Gems of old

These normal lenses (50mm) range from the rangefinder era are very dear to me. Most are older than I am being stars in their right during the heydays for rangefinder photography. They are all Leica, they are all chrome and German. Probably because I collected them specifically, Canon and Nikon also have their own range of rangfinder lenses. I only have one from Canon, the Serenar 50/1.9 which was imspired by Summitar 50/1.9.

I had used most of these lenses with the Leica screwmounts cameras than I have. Clearly there were some favorites, some I have yet to use extensive. They are the Summar, Summarit, Elmar and Summicron. There's a Russian Elmar that made really nice pictures, which I used more than the original Leica Elmar.

Henry Cartier Bresson used Elmars for his street photography, two screwmount cameras with Elmars. The combination were tiny, light, and were both capable and pocketable.

My favorite has to be the collapsible Summicron f/2.0 in screwmount. With an adapter (Leica Screwmount toLeica M mount bu Voigtlander) the Summicron can also be used on the M mount. Though I don't own a Leica M camera, I do own the Bessa R3M.

Canon Serenar 50/1.9

Leica Summitar 50/1.9

Leica Summar 50/2.0

Another Summitar

Voigtlander Heliar 15/4.5

Leica Elmar 50/3.5

Sony A7S + Summicron 50 collapsible, missing the lenshood.