A small camera like the CL, manufactured in a less costly way, paired with a 40mm lens could potentially tap in to that market. I suspect that Leica – though I have no evidence, facts or even hearsay to back this up – felt they were missing out on some of this marketplace.
It must have been much more widely considered to be the ideal single carry-everywhere focal length as there were countless compact cameras released with 40mm lenses the Olympus Trip, Rollei 35 and Canon QL17 GIII to name a few popular classics. These days trends have pushed more toward the use of either 50 or 35mm with 40 being a bit of a piggy in the middle, with many people regarding it as neither here nor there.īut, back in the 70’s, 40mm was a popular focal length in compact cameras. The Leica CL was designed specifically to work with a 40mm lens. Of course whilst some advantage comes with the size, the story by no means ends there. A small camera deserved a small lens, and that’s what the 40mm Summicron is – in fact I think it might well be the smallest M-mount lens Leica have yet to produce. The 40mm Summicron was lens that came with the CL. Then in collaboration with Minolta they brought out the Leica CL, a camera that supposedly went down a little too well and pulled focus away from the Leica M5. They brought out the Leica M5 and it didn’t go down as well as it could have. I wasn’t around, but from what I understand, Leica had some real problems in the 1970’s. 3 The 40mm Summicron rangefinder compatibility myth(?).Additionally to this – since I’ve spent so much time reading online about this lens – I thought it might be useful to bring some of what I’ve found helpful combined with some of my own thoughts together into one place… Hopefully, if you find this post looking for information on the 40mm Summicron, I can save you the job of scrolling through endless comments on forums to get to the bottom of some of the things people say about it.
For a start, I’ve been so impressed by the thing, I wanted to add my own words to the positive chorus. Unsurprisingly, the story from me isn’t going to deviate much from that. Much of this surrounds compatibility issues and whether or not the lens can or should be used with any other camera than the Leica(/Minolta) CL or the Minolta CLE. Additionally to these common observations on quality, there also seems to be a lot of information about the lens that veers into hearsay. “It’s Leicas greatest sleeper”, “Summicron quality for less than Summicron money”, “…but bokeh can be questionable”. If you spend any time reading about this lens, you’ll find the same sorts of comments from people time and time again. I guess this is why I was attracted to the idea of trying one out that and it’s match to my little Leica CL. The Leica 40mm Summicron is an odd little lens, both in terms of what it is, and its reputation.