But, it’s only a 15 percent price drop to lose a stop of light and roughly half a pound. $900 on any other lens system would be a big price difference. A $5,095 price point is expected on a Leica, but the f1.4 is $5,995. It will capture a lot of sharp shots, but it’s not quite as fast as Canon or Sony systems.
We noted in our S5 review that the body doesn’t focus as well with Leica lenses as it does with Panasonic glass.
Even as an f2, it delivers some beautiful bokeh with great background separation.īut, the autofocus is just okay. The metal design withstood both water and sand. It doesn’t make the camera body too front-heavy, and it balances image quality with character-building bokeh and flare. The Leica SL 50mm f2 Summicron is a well-balanced lens.
It’s lighter than Leica’s and Panasonic’s 50mm f1.4. The contrast and bokeh still look great. Distortion is well-controlled, yet there’s still some character from flare and bokeh. The metal design is both beautiful and durable. That lead me to believe that it’s the S5’s autofocus that has a lower hit rate with backlighting. However, when I swapped out the Leica 50mm f2 for the S5’s kit lens and shot the same exact scene, the autofocus still had trouble. I did have some trouble locking focus when shooting backlit, particularly with darker subjects like the chocolate-brown fur on my dog. Occasionally, you’ll get a shot that’s not quite on the eyes, but it’s not bad. Photographing a teenager, that miss rate dropped dramatically. This is expected, especially when working with subjects that are heading straight towards the camera.įor portraits, I had a few soft shots of a squirmy toddler. The 1.15 autofocus limit is true for stationary subjects, but with moving subjects, you’ll want them to be at least three feet from the lens. Closer to the lens’ 1.15-foot limit, the opposite was true and most of the shots were soft. The autofocus had a near-perfect hit rate with moving subjects several feet away. The lens is fast enough for portraits and freezing subjects at a walk but slows down when working at close range. The autofocus is generally fast, but not quite as robust as Canon’s or Sony’s. The motors are quiet enough not to draw attention to the photographer. The Leica 50mm f2 SL uses dual drive autofocus motors. Bayonet/sensor format: L-Mount, full-frame 35 mm format. Aperture Setting/function: Electronically controlled aperture, set using turn/push wheel on camera, including half and third values. Leica lists these tech specs for the 50mm Summicron: Otherwise, the innovation here is what’s innovative about Leica’s other lenses - durable all-metal design. This is not the low-quality version of the f1.4, just a low bokeh version. What’s unique with the way Leica handles these lighter f2 lenses is that they still focus on eliminating aberrations and other distortions. 
The 50mm f2 is really meant as a lighter alternative to Leica’s 50mm f1.4 Summilux. And I paired it with a WANDRD wrist strap. I used the Leica 50mm f2 SL with the Panasonic S5.
About 25% lighter than the Leica 50mm f1.2 SL.
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