Dallmeyer Super-Six 2inch 50mm F1.9 Lens

Dallmeyer is an English Lens Company made by J.H. Dallmeyer. Their cinematic lenses are famous for its out of focus rendering and oil-painting quality bokeh.

Due to its limited production numbers that demands very high prices on the market. It’s cine lenses can be graded from the following series: Kinematogrph, Super-Six, Dallac, Speed and Septac, which is the ultimate and the rarest. However, Dallmeyer is most well-known for its Super-Six series, which offers strong 3D image quality, unique colour rendering, swirly and oil-painting like bokeh.

Although Dallmeyer Super-Six 50mm f1.9 is famous as the standard lens of Witness Camera which has been manufactured by the British Ilford Corporation, the Lens shown here is very early production lens that is later converted to Leica mount. The Lens composition is Six elements in Four groups with Double Gauss Type Glass Design. They were made with extremely expensive rare earth elements that earned them the name “Super Six.”

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Dallmeyer Super-Six 3inch 76mm F1.9 Lens

Dallmeyer is an English Lens Company made by J.H. Dallmeyer. Their cinematic lenses are famous for its out of focus rendering and oil-painting quality bokeh.

Due to its limited production numbers that demands very high prices on the market. It’s cine lenses can be graded from the following series: Kinematogrph, Super-Six, Dallac, Speed and Septac, which is the ultimate and the rarest. However, Dallmeyer is most well-known for its Super-Six series, which offers strong 3D image quality, unique colour rendering, swirly and oil-painting like bokeh.

There are significant differences in image quality and price between each series. Also within each series there are both coated and uncoated versions, with the recognisable “DC” Dallmeyer Coating but uncoated versions are generally more rare and collectible.

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Alpa Kern Macro Switar 50mm F1.8/F1.9 Lens

Introduction

The Alpa Kern Macro Switar 50mm was exclusively made for Alpa cameras by Kern Aurau in Switzerland. Alpa is a precision Swiss watchmaker combined forces with Kern who was famous for making optical glass at the time to produce this legendary lens. The Kern Switar 50mm F1.8 was firstly introduced in 1951 and replaced by Macro Switar in 1958 with close focusing capability of 28cm for macro photography. The Kern Macro Switar 50mm F1.9 was introduced in 1968 with revised lens design and newer coatings for improved optical performance.

Build Quality

Alpa is known as the precision watchmaker thus no surprise that the Alpa Kern Switar 50mm lenses were extremely well engineered. The build quality is excellent and on par with well-known cinematic lens makers such as Angenieux or Schneider at the time. The Kern Switar 50mm lenses were hand assembled and finished in either chrome, black paint or combination of both. 

Image Quality

Image quality from the Alpa Kern Switar 50mm lenses are exceptional and the lens excels at macro photography. Images produced are extremely sharp with high contrast and vivid colour saturations. Alpa claimed that this is an apochromatically corrected lens of unequalled quality, which is found to be true in most situations.

The Kern Macro Switar 50mm Lenses have close focusing capability when used with liveview for macro photography. The details retained by this lens is incredible with extreme sharpness and pleasant rendering, which is an amazing achievement on modern rangefinders.

Practical Use

Unlike Modern lens design, when the aperture ring is turned that the yellow dots appeared indicating the visifocus depth-of-field scale for the selected aperture stops. The focus ring has an extremely long throw and takes several turns to reach the minimum focusing distance of 28cm equivalents to 1.8x magnification, which is extremely useful for close-up work.

Modern photography technological aids such as live-view or high resolution electronic viewfinder, which allows to maximise the ability of the Kern Macro Switar 50mm Lenses to reach its full potential for macro photography.  

Alpa Kern Macro Switar 50mm F1.8

VS

Alpa Kern Macro Switar 50mm F1.9

The Kern Switar 50mm F1.9 Lens was introduced later with revised lens design and newer optical coatings compared to the Kern Switar 50mm F1.8 Lens for improved performance. The Kern Switar 50mm F1.8 has golden yellow colour coating whereas the Kern Switar 50mm F1.9 has golden yellow with purple coloured coatings.

The Kern Switar 50mm F1.9 has updated lens design with an additional element with 8 elements in 5 groups compared to 7 elements in 5 groups of the Kern Switar 50mm F1.8 Lens. The Diaphragm blades also have been moved forward in position. The improved lens design resulted better optical performance for the newer Kern Switar 50mm F1.9 Lens.

Lens Versions

 Nekogahora Camera Collection (Clockwise)

1. Macro Switar 50/1.9 (Surgical 81)
2. Macro Switar 50/1.9
3. Macro Switar 50/1.9 (Gold Plated)
4. Kern Aarau Switar (Automatic Diaphragm)
5. Macro Switar 50/1.8 (Black Paint)
6. Macro Switar 50/1.8

Adapters

There are three popular Alpa to Leica M adapter options on the current market and the price is reflected in it’s materials & build quality. The finish of the adapters are mostly in either Chrome or Black and most adapters are Rangefinder Coupled. However, during actual use might require manual calibration to work perfectly on Rangefinders.

I will rank the adapter brands from most to the least expensive:

1. Shogun
2. Metabones
3. Kipon

Specifications

Lens Mount: Alpa

Production Year:  1951 (F1.8) | 1968 (F1.9)

Construction:

7 Elements / 5 Groups (F1.8) 

8 Elements / 5 Groups (F1.9)

Diaphragm:  9 Blades

Maximum Aperture:  F1.8 | F1.9

Minimum Aperture:  F22

Closet Focusing Distance:  0.28m

Filter Size:  48mm

Weight:  280g

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Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM Lens

The Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM is arguably the best Canon 85mm RF lens made. It is relatively hard to find and has very high reputation as a portrait lens without the softness associated with most vintage lenses. It has similar resemblance to the older Canon 100mm F2 LTM lens but with improved ergonomics and optical performance.

Build Quality

The Canon 85mm F1.8 is a solid and compact lens for its focal length. It’s compact dimensions and solid build quality is perfect balance on Leica M Rangefinders. The lens is all metal construction with design consisting of focusing and aperture ring turning simultaneously.

Image Quality

The Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM is a vintage lens that offers relatively modern rendering with typical Fuji signature colours. The lens produces sharp contrasty images and renders like newer modern glass. There isn’t noticeable flare or vignetting with this lens and it renders image beautifully for 1970’s Lens.

The Lens offers a relatively fast maximum aperture at F1.8. When shot wide open, it produces pleasant bokeh and smooth out of focus area. The image rendering is classic with natural and vibrant colours.

Practical Use

The Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM is in original Leica Thread Mount hence requires a LTM-to-M adapter to work properly on Leica M Cameras.

The focusing throw on this lens is very long but very smooth at the same time. When adjusting for aperture, since the lens has no dual helicoil mount and the aperture ring turns with focusing throw. This can be confusing during practical use as both aperture and focus turn at the same time.

Canon 85mm F1.8 vs Canon 85mm F1.9

The main difference in terms of image quality is when shooting both lenses wide open. The Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM is definitely sharper and more contrasty than the Canon 85mm F1.9 LTM at their respective maximum aperture, this is partially due to their optical design. When shooting wide open, the bokeh of the Canon 85mm F1.8 is more smooth and pleasant in comparison to the Canon 85mm F1.9 lens.

The size and weight of the Canon 85mm F1.8 is bigger and heavier than the Canon 85mm F1.9 lens. It is slightly larger in dimensions and around 100 grams more in weight. There is also a difference in applicable filter size for both lenses with 58mm for the Canon 85mm F1.8 lens and 48mm for the thinner Canon 85mm F1.9 lens.

Specifications

Lens Mount: Leica Thread Mount (LTM)

Production Year: 1960 - 70s

Construction: 7 Elements / 6 Groups

Diaphragm: 13 Blades

Maximum / Minimum Aperture:  F1.8 - F22

Closet Focusing Distance: 1m

Dimensions: 75mm x 60mm

Filter Size: 58mm

Weight: 470g

Conclusion

The Canon 85mm F1.8 LTM is an excellent short telephoto lens, it has plenty of character and shoots eye-pleasing portraits. The lens has great colour rendition and produces contrasty images. It is an amazing lens for Leica M you won’t regret buying, that is if you can find one.