The Picture Desk: Using the 50mm F1.1 in the field

Using a rangefinder camera has a few advantages over a regular SLR... and of course a few disadvantages. One of the great pluses is the ability to accurately focus in low light. Since the cameras work so well in low light, the manufactures cater to this market and make faster lenses for these cameras.

There are few lenses faster than the new Voigtlander 50mm F1.1 in the Leica M mount. This past Saturday I put on a Demo Event around this lens in the back "Graffiti Alley" in Toronto. These are a few of the shots that I took with the 50mm... they were all shot at F1.1.

Overall I thought the lens was fantastic. Although zero depth of field, I was surprised how sharp the lens was wide open. You could get Kate's eyes in focus, but the rest of the picture was gone, which produced an interesting look. The more I shoot with lenses wide open, the more I like the resulting look in the out of focus background area (often called Bokeh).

I think this lens would appeal to those rangefinder photographers doing street photography, photojournalism, fashion or weddings.

These shots were done on the Zeiss Ikon camera, on Aperture Priority on the Kodak Ektar 100 film and scanned at my local lab. You can get the lens through www.bigcameraworkshops.com.