Russian Elmars = confusion ?

[dee]

I have a Fed '' clip '' collapsible , lense from a Fed 2 . And various I 22 / I 50 ... some of which have been pressed into service on my Leica M 8 as well as my twin Fed 1g '' Leicas '' [ not all are calibrated to a Leica , but are fine on the Zotrkis and Feds ]

The Fed is brilliant . Crisp and '' bright '' on my M 8 , yet is notably the same family as my 30s and 50s Elmars [ and Summitar ] ... yet I am told that Russian copies followed Zeiss practise , rather than Leitz , which I associate with a sharper '' harder '' style ... even my I 50 '' Ugly Bug '' rigid is so similar to the Fed to be virtually the same .

It's quite different from the Helios on the Kiev , and a late new / old stock J 8 , which i do not find so '' pictorial " ... i gather that these certainly are Zeiss designs ...

confused-dee

[Brian Sweeney]

Elmars and tessars are the same optical formula. The Helios and Summar are the same formula, a 1-2-2-1 Planar.

The Russian lenses are built to the Zeiss "standard" focal length of ~52.5mm. That is according to the factory spec sheet that I have that came with a J-3 in 39mm thread mount. The Leica standard is ~51.6mm.

[john neal]

I always thought that, although the glas construction of the two is very similar, the big difference with an Elmar is that the aperture is immediately behind the front element, unlike the Tessar, where it is between the 2nd and 3rd?

Apparently this affects the sharpness of the results in some way.

Any lens experts out there?