Here is what you’ll need. (I’ve attached B&H links, my favorite camera store, for the following items).

• First a well-made case. I highly recommend the Tenba TTP46 TriPak. It’s well made. Padded and can hold everything below. Kind of pricey, but worth it. – $154.96
• 11′ Light Stand. Be ready for everything. I love avenger products – Avenger A0035B Baby Alu Stand 35. They seem to be made more heavy-duty than most. – $138.81
• 60″ Photoflex Bounce Umbrella – 60″ is big enough to light the largest of groups in a wedding situation, and is perfect for soft light on your couple. – $37.95
• Stroboframe Flash Mount Adaptor – cold shoe to mount your flash. – $8.95
• Manfrotto Swivel Umbrella Adaptor – This allows you to mount an umbrella shaft and tilt the position of the flash and umbrella. I like this manfrotto the best because it is metal and well made. – $33.10
• Phottix Strato RF trigger – many use pocket wizards. I love these phottix strato triggers. They are 80 bucks shipped and work as well as the more expensive pocket wizards or radiopoppers. – $80.00

That’s it. This will work in almost all of your wedding scenarios. It’s one extra bag to carry and you can turn your light from blah to awesome. (Of course  you will need a flash…I assume you will use your nikon sb-800/sb-900 or canon 580 EX II flash (or more likely your backup flash)…the important part is getting it off the camera).

Here are some examples of where I’ve used a single off-camera flash to increase the quality of light in my photos.

Above: I’m using my off-camera flash to provide backlight for a very dark reception hall. In this case I am using an on-camera flash to bring up the exposure of the faces.Above is an example of an engagement session with a single off-camera flash. I’ve cloned out the light stand and umbrella to the left of Rachel and Mark.Here again I’ve used a single off-camera flash to help light Lindsey and Ryan during their first dance. It’s nice to be able to set up one light, set it for manual exposure and then couple that with on-camera fill-flash, as I’ve done during the speeches in Ben and Meghan’s wedding.

So what are the total damages?

$453.77. That’s less than the cost of most lenses!  This is the single greatest thing you can do to improve the quality of your photographs! Using the tenba case keeps everything organized and easy to bring around. So what are you waiting for? Get that flash off your camera!

I hope this article helps. I will keep adding to this series so check back often. Thanks for coming to check out my site.

P.S. If you have an assistant an even easier way to be portable with your off-camera flash is to have your assistant carry around the off-camera flash with a monopod. Use the same items as above, but just exchange the light stand for the monopod.

P.P.S. I’m not the first person to get excited by off-camera flash. There are tons of great resources online – check out http://www.strobist.blogspot.com/ and http://neilvn.com/tangents/ for lots of great info.

P.P.P.S. This is my last, I promise – the awesome photographer Zack Arias has a killer DVD intro to off-camera lighting with his OneLight Workshop DVD. Highly recommended.

Have a great day!

I use Apple Aperture 3. I’ve tried a number of different solutions for RAW image processing including Bridge, Photo Mechanic, Bibble Pro etc and I keep coming back to Aperture. I’m going to share my workflow today mainly as notes to keep myself honest but hopefully someone else will be interested too.

Aperture is a database-based photo management/editing and processing solution available from Apple. It’s quite inexpensive for all of its features and interfaces nicely with Photoshop CSx.

It’s $159 which is a steal. Please buy it from B&H. B&H rocks. Buy it here.

When I shoot a wedding I get a lot of RAW files. I shoot in RAW. Some people shoot in JPEG which is fine, but I prefer my masters to be loseless. To each his own.

First step when I get back from a wedding is to import the images.

My workflow is super simple and it needs to be because with 30,000 images in my library currently, a complicated management system would make my life hard. (I have 10k images from other programs and personal photo-sessions that I’m currently working on importing etc but those are on the non-paid-gig backburner.

Basic Workflow…

I have folders for years. Anytime I shoot in a given year the images will be stored in the year’s folder in projects (we’ll get  to that).

shift-command-N to create a new folder within a folder

Here is my basic file structure. I started shooting non-personal things in 2009, so anything before that (which is currently not as organized as it should) is in the Older Images Folder sorted by category.

Within the 2010 folder I have 3 subfolders for: ‘Weddings’, ‘Product Shots’ and ‘Other Photo Shoots’.

I’m now ready to import the new shoot I just completed. I have a very specific naming structure that I use to make sure I can find the images. This naming structure is embedded in ALL THE IMAGES, not just the folder. In two years IMG_0001.CR2 will mean NOTHING. BUT… 2010_MONTH_DAY_BRIDE_GROOM_0001.CR2 will.

I import my images using the import command (command-i) and at this point I add in keywords and info that will help the database and my brain catalog the images.

Add in appropriate metadata when your importing makes finding stuff easier later...

This is SUPER IMPORTANT when you import your images. This will add the info to the Metadata of each image. I put in a brief caption showing the names of the bride/groom and three import keywords:

1. Type of shoot (in this case wedding)
2. Names of Bride/Groom (for easy searching later)
3. Location

I then use the city, state, country and add a copyright to each of my images.

It’s now also important to rename the files as they are being ingested by aperture with the naming structure:

YEAR_MONTH_DAY_BRIDEGROOM

with index. This will name all of the images with the important info and if anything gets lost or misplaced it’s easy to see what’s going on with the images at a later date.

My aperture library lives on my Multi-Terabyte raid array (raid 5) which is backed up to another hard drive that gets locked into my safe. I need to get an offsite backup sooner than later. I suspect what I will do is get another RAID 1 hard drive and backup my library and keep that backup at a remote location. You need 3 versions of a file otherwise it’s not truly backed up.

Master Images are Sacred.

Don’t mess with the masters after you’ve imported them. Aperture 3 does a great job with this, all editing is non-destructive. All edits and improvements are simply instruction that Aperture does to the master image when it is exported for my blog, JPEG-proof/high-res images for the clients, or facebook/flickr.

The next step in the process after importing the raw files is to catalog, mark, rate and organize the images into albums, books, smart Projects, light tables within the large project. Think of this as a funnel…start with your 1000 images for example in a wedding and mark the ones that you like with a star system. I think 5 stars is too much. I use the following:

3 Stars is blog-worth (best of the best).

2 Stars is client-worthy (images for the high-res JPEG export).

1 Star is good but revisit after looking at all images (example 5 images of the same scene, are marked with 1 star and then re-examened to determine the best of the series).

0 Stars for not bad or good but pass for now.

Reject for problem images (out of focus, eyes closed, etc) – 9 key…

In Aperture 3 the 1,2,3 keys are for 1,2,3 stars. Rejected images are given with a 9. This is first step, snap through the images and rate them all. Turn on ‘Quick Preview’ –  far right corner will turn yellow, this will snap through the images quicker.

A hot key that I use  all the time is the ‘V’, this switches the view from thumbnails, filmstrip and detail.

Smart Albums Rock.

The first thing I do when I’m processing a wedding is the blog post. This gets the bride/groom excited about the images and gives them and my readers instant gratification. I create a new smart album and call it ‘Blog’ I then have the filter for the Smart Album be any images that are ranked with 3 stars (see above). As I snap through the images this album quickly gets populated. I do the same of the 2/3 star images (a smart album of images >= 2 stars) for the JPEG export (this is my hand-picked, ‘best’ images from the wedding.

Smart Albums Setup Screen

Let’s keep the funnel metaphor going…

Next step is to provide coarse color correction.

Aperture makes this pretty easy with the stamp tool. If you have a white-balance photo (either with a gray card or a spyder-cube) you can lift the adjustments and then stamp them to another image. This is great.

Speaking of spyder-cube. This is coming in the mail later this week. I just shot this wedding with very complicated indoor mixed lighting, the spyder cube will help. My plan is to get a small nano-stand and keep the spyder cube ready to put into a white-balance photo. I’ll have a mini-review coming on that pretty soon with examples.

Buy the Spyder-Cube from B&H – it’s only 50 bucks!

The expanded meta-data function is very nice too. It lets you see all the EXIF data/ lens used/ etc when you are editing a photo:

3 star images with expanded metadata before externally editing

It doesn’t take up a lot of room but is very helpful for looking at the image you are working on. It give you the ISO, f-stop, shutter speed, EV, MM of lens, stars, lens info and caption. Very useful!

A final thing that I do is color-shifting and blog-image retouching in photoshop. You can set up PS to be an ‘external’ editor for aperture. This is super helpful for moving a 3-star image in or out of the project.

SHIFT-COMMAND-O opens it in photoshop (making a copy of the image as a psd!) very import, don’t mess with your master images because photoshop IS DESTRUCTIVE!!!

The photo will open up in photoshop with the basic adjustments/whitebalance I’ve made in Aperture. I can then do my colorshifting/tweaking retouching and save the file back into Aperture.

Image after external editing in photoshop cs4

Aperture makes a copy first of the file from the RAW file, which it has processed, and turns it into a psd file which you can then edit in photoshop and save back into aperture to arrange in albums, export for blogs, keyword etc.

This is the better way to do it because you don’t want to have so many version, a blog version an export version, print etc. Keep everything organized in Aperture 3, do you critical editing and retouching on photoshop and then keep Aperture for the final arranging.

Aperture and Photoshop play very nicely!

Have Fun!

I first read about the digital M Camera (The Leica M8) a few years ago when it first came out. I was immediately turned off by with the what-seemed-like outlandish price (Around 5995 at the time). There was no way, I thought, that a Leica digital M-mount series would ever become a reality for me. Fast forward to 2009, and we have an even more expensive Leica digital M camera: the M9 which retails for around 7,000 and one on Ebay from a seller in New Zealand with 0% feedback is going for well over 10,000!

(When will stupid people stop artificially inflating these pricing and buying scam products)… The first tip off should be when the seller says that he’ll mark it as a XMAS gift to avoid the tariffs (will be used as exhibit “a” in the trial in a few months – if the camera even exists at all). Anyways, off topic as usual.

For anyone who is looking to get into a digital Leica system without spending $10,000 or more dollars, now is the time to do it. I really good one-lens system and M8 can work for around $2500 or a two-lens system will work for about $3250. I know what you are thinking – $3000 is still a lot of money for a hobbyist or advanced amateur. Well I am here to tell you, you have probably spent that much on your SLR gear and all your accessories. Unless you are buying the absolute entry level Nikon/Canon DSLR gear (and keeping it without upgrading) when you think about all of the un-needed accessories you have probably purchased, it really adds up. I know it did for me. It’s time to sell it all and simplify your life with a Leica M system! The first key to an affordable Leica M system is the built-in self-control feature of Leica gear. Let me explain. Let’s take an example of a DSLR-shooter’s gear acquisition cycle.

Overview of the Leica M8:

Leica M8 Overview from Dan Valente on Vimeo.

Someone who is just getting serious into digital photography will most likely walk into their local camera store or big-box store and purchase what they deem to be a good camera for beginners: either a Canon TI1 or Nikon d3000/5000 at the time of this writing. This will set them back about 500-800 dollars. This camera will work well for a while but then you’ll realize the kit lens sucks. It’s time to upgrade lenses. The kit lens that you have sells for basically nothing on Ebay or the like so you decide to keep it. You look online and see that Nikon and Canon have a ton of lenses available and at many price ranges! If you are smart, you buy a fast prime (50mm f/1.8 or 35 f/1.8 if you are shooting Nikon) – but you still think that you need a zoom lens to you buy or upgrade to a mid-line zoom lens.

For the sake of this hypothetical –let’s stick with Nikon because I know that system well. I would say most new-photographer end up buying the 18-200mm VR (or VRII now…) which is a great lens- and one that sets you back about 750 dollars. Now we are in for about 1300 or so dollars and we have duplicate-covered focal lengths with our kit and the upgrade. No more lenses for a while because, after all, this 18-200 covers all the focal lengths right? Anyways now we are getting the itch for more upgrades and gear so we go to accessories. A tripod will make our photos better, right? We go and look at tripods and some are cheap and crappy while others are crazy expensive – just like lenses, right (remember that Nikon 200-400mm AF-S VR that we looked at for 7k!). We decide on a mid-level Manfrotto or the like and spend about 150 for the legs and then another 150 for a ball head. Now we are up to 1600.

We also eventually need more things like an extra battery or two, filters, memory, and an expensive Tenba or crumple backpack to carry it all around with. We are about up to 2000 after all of that. It’s a couple of months down the road and we have an itch for another lens or two because the 18-200 is cutting it – it isn’t that sharp unless we stop is down to f/8 – 200mm is pretty much unusable and the wide-side of things distorts way too much. Plus none of the backgrounds are out-of-focus like we have seen. Maybe a wide angle – perhaps the Nikkor 10-24? ($999) or some fast primes – 50mm f/1.4? or 85mm f/1.8 . By the time we have bought another lens we realize that our d3000 or d5000 is missing something or doesn’t feel good in our hands so we look for maybe a d300s or even a d700? That will set us back – and now our tripod is not sturdy enough, to support the 300mm f/4 VR that we are looking at! You get my idea.

By the time we are done we’ve spent well over $3000 dollars for a bunch of gear that works fine for most things, but ultimately gives us the itch for more gear. Nikon and Canon are structured like this – it isn’t their fault either. The consumer market that buys their $500 d3000 and kit lens makes them a lot of money. Money that companies like Leica does not have access to – nor do they want.

But now here is the problem other than the money that was wasted. You have a backpack full of gear that weighs 20 lbs that you never bring around with you. It’s all too big and bulky and you quickly get sick of it. That’s the problem with the amateur photography market – we don’t have a destination where photography is 100% of the reason for going. If you have a professional business and you can load up a big Lowepro bag with 2 bodies and 8 lenses, go to the shoot, get paid and go home that is fine but for most of the amateur market you are bringing you camera on vacation, have to deal with flying or walking around a city, going to restaurants or other sites so a big camera system does nothing but weight you down and stay in the hotel room.

My point here – and I have played this game I know because I have owned more cameras than I want to think about- is that I wished I had just purchased an M8 and one good lens from the get go. I would have saved lots of money lost from buying and selling countless camera bodies, bags, lenses, and other crap that I would have most likely been able to afford a nice 35mm Summicron or something! In a way if you can find a system that makes you resist the urge to buy 8 lenses and change bodies every 12 months you are in good shape.

That’s what I like about Leica – what are my choices? I am in no position to buy an M9 for $7000 dollars – I basically have 3 lens focal lengths that work well on the M8 and that are cost effective – 28mm, 35mm, and 50mm. For those focal lengths I am looking at one or two types of used lenses that are in a budget price range – 28mm Elmarit V3 or V4 (I own the V3), 35mm Summicron (V3 or V4) and the 50mm Summicron Rigid. All the new lenses are too expensive for a budget system. It’s not like Nikon and canon which have 30-40 lenses available for under $1000. That’s a lot of choices and choices make you act impulsively – well I could really use a macro lens or another fast prime because my zoom doesn’t… Well all of Leica’s lenses ARE fast primes and there can be no complaints about almost any Leica lens in terms of resolving power, contrast and sharpness.

These problems do not exist on all but the cheapest (Can you say Hektor 135mm) lenses by Leica. So my though is go out and sell all you Nikon and Canon crap that you don’t carry around anyways. Resist the urge to buy a new camera body every 12 months. Buy a Leica M8 now while they are reasonably price – $2100-2400 in excellent condition and pick one lens that you can fall in love with (either the Elmarit 28mm or the Summicron 35mm Pre-ASPH) You are in for under $3000 and now you can have a camera that you can bring everywhere. It will slide into a tarmac medium lens case and be able to be stored in whatever bag or backpack you are bring around (or messenger bag in my case). Be Happy! Buy Leica and don’t have to buy twice.

One final though about Leica’s limited lens choices. When you make nothing buy no-compromise products you will naturally have fewer products in your line. This is why Apple has so few products, but Dell has so many. Dell makes crappy entry-level computers that break in 12 months, cannot be repaired because of parts that disappear or change and generally you get what you pay for. With Apple every product is their best product. You compromise on a feature – like missing a Firewire 800 port on the new Macbook but you don’t compromise on the quality. I’m sorry to say but Nikon and Canon is Dell and Leica is Apple. That is not to say that Dell does not make good products (Like the XPS and high-end servers) – but that their products run from cheap/bad to expensive/good therefore they have more products.

Nikon and Canon is the same way – they both make a 100-150 dollar 50mm f/1.8 lens that have inferior build qualities, noisy or slow focus, a horrible manual focus ring and sub-par wide open performance. – BUT they are $150 dollars so what do you want? With Leica – their “economy” 50mm is their Summarit (around $1200) – like Apple you lose some light gathering ability of say the Summilux (A.K.A MacPro) but you don’t lose any of the quality. The build quality is nearly the same, wide-open performance is there, focusing is quick and precise and the materials used are nearly the same (Again my Macbook -$1000 vs. MacPro 8-Core 32GB Ram $6500 argument). I like this approach – this way people buy the lenses and cameras – like Apple computer based on the features they need and not overall quality and reliability. No plastic mounts or bad distortions or broken fans in my Leica / Apple world (Can you tell I’ve been a Mac User for 20 years?)

This is a tricky situation because most video cameras are very very heavy compared to the 5d Mk II…. unless you set up your rig like this guy:

Cinematographer Adam Habib and his 1st AC Raul B Fernandez, stopped by Zacuto HQ to get a Panavised Canon 7D setup with proper mounting.

Most of us, of course will not. Now shooting without a tripod or some sort of stabilization yields shaky video, poor pull-focus ability, and generally a bad and frustrating result. Most nature photographers know that the key to dealing with long lenses for long periods of time is in a high-quality tripod and ball head. (Or if you are lucky enough to have one of the long-white-lenses i.e. 500mm f/4 etc, a Wimberley Gimbal).

The key to getting a high-quality video experience out of the 5d Mk II is in the choosing of a sufficiently high-quality tripod and FLUID video head. Ball-heads are great for still photos but do not provide the control and drag to make a smooth pan while shooting.

I scouted youtube last night and found a bunch of interesting resources on getting the proper tripod setup.

I enjoyed several of @mauromedia’s posts on the subject. He is a nature photographer and uses several of the big white lenses and as a result uses big heavy duty tripods and video ball heads. For most of us mortals that will only limit ourselves to a 70-200mm f/2.8. Big lenses are expensive and need expensive support; the ball head that this photographer is using is more than the cost of the 5d Mk II itself… (Sachtler Video 15sb)

Results of my research:

I set out to look for a more economical approach, but still have a lightweight carbon tripod (for backpacking around) and a fluid video tripod. My results yield a system that is more reasonable in price, but still should get the job done.

B&H Puts together a “kit” that really seems to be a top notch choice for what I am looking for. It consists of a Manfrotto 190CX3 Carbon-Fiber Tripod and 501 HDV Fluid Head. It is just under $400 dollars…

In addition, an important accessory is the leveling center column, which allows you to lever the camera independent of the legs (a level horizon being very important for video shooting.) It is another $100 dollars.

At NAB 2008 the rep from Manfrotto shows this setup in the first 1 min of the following video: (With the slightly smaller 701 HDV head)

So I think I’ve found a good system that features a leveling center column for about $500 dollars. Manfrotto does make high quality items, and at a price that is affordable to most photographers.  With this setup, it should be easy to maximize the quality of the video you capture from your 5d Mk II. Can’t wait for the new firmware to come out that support audio leveling, and expanded framerates!

As a wedding photography a big concern is how to carry your quickly-needed items in a way that you can get to them easily, while still being nimble-enough to get the shot. Camera bags come in all shapes and sizes and I have to admit, I am still searching for the best set of bags that works for me and my equipment.

Time is a luxury not afforded to you while shooting a wedding. Things happen blazingly fast – the kiss, the first dance – everything and you usually only get one shot at it. As photographer, I also like to use different lenses for different perspectives, angles etc. I personally love shooting with fast prime lenses like my Canon 50mm f/1.2 L.

The convenience of a zoom lens, though, means you can adapt to a quickly changing shooting situation without needing to change lenses.

Most photo bags are made for storing gear, not using it, plus bags are bulky, annoying, and difficult to get in and out of. I’ve tried numerous “solutions” but all have fallen short.

1)      I started with a large “base-camp” bag where I could have all of my lenses and store the bag at a strategic location somewhere around the facility where I am shooting. I quickly learned that this is a BAD idea. Besides the obvious concern of theft, it is super difficult to get anything out of the bag, and forget about it if you need to grab something fast. No way- pass

2)      Got a smaller backpack that I thought I would carry around and drop at a location, open up and work out of. Nope. This won’t work either, especially at the reception.

3)      Tried a shoulder bag (Think tank Urban Disguise 50) – way too bulky, heavy and impossible to work out of.

4)      This past wedding I just shot I tried a belt system by K-gear. Hated it. Totally got in the way and I was bumping into people and objects, but it was really easy to work out of, I could grab my most often used lenses, quickly change them and have a safe place to store them when they are off the camera.

I thought to myself: What do I need to absolutely have on my person while shooting. I need my flash – a Canon 580 EX II, my remote-light trigger, a place to store my flash when I’m using the remote light trigger, a lens on my camera (usually the 50mm f/1.2 ), two other lenses (worst-case size-wise, 24mm f/1.4 L and 70-200mm f/2.8 IS), memory card wallet, business cards, extra batteries and a lens cloth.

I’ve been looking at the “Shootsac” by Jessica Claire. She is an awesome photographer that also manufactures a very light-weight lens bag that allows you to carry basically what I mentioned above in a way that it is easily accessible. Great concept and bag and several of my friends swear by them – the only problem is that they are $179 bucks! Ouch for a few dollars worth of neoprene. I thought I could figure out some other way to get this done…

So by some stroke of luck, while at Marshalls this past weekend I found a “built NY” neoprene laptop sleeve, which has two neoprene pouches on either end of the bag – very similar in dimensions to the Shootsac. Then I looked at the price – 15 bucks! I figured what the heck, I’ll give it a shot.

Above: My “shootsac” on my hip holding a Canon 580 EX II flash. You can see how easy it is to access the item, even without looking at it.

To turn the bag into a lens bag I made a divider in each side of the bag by using industrial strength Velcro. Each side of the bag will fit one lens or my flash. The middle laptop zippered part will fit my memory card wallet and extra batteries. The included shoulder strap is very well designed and the neoprene help make the weight of the gear seem less. We’ll have to see how it works in an actual shooting situation but in my testing, I’ve found the concept works really well, the pouches make working out of the bag very easy and lens changes are fast.

Above: Here it is with the 70-200mm Canon f/2.8 L zoom lens with hood deployed in shooting position. Works great! And hugs my hip to keep it ready to go.

For 15 bucks I don’t think I can go wrong! I will still need a trunk bag that I like to get my gear to and from the gig but that is a project for another day.

A) Introduction

It’s saturday, I am having a nice cup of coffee and I am about to write a review of a lens that I have been shooting with for the past month: The venerable Leica M Summicron 35mm. This is probably the most iconic Leica M lens. The 35mm Summicron has been made since 1958 and has gone through many changes since then, with numerous versions that make shopping for a used one a bit difficult at times.

The latest version the :

Leica Wide Angle 35mm f/2.0 Summicron M Aspherical Manual Focus Lens (6-Bit, Updated for Digital) – Black

Or:

Leica Wide Angle 35mm f/2.0 Summicron M Aspherical Manual Focus Lens (6-Bit, Updated for Digital) – Chrome

are both unbelievable $3000 dollar aspherical-6-bit-coded-wonder-lenses that represent the classic 35mm field of view on an M9 camera or classic normal 50mm-ish FOV on a crop camera like the M8. For those of us that don’t have 3,000 dollars to spend on a new lens may look to the used market to purchase a 35mm Summicron.

Like I said this lens has been out for a while, there are many version so it is not hard to find one on the used market. It is important to know the version of the lens you are buying, and it’s characteristics, in order to choose the one that works best for your style of photography and needs.

This review will look at the history of the lens, a photographic tour of the lens version of this review (The 7-Element, Made-in-Canada, Pre-ASPH), provide some sample photos, a subjective comparison to the Zeiss ZM Biogon 35mm, and finally provide a conclusion.

1) Bottom Line Review -

This is the Leica lens, not too wide, not too slow, not too big, and nearly impeccable handling. The combo of focal length, f/2 max aperture, and performance wide open makes this a lens ideal for any shooting situation.

Color and background rendering is top notch and bokeh is sublime. IMO if you had to have one lens for a Leica system, this is the lens to have.

2) History -

There is a lot of versions of this lens floating around on the used market and they are all called the same thing: Leica Summicron 35mm. (Summicron is a name that means f/2 if you are not familiar with the Leica naming conventions).

Even within a “version” there are several sub-version, and in terms of value, some versions command a premium so it is important to keep that in mind when shopping for a used lens.

The first version of the lens was introduced in 1958 and came in two subversions, one with “eyes” and one without… the version with “eyes” allowed the Leica M3 film camera (which had a huge magnifying viewfinder) to reduce the optics to frame the 35mm lens. The other subversion was a regular m-mount lens. This is an 8-element version of the lens and is known for having very high resolving power and medium contrast. The lens came in both black and chrome, with black versions commanding a higher premium on the used market.

The second version of the lens (introduced in 1969) is a 6-element lens which uses a series 7 filter in-hood (avoid these lenses for the M8, as series 7 UV/IR filters are annoying to find and most versions of the Summicron in V2 that you see on the used market do not come with the hood.

This version’s aperture adjusts with a tab which is how to spot that you are dealing with a version 2 Summicron. This version trades improvements in macro-contrast for a lowered resolving power over the version I. This is still a great lens and can be had for about $800 on the used market.

A third version was introduced in the early 1970s, with a change in the optical formula and the use of a 39mm filter size. Performance and price between the second and third version is similar.

The forth version of this lens, the lens I am reviewing in this article, was introduced in 1979. This version added a seventh lens element, has a focusing tab (the thumb tab) and the aperture is adjusted with two knurled outcroppings. The performance in terms of resolution is improved over the other versions and is known for it’s background rendering or “bokeh”. The close focusing is .7 meters (which is the same as the rest of the versions) and the filter size is 39mm.

The newest version of this lens adds an aspherical element, and increases the contrast as well as the resolving power. This is a very very high-quality lens, and if you can afford one, by all means, buy it!

As you can see there are a lot of versions of this lens and the values are drastically different (from about $800 for a Version 2 or 3 vs 2,500 for a used Version 1 or used Aspherical). It is important to know what version you are buying, but all version are top performing!

2) Tour of the lens

Here is the lens – small without the caps and hood. (Above), and with the hood on (Below)

Looking down the front, notice the focusing tab and 10-bladed aperture, (stopped down 1-stop). (Below)

Here it is stopped down a few stops (below). The aperture remains very circular which causes a very high-quality background rendering quality or “bokeh”

Rear element stopped down to f/8 (below)- also notice I have hand-coded the lens mount such that the 6-bit code on my M8 reads what lens this is. This was tricky because the lens mount screw. I had to try a few times before getting the M8 to read the code.

Here is how it looks on the M8 with UV/IR filter (below). Notice how small it is even with the hood deployed. Very good match for the M8.

And for fun here is how it looks on the Olympus E-P1 camera with a Voigtlander M-Adaptor. Adapting leica-m lenses to a micro 4/3s camera is easy.

3) Sample Photos

Here is a set of sample photos taken with the 35mm Summicron on either the M8 or the Olympus E-P1. Notice the quality of the bokeh, the color, contrast and resolution of the lens all of which are very high. This is an easy review because there are no complaints. If you can’t take good pictures using this lens, you are doing something wrong…

Here is a test of the bokeh and quality of rendering bright points of light. Look at the color saturation and smooth blur circles (this is stopped down 1 stop).

Close to minium focusing distance; f/2. Notice the 3D rendering of the subject and creamy background.

Even at minimum focusing length and f/2, the 35mm lens allows for sufficient depth-of-field while rendering very high quality out-of-focus backgrounds.

Color and Contrast! Not much more to say!

An example taken with the Olympus E-P1 at ISO 3200. Focus is manual using the 10x multiplier on the screen.

Also a great focal length for indoor portraits. The 35mm focal length makes hand-holding at sub-optimal shutter speeds indoors possible.

3a) Flare Test

Flare resistance is pretty good. Here is an example shooting right into the sun stopped down to f/8. Got to love the sunstars.

Notice the little bit of flare. Here is a 100% of that:

Not too bad.

All and all, just a fun lens to get out with and makes some great pics!

4) Compared to the Zeiss ZM 35mm Biogon

The Zeiss ZM Biogon 35mm f/2 is a great lens, and can be had for about 1/2 the price of this used Summicron. I did a review of the Zeiss as well. I like both of them, but I feel that the photos with the Zeiss were missing something in the rendering of the backgrounds that the Summicron possessed. Also the Zeiss is far bigger and uses a non-standard 43mm filter (for Leica lenses, that is). The Zeiss has a very sharp in-focus to out-of-focus depth of field, while the Summicron is a much more gradual transition.  Both lenses are great, but I prefer the Summicron, for it’s overall better image quality, construction and smaller size.

5) Conclusion

Fantastic Lens. Get one if you need a Leica 35mm lens. I am sure that the Aspherical version is better, but I am not sure it is worth the $1000 dollar premium. Take the $1000 dollar difference and buy a 50mm Summicron or 28mm Elmarit. Either of these focal lengths would compliment the 35mm lens well. I would do a pros and cons of this lens, but I can see no cons. I suspect the value of this lens will increase in the near future, so buy one while the cost is reasonable (~$1400 on the used market).

I give this lens a solid 9.5/10 with the only deduction being that I know that If I had a Aspherical version, I would give that a 10/10.

Thanks for reading!

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Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

This is my review of the Leica Summicron 50mm f/2 lens. Before I start the actual review I wanted to talk about the lineage of the Summicron 50mm iteslf. There has been many versions of the Summicron 50mm. It is one of Leica’s smaller lens and also (in the Leica sense of things) inexpensive. The maximum aperture is f/2 and the filter size is the 39mm.

Background

This is how the Leica Summicron 50mm looks on my M8. It’s a very compact setup, especially without the Summicron’s clip-on hood, which I normally don’t use.

This makes for a low-light, small lens and while not gathering as much light as a Summilux (with a max aperture of f/1.4), the f/2 allows the photographer to take pictures in relatively low light with a lower ISO (good thing for the M8). Summicron 50s historically came in two types: Collapsible and Fixed. (There were a few variations on this theme, too, which makes it a bit tough to buy one used when the seller doesn’t know quite what he has.

Leica Summicron 50mm F/2 Review and Overview from Dan Valente on Vimeo.

The collapsible Summicron 50s have the reputation of being very sharp and small, although it is inadvisable to use them with the M8 as one could collapse the lens into the shutter. The original collapsible Summicron 50 was made in the 50s and now sells for about $400 on the used maket. Like all Summicron 50s it used the E39 (39mm filter).

Other than the Collapsible Summicron, Leica has made four other “Rigid” versions of the lens, one of them, the Dual Range, being unique. The Dual Range Summicron has a special set of foucusing “eyes” and two cams that allow the lens to focus much closer than a standard design 50mm lens.

Above is the Summicron 50mm f/2 that I will be reviewing. It is a very small lens with no focusing tab and a slightly sloping look from lens mount to front element. It uses a 39mm filter and makes a very compact setup on a M8.

Here is the Summicron viewed through the rear element. The relatively large opening allows a maximum aperture of f/2. The aperture is stopped down with 10-blades which stay circular throughout the range as can be seen below:

Back to the special dual-range version, as a result of the dual-cam design, this lens will not work on the M8 (I found this out the hard way). It is possible to file down or mill off the flange for the close focusing mechanism, remove the eyes and use it as a standard 50mm lens, but I did not see the point in destorying a unique lens that still has its applications on a film camera. This was the first Summicron I had bought. (By accident, as the seller did not know he in fact had a dual-range on not a standard ‘rigid’).

The normal rigid Summicron has gone through 3 revisions, the first design was introduced in the late 50s and is a 7-element design. From what I have read the bokeh is quite smooth although the coatings on the glass are known to fog and suffer from what is coming called “white dot” syndrome. The second iteration of the rigid Summicron came in the late 60s and is a 6-element design.

This is version of the review today. What is great is that you can get a mint condition version of this lens for around $750 dollars, with lenses missing accessories (i.e. Hood or Leica bubble) for quite a bit less. This lens also used a 39mm filter, does not have a focusing tab, and focuses close to 0.7 meters.

The current version of the Summicron is the “Fourth Version” and sells for $2000 at B&H. This version is known for slightly different looks, a collapsible hood, 6-bit coding, and 0.7m close-focusing distance. I did not believe that the new version is $1300 dollars better than my lens so I went with the slightly older Version III Rigid for this review.

Fit and Finish

Before getting to the performance and the sample pictures let’s take a look at how this lens is constructed. The First thing I noticed when I handled this lens is the small size. With a 39mm front filter, a profile that pulls in toward the front of the lens, and no focusing tab, this is a very very small lens. (albeit not as short as a 40mm Summicron-M or 35 Summicron-M). The focus ring is very well damped and not quite as easy to use as my Elmarit 28mm due to the lack of the focusing tab. The Aperture adjustment is in nearly the perfect place and my hand can find it without looking.

The hood is a poor design. Sorry Leica. The hood works with a snap on cap that only fits over the hood when it is reversed. When the hood is reversed you can’t adjust the aperture ring or focus the lens. Also the hood’s contacts are metal and it is very easy to see that brassing will occur with repeated use of the hood, going from the on to off position. I am ditching the hood and the Leica Bubble (A plastic protective case that is also the body cap.) I’ve taken a picture of the bubble and posted it below. With the bubble it makes the Summicron about the width of a Canon 28-135mm, which is WAAY too big to fit in my bag. It’s a nice idea, but more for displaying the lens than actually using it.

I would have rather just received a standard Leica body cap. I will save the hood and the bubble just in case I need to sell the lens, but it is going in the closet.

I ordered a new 39mm Leica plastic snap-cap for the front and Op/Tech O-ring body cap for the back. Just in shooting with this lens for 1 day I have managed to lose the original front cap for the hood because it doesn’t have a positive attachment. It must have fell off somewhere while I was walking around looking for pictures to take. I believe that the new hood design that telescopes and is attached is much better.

I used a 39mm UV/IR filter both for protection and because the M8 needs it to keep blacks, black. I have no idea why so many people make a big deal out of this. I use UV filters on all my lenses anyway because I’d rather replace a 50 dollar UV filter than a front element any day. If I have a get a UV/IR for 54 dollars it doesn’t bother me that much. But back to the fit and finish.

39 MM UV/IR Filter I use (Below)

I Use a Heliopan E 39 UV/IR Filter (Skylight Filter Shown in the Box) and I also have purchased a replacement new-style pinch-cap for the front element.

Op/Tech Leica M O-Ring Body Cap

* This cap is nice because it is a bit less expensive than the Leica version and has the added benefit of an O-Ring on the mount to reduce the possibility of dust and moisture getting into the rear element while being stored.*

The tapering shape of the lens allows me to find the focusing and aperture rings quite easily and I also like the way that it disappears on the M8, i.e. you can’t feel the weight of the lens once it is mounted to the body. The construction of the lens is quite similar to my 28mm Elmarit, black aluminum with engraved markings everywhere. The aperture closes down nicely in half-stops and makes a circular opening. You can see the 10-aperture blades in the second picture of the lens.

Above is how the lens looks with everything deployed: Hood in shooting position, 39mm UV/IR filter on and ready to go.

Above is how everything looks compressed. Lens hood is stored in reverse and snap-cap fits over top.

Movement while focusing

The lens actually gets larger and smaller as you focus. I have taken two pictures of the lens fully-extended and fully-retracted next to a travel-sized hand-sanitizer bottle for size reference (yes, this lens is that tiny.) Note that the front element doesn’t rotate like cheap nikon/canon lenses, we just have some movement of the all-metal barrel to facilitate focusing and to keep the lens as compact and simple as possible while storing in your bag or on the camera.

Here we are fully extended.

And fully-retracted.

Bokeh:

For performance lets start right out with the good stuff: Bokeh. Many people buy longer focal length lenses (50mm being relatively long in a leica system, and the M8′s crop factor helps with that) because they are able to throw backgrounds out of focus and create a 3-d look to your subject by isolating it from the background. How does the Summicron 50mm perform in this regard? Well – pretty darn sweet!

This photo is suppose to be over the top. I think it shows quite nicely the quality of the OOF areas rendered with the Summicron 50mm. I think the phrase to describe the blur-circles and background is “smooth and silky”. Also note that there are no sharp edges or annoying shapes to the Bokeh. Also notice the color saturation and contrast. This gets an A+ in my book.

Here is another shot showing the “glow” of this lens. Also notice the very high contrast in the branches. The depth-of-field at f/2 is quite shallow and as such it is quite good for portraits.

This picture was taken indoors. I love the focal length of the 50mm on the M8. With my d700 I always thought that 50mm was a poor focal length. It either was too wide or too-narrow. Now with my dual-lens kit (28mm and 50mm) on the M8 I feel that I have the sweet-spot for FOV. The 66.5mm effective FOV is great.

Other Thoughts About Image Quality

As I have only had this lens for a few days month or so I am in no position to make a definitive closed-review on it so I will be adding to this review as I take more images. Suffice it to say that I am happy so far and I would highly recommend this lens as an inexpensive (relative) addition to a Leica-shooter’s lens collection.

If you do not care about the aesthetics of the lens, an excellent condition copy can be had for around $500 dollars. The sharpness and contrast are very high, and the size is great. It doesn’t occlude the viewfinder at all and it is very easy to focus. I was walking around the outdoor mall in Omaha last night and this kit (M8 + 50mm Summicron) pretty much disappeared.

I’ve also noticed that the color contrast captured by this lens seems very very high. My only current complaint and suggestion is to ditch the hood and get a new pinch-cap and body cap. Keep the bubble and the original hood in storage until you want to sell the lens or don’t worry if your lens doesn’t come with a hood. It just adds to the size of the lens which I think is detracts from one of it’s best features: it’s diminutive stature.

For comparison and to show just how small this lens really is, here is the 50mm Summicron next to my 28mm Elmarit:

I think that is all for now! Thanks for reading. Don’t forget you can subscribe to my blog via email to get notice when I publish a new article.

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Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

Reactions to Switching to Leica and Using the Elmarit 28mm on my M8

I have officially switched to a Leica system for my walk-around camera. I was tired of not bringing my camera around to places because it was too bulky or the lens too long. The Leica M8 solves this problem. If you are contemplating purchasing a Leica M8, now is the time to do it. Many Leica-shooters are selling their old bodies and upgrading to the new M9 (which many feel is the ultimate digital camera, but I could not afford, nor justify a $7000 dollar camera at this point in my life).

I have also officially given up selling on Ebay and trying to get away from using paypal. I’ve avoided it in the past, but I recently looked at how much I have paid ebay and paypal in fees over the last 6 years and it is a scary, scary number. No more. I have found that for most items, such as electronics and cameras, craigslist is the way to go. I recently sold my nikon kit by using Fred Miranda’s Buy/Sell forum. This is THE place to sell camera gear.

It’s not free, which was annoying at first, but $25 bucks for a year is a lot better deal than ebay, and with the listings there the seller can specify that the buyer is to cover the paypal fee. I was also able to sell 90% of my gear in less than 48 hours at pretty much 95% of my asking price. That is a good turnaround for a gear-head like my self… but I digress.

For leica info I would check out the l-camera-forum at http://www.l-camera-forum.com this is where I purchased my used m8. Also at Fred Miranda, there is quite a few leica’s for sale. I purchased this lens, the subject of my review from keh.com where the price was actually 200 dollars LESS than was selling on ebay, and my lens had a 90-day warranty and 14-day return policy. Also the “excellent” condition items that one buys from keh.com are usually one full step up from a self-proclaimed “mint-condition” item on ebay. After much research, I decided on the 28mm focal length for the “one-lens” for my M8. This focal length is around 37mm full-frame, or a nice wide-normal field of view. The 28mm brightlines on the M8 are also highly-visable and IMO the “sweet-spot” for this camera.

This version of the 28mm Elmarit is a late-model Mark III, with a filter thread of 49mm. It uses spherical as opposed to the new 1800 dollar version, which uses aspherical elements. To be fair, I have read that the new version is just about as sharp and contrasty as you can get, so if you have 1800 bucks to spend, by all means get the new one.

I hand-coded the back of the lens so that it is recognized by my M8. Lenses wider than 35mm, when using a UV-IR filter exhibit a phenomenon know as “cyan-corners” due to the filter, the lens code helps to fix this. I purchased a great laser-cut template bophoto.typepad.com from this guy for 5 bucks shipped to my door. Just a few marks with a sharpie and I was ready to go.

The build quality is what you read about, the aperture ring adjusts with a flick of the finger and the focus is sublime. The nice thing about this version of the lens is that even though it is painted black, the body is made out of brass, not aluminum like the newer black-versions (the chrome current version is still made out of brass). I can’t say enough about the quality of this lens. I just shipped out a nikkor 50mm f/1.8 and the comparison between the two is a complete joke. The nikon feels like a toy and the leica feels like a precision instrument.

Leica Elmarit 28mm Lens Review from Dan Valente on Vimeo.

The lens I purchased did not come with a hood, which is a shame because I have noticed the lens is prone to flare. I have a posting on FM and L-camera-forum wanting to buy the correct hood, but we will see. 49mm screw thread and bayonet-mount hoods are few and far between.

As far as image quality there is nothing more to say but awesome. Unfortunately the weather in Omaha this week has been pretty miserable so I haven’t been able to take this lens out for a full test, but the three images (and the one of my cat) in the previous post should give a general idea about why I am loving this lens. The bokeh is smooth and the color and contrast are great. The fact that the focal length is 28mm means that even wide open there is sufficient depth of field for portraits and landscape shots. One negative is that I have noticed that the rangefinder focus is a bit off at infinity… I don’t know if it’s the lens or my camera. I will post more pictures as well as an update of this review as time goes on. As far as price to performance, I think this lens is about as good as you can get in a leica.

As an aside I have noticed the perceptual quality of the out-of-foucs areas is very similar to the 90mm f/3.8 lens I had for my mamiya rb67, which is to say very, very, good. At 28mm you are not going to blow out your backgrounds, but what is left is smooth, creamy and totally classy.

These next two example pics are what I mean about the smooth OOF areas. The trick with 28mm lenses is that they still draw backgrounds that are definable (at least at f/2.8, the max aperture of this lens) – the difference between this lens and say a Nikkor AF F/2.8 D is the quality of the background areas and is what many refer to as the “Leica Glow”. This “drawing” of the 28mm focal length background that provides subject isolation while not blowing out the background like say a Canon 85mm F/1.2 lens is why many like the 28mm focal length for general photography. In fact, Nikon’s 28mm F/1.4 lens (now 4,000 dollars used!) is regarded as many people’s favorite lens. Obviously as far as OOF areas melting away, the max aperture of the F/1.4 is much better than this Leica but the Leica at f/2.8 provides something intangibly “extra” to the background image quality.

Take for example the lights on this construction site that are about 150 feet away from the safety fence I shot through as well as the treeline that melts away as you look further back in the image. This IQ of the lens has something that the Nikon and Canon counterparts that I have used simply do not.

You can also see the almost 3-dimensional qualities of the construction sign in this picture above as well as the color and contrast of the treeline and construction site.

Elmarit 28mm Version III Canada 49mm – Pictures of the Lens

Now that I have spent some time talking about how much I like the lens let’s take a look at the fit and finish as well as some views of the lens on my M8 and compared to a 50mm Summicron f/2 for size comparision. Below you see the lens mounted on my M8 with a Leica 49mm UV/IR Filter:

Here is a side view:

Notice the focusing tab and the “Lens Made in Canada” etching.

The rear element of this lens protrudes into the camera. This is one of the reasons that wide-angle lenses can be much smaller on rangefinders, lens designers are free to put the rear element very close to the sensor and not have to worry about hitting a swing mirror like on an SLR.

Again notice how deep the rear element protrudes into the camera:

Even though the front filter size is 49mm, there is a lot of room around the front element. The new version of this lens (The 28mm Elmarit ASPH) - is so much smaller and uses a 39mm filter size despite being the same focal lengths).

Here is an image of the aperture stopped down.

Size comparision between the Elmarit 28mm (Left) and a Summicron 50mm (Right).

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed my review.

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Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

Introduction

Another week, another new lens to take a look at and review. The 90mm Tele-Elmarit by Leica has been a lens that I have looked at for a while partially due to its low price (around 400-450 USD depending on condition), small weight (226 grams) and size.

The Elmarit is a series of lenses by Leica characterized by their relatively fast max aperture: f/2.8, high-contrast and resolving power, as well as good price/performance ratio. For the budget-minded Leica shooter, the 90 mm Tele-Elmarit appears to be a good choice.

I jumped at the opportunity to shoot with this lens, and trade a FM Forums’ user my 28mm Elmarit for this lens and some cash to facilitate another lens purchase… (Of which I haven’t made a decision, we’ll see how much I like this lens…) This lens is a good inexpensive choice for someone who just purchased an M9 and wants to keep their house, an M8 for an economical kit, or any of Leica’s great film cameras like a M7 or the fully-manual and mechanical MP. The 90mm focal length is great for flattering portraits, quasi-macro shooting (i.e. flowers), or even landscapes.

M9 At B&H, M8.2, M7 TTL, MP

History and Versions

Here is the Tele-Elmarit on the M8 (above)- Despite its long focal length it makes for a very compact setup

Like many of the other Leica lenses of a given focal length and name (i.e. 90mm, Elmarit) there has been several version with varying prices, sizes, performance, usability and year-manufactured. Unlike the 50mm f/2 Summicron which have many versions all basically called the same thing; the 90mm Elmarit has a bit more distinction.

Before getting to the review of my lens let’s review the other version of the 90mm Elmarit that have been available throughout the years. There are two broad types of 90mm Elmarits: a 90mm Tele-Elmarit and a 90mm Elmarit. The Tele distinction, or “Telephoto” and the lens that is the subject of this review means that the physical length is shorter than the focal length. The telephoto lens also incorporates a “telephoto group” of glass elements that makes this possible. So basically Tele-Elmarits are simply 90mm Elmarits that use a telephoto lens design, and 90mm Elmarits do not use a tele-photo lens design.

This makes these two types of lenses two very different beasts despite being given the same name (Elmarit, which only corresponds to the max aperture and not the lens design). The normal 90 Elmarit (non-tele), original model was manufactured in the late 50s to early 70s and is not as compact as the lens that is the subject of this review. It sells for about 200-300 USD on the used marked depending on condition and was manufactured in Germany.

The newest version of the Elmarit 90: the Elmarit-M is a highly-regarded lens with a modern design and a pull-out hood. It is now discontinued and quite expensive (~ 1000-1100 USD, used) but optically and mechanical superb (or so I have read). The Tele-Elmarit came in two varieties: the “fat” version and the “thin” version. The fat version is easily seen by is beer-can like looks and knurled focusing ring. They sell for around 400 USD for a black version and 900 USD for a chrome version (rarer). I passed on getting one of these because of the size and weight and non- E39 filter diameter. I personally would rather get a 90mm Summicron if I were to look at a bigger, heavier lens.

Specifications The lens that is the subject of this review is a very small and compact lens, either made in Canada (earlier models), or made in Germany (later models). It only weighs 226 grams and has a similar look to a 50mm Summicron; the lens gets smaller towards the front, has no focusing tab, and sports a skinny aperture ring. It used an E39 (39mm) filter. I keep a Leica 39mm UV/IR filter on it for my M8.

Not a Leica 39mm UV/IR (above) – This is a Heliopan that is losing its coating… but it still works fine.

The lens is constructed of four elements in four groups and is optically a very simple design. The minimum focusing distance is around 1m which means a maximum reproduction ratio of about 1:9. Depending on when the lens was made, it may or may not have a ‘90’ printed on the body. The construction is typical, all metal, awesome Leica construction. When purchasing this lens used make sure to check the rear elements for etching caused by moisture corroding the glass. Hold the lens up to a strong back light like a flashlight and inspect the rear element. If you see anything, pass, because the repair is almost as much as the lens is worth…

The aperture adjustment ring clicks in very well-defined half-stops from f/2.8 to f/16. If you surf the forums and review sites you will find many seem to bash the performance of this lens. The question is, is it because the lens is of lower-IQ than other Leica offerings, or people just unable to accept that a 400 USD used Leica lens can hang with the current 3500 USD Summicron 90mm f/2 APO ASPH in areas other than max aperture… well keep reading and find out! Now let’s get to the good stuff. We have spent enough time on history and specs. Let’s take a pictorial tour of the lens and then see how it performs!

Video Tour of the Lens

Leica 90mm Tele-Elmarit “Thin” Review from Dan Valente on Vimeo.

Pictures of the Lens

Here is the Tele-Elmarit with no font or rear caps. Notice the slim and tapering shape as well as the difference in ridges between the focus ring an the aperture ring. My copy is in excellent condition for its age but does show some wear in the paint markings. This lens has a nice depth of field guide, easy to find aperture ring and short-throw focus.

Tele-Elmarit with rear cap and 42mm push-on front cap. Note that this cap does not work well with a filter on the front, a new-style pinch cap seems to work much better. Also my 50mm Summicron vented hood fit over the lens and onto the ridge below the aperture ring.

Markings on the front say “Leitz Canada” – My version of the lens has a serial number of 268229x. The lens says “Tele-Elmarit” and 1:2.8/90. These markings are nicely engraved in the metal and painted. Build quality of the lens is superb.

Aperture stopped down to f/8 – notice the ten curved blades which make a very interesting aperture pattern. At f/16 the aperture opening is perfectly circular.

Rear of the lens. This lens can be coded, mine is not. The 6-bit coding helps to let the M8 know what lens is attached and also transfers EXIF data. The M8 can also correct for vignetting and/or “cyan drift” present with the coding but this is only really and huge issue for wide-angle lenses. This 90mm nor the M8 seem to be bothered by not communicating with each other.

Taking The Tele-Elmarit to NY for the Holidays

It’s Christmas time and I am taking a week off of work to visit my family in Upstate NY and being that I currently doing this lens review, I thought it would be a good idea to focus on shooting as much as possible with the Tele-Elmarit to get lots of good samples of its contrast, sharpness, resistance to flare (or lack thereof), bokeh and color rendition. 90mm (or 117mm-equivalent on the M8) is a bit tight for indoor shots and the focal length necessitates at least 1/60th second shutter speed to reduce motion blur.

This is definitely not an indoor lens and coupled with its max aperture of f/2.8 and the M8’s marginal high ISO performance, most of these pictures will be captured outside. I hope my NY trip will give a good cross section of what this lens is capable of and help make the decision to either reject it or add it to your lens collection.

*EDIT* As I am writing this I have noticed that my copy of the lens has a relatively severe back focus problem. I am currently sending the lens in to Youxin Ye for a CLA (Clean, Lube, Adjust) and to check for this back focus problem. I am going to finish this review mainly about the construction and information regarding the lens, but will have to post more actual shooting examples when it comes back from repair. I did get a chance to snap a few shots at a stopped down aperture as well as test the quality of the OOF areas and Bokeh, which I will report below.

*EDIT 2* 11-1-2010. After sending the lens to Youxin Ye and DAG, both were unable to correct the backfocus because of the way the lens is physically constructed. This is too bad, and I was forced to sell it. I perhaps will pick up another one in the future and report back.

Some Samples

What is very interesting is that even though my lens is un-coded, my M8 recognizes it as a 90 mm lens. I think one of the screws on the m-mount is tricking the optical 6-bit sensor into thinking that it is seeing a 6-bit code. As for as resolving power for this lens and contrast I believe it to be quite high. To my eyes it has a very detailed drawing character and a slightly older-lens “look” to it. (Which I like)

Shipping and Receiving. (Check out the back focus) – this was taken at f/5.6 – my rangefinder patch was lined up with the ‘I’ in Shipping, but you can see that the focus is on the wall behind this building. Hopefully when it comes back from adjustment it will be in better shape. Focusing with a 90 mm lens is hard enough on an M8, and with the back focus problem, it makes for complicated shooting (or maybe I am not good enough and the quick manual focusing yet…)

Bokeh

Given that the 90 mm Tele-Elmarit has that unique aperture closing shape I figured I would snap some out-of-focus blur circles stopping the aperture down to stops that would render OOF background and see what we get. I am quite impressed, to say the least!

At f/2.8 everything is circular and glowing. This would make for a very nice background for a portrait. I also love the colors.

At f/4 you can see the shape of the aperture generating 10-sided blur circles.

At f/5.6 you can see that the blades are creating an inverted scalloped shape. This will certainly create an interesting character for the OOF parts of your image.

More Cold Weather Samples

f/2.8 ISO 160. Had to work to get the focus right on by adjusting for the back focus.

Rusty Rails f/2.8 ISO 160

Geese f/8 ISO 160 Focused at Infinity

Conclusion?

Well, there will have to be a part-II (p.s. 11/1/2010, no part II yet, will have to be a to be continued when I get another copy) to this review when I get the lens back from adjustment and cleaning. Hopefully it will come back to me ready to take some good pics. As far as the price/build ratio it seems quite high on the 90 mm Tele-Elmarit for sure. The question, though, is 90mm too-long for an M8? For me, I think the answer is yes for most cases. I think this is an excellent argument for buying a Tele-Elmarit. You can get one for 400 dollars. I would feel much better about not using this lens that much than having spent 2500 USD on an APO Summicron 90mm…

The IQ seems quite high so when you wanted something longer you could count on the Tele-Elmarit to perform quite well. I would personally buy one of these way before a new 90mm Summait, which is mass-produced (relative terms for Leica, that is) rather than hand-assembled like the Tele-Elmarit and 3 x the price… This also frees up some funds for a higher-quality wide-normal or wide angle lens (I am currently looking to get a 35mm Summicron). In the end it is up to you. With part II of this review I hope to take some good examples of what you can do with this lens for landscapes, portraits and nature/macro-ish captures.

Pros of the Tele-Elmarit 90mm

1. Very Compact Size
2. Uses Standard E39 Filters
3. Inexpensive
4. Better build quality than Summarit 90mm for 1/3 the price
5. Not much bigger than a Summicron 50mm on a M8
6. Longest practical focal length for the M8

Cons of the Tele-Elmarit 90mm

1. Have to be careful to purchase one without rear-element problems
2. 90mm is a little bit long on the M8 without a magnifier
3. No focusing tab
4. Relatively slow max aperture f/2.8
5. Unlike most other Leica lenses, peak performance is stopped down a bit rather than wide open (although this could be the back focus in mine)

Where to buy one used and suggestions if you wish to purchase a new lens of the same focal length

KEH.com Rangefinderforum.com getdpi.com fredmiranda.com

All of these places are better than Ebay for buying used Leica lenses. Most folks on the forums are avid photographers that take care of their stuff and aren’t just looking to make a quick buck. KEH.com is ofter cheaper than Ebay and offers a 14-day trial period and 90-day warranty on their used gear. For new Leica gear, I highly recommend B&H Photo. Click on the link below to go to the site and purchase a new Leica lens.

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Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

I had the pleasure of having this lens for use on my M8 for about a month. I ultimately sold it as I got a great deal on a Summicron 35mm f/2 (Review Here) and didn’t need the redundancy. Bottom line, if you don’t have over 1,000 bucks to spend on a 35mm f/2 lens for your Leica M8 or M9, this is the lens to get…

The Zeiss Biogon is a great all-around lens with a fast max aperture of f/2 and a very nice wide-angle 35mm focal length on a film M or M9, and a pleasant just-shy-of-normal 47mm effective focal length on my M8.

The best place to buy the Zeiss ZM Biogon 35mm is at B&H. They have it offered in either black or silver to match your camera body color. If you have a M8 you are going to need a UV/IR filter. You need to purchase a B+W filter in 43mm, and not a Leica E43 as they have different thread pitches and you will cross-thread you new $1000 dollar lens… get the B+W, it is of the same quality and is quite a bit cheaper than the Leica E43 UV/IR.

For the M9 I would recommend the B+W Skylight filter for protection. These are multi-coated, very high-quality and do not vignette.

All right onto the lens…

Build Quality:

Very nice, I would give it a solid 9/10, there is a slight *slight* play in the front focal element i.e. the lens extends a little bit when focusing close, this has a bit of play but nothing to worry about.

Focusing is a very high-quality slim knurled ring with a protuberance (love that word…) It does not have the crescent thumb notch of the Leica Summicron 35mm, but rather a extension that your thumb can lock onto. It works well, but I prefer the leica design, your milage may vary.

Mount: very nice to mount onto the Leica M8 body, no play to speak of.

Size:

The lens uses a 43mm filter size, which is larger than the Leica Summicron’s 39mm size, but not by much. The lens is 56mm long or 2.2 inches. Very small!

The aperture adjusts in 1/3! stops (improvement over Leica’s 1/2s) and is well marked. The font of the Leica is easier to read than the Zeiss.

Focus is very short throw, and you get from infinity to minimum faster than on Leica.

Focus is well damped and you can focus from 0.7m to Infinity. The lens is known for very low distortion and weights 240g. The maximum magnification at 0.7m is 1:18. The lens is built with 9 elements in 6 groups. There are no aspherical elements in this lens and really no reason for there to be. Remember that the Summicron 35mm Aspherical is 3x the price.

Sample Images

This is shot wide open, converted in ACR and saved. No sharpening. This is a very sharp lens even at f/2. I am not sure what other people talk about when this say the sharpness is lacking wide open. This is enough for me. ever. Here is the 100%:

How about the Bokeh? Well – the Summicron 35mm version IV is known as the “Bokeh King” so this lens has big competition in it’s focal length group. I am happy to say that the bokeh is neutral and pleasant. I have noticed, and also read on other blogs that the Zeiss designs have a rather steep slope between in-focus and out-of-focus parts of the image giving the subject that is in-focus a rather 3-D look. Here is an example… look how the glass pops out of the frame.

Now with the 35mm focal length, you aren’t going to be able to blow out background like a 50mm f/1.4 or something longer, but you can see that my fish tank has turned into a nice blurred background. Here is another example of the bokeh: (Rather boring pic, I know, but it demonstrates that Bokeh nicely, plus it’s been -20 degrees in Omaha so indoor shots will have to do…)

Another nice thing I have noticed about the Zeiss is that the color rendition is very complex, that is there is smooth gradations between colors. Notice this picture in mixed light the transition from the radiated sunlight and the overhead indoor lighting is very smooth. The color is on the warm side, which is also nice and flattering for your subject…

How the lens comes:

Nice packaging box. Note, the hood is not included you will need one. Also the front pinch cap is pretty bad. I would recommend not using it, just keep the hood on.

Here is the lens fully deployed. This is an off-brand 43mm Hood, found for around 10 dollars. It screws into the front of the lens and provides decent flare-protection, as well as protects the lens, if you decide to go capless.

Notice the focusing “nub” , B+W UV/IR filter and lens made in Japan. Zeiss despite having German heritage now makes all of their lenses (expect the super super expensive 15mm f/2.8 Distagon T* – $4600 bucks! Made in Germany) in Japan.

Conclusion

Well that is pretty much it! Not much more to say about this lens than if you can get past the fact that 1) It’s not a Leica 2) the focusing nub and 3) the larger size compared to the equivalent Leica 35mm — it’s a best buy lens for the Leica M-Mount. For the M8, probably the best value in a fast normal lens! You can also find them used for around 650-750 depending on condition.

I give this lens a solid 9/10… had I not found a killer deal on a Summicron IV 35mm, I would have surely kept this.

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Thank you visiting my site. If you have found this information helpful please use the links provided to purchase your gear. I have an affiliate program with B&H Photo and Video, my favorite dealer of camera, computer, and audio equipment and what little income this affiliate program brings in will go back into this site. Please help me to continue providing reviews and photography tips by using my links! B&H has the best prices around and the most diverse catalog of all things technical. Most items are shipped fast and free and they have a liberal return policy!

Buy a high quality nikon film scanner capable of scanning medium format film at 4000 dpi. You can get a nikon 5000 ED used for about 1195. Someone is selling one on get.dpi.com  —- Nikon Film Scanner

Buy a Mamiya RB67, 120 film back, Waist level viewfinder and 150mm lens – keh.com has one for around $500 with all of these parts.

Buy some Fuji Velvia 50 film – $25.00 a 5-pack

Get the slides developed at Walmart – for slide film it is conservatively $4.00 a roll – or  $20.00 for the 5-pack.

SCAN THE FILM in the Nikon Film Scanner. Bam. 38 Megapixel files. Repeat.

Grand total: $1740 (you have now show 50 frames). Additional frames are (conservatively) – .90 USD a shot. Sounds a bit expensive but you have to shoot and develop almost 24,000 frames to equal the cost of the BODY ALONE for the S2. Imagine shooting 24,000 frames of film. Not going to happen any time soon.

Of course the only downfall here is that you have to be patient in getting the film developed, but after a few rolls you can have a steady stream of shots coming through. Couple this with an inexpensive dslr or rangefinder and you can shoot the “non serious” stuff with the digital film and have instant gratification.

BTW here is a 100% crop from a scan of a mamiya 645 file – about 27 megapixel equiv. ISO 400 film. Pretty awesome stuff you can do with MF film cams.