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  Wednesday  October 5  2005    09: 59 PM

leitz or kmz?

I had been planning on using the Leitz Summitar 50/2 that was on my Leica IIIc but it has a little haze. It's hard to see. If you hold the lens to the light just right you can see a hint of haze. I don't have the money to CLA it right now. Sherry Krauter said it would be upwards of $90. I thought I would compare it to my minty late model Jupiter 8 50/2 made by KMZ in the former Soviet Union. I was surprised.

Two pictures taken with two lenses with the same exposure. The point of view was a little different but the distance was the same. I scanned both negatives with the same scanner setting. The details are at scanned resolution and are unsharpened with nothing done to them. The contrast is way down on the Summitar. Either its a lower contrast and a not as sharp lens or the haze is degrading the image more than I thought. Here is another example.

The second set shows the same thing. Same point of view and same exposure. The Summitar collapses to a more compact package but I can still put the Leica and J8 in my coat pocket. It looks like the J8 will be living on the Leica. Someday I will CLA the Summitar. That day may not be for a while.