Friday, April 3, 2015

Voigtlander Color-Skopar X 50mm f2.8

I am a big fan of the original Voigtlander lenses.  I would buy them whenever the price is reasonable.  There are many, many Voigtlander lenses out there, from large format, folder, to 35mm format.  They made a series of lenses in the DKL mount.  This Color-Skopar X 50mm f2.8 is one of them, which was used in some Voigtlander and Kodak reflex cameras.  The lens itself has a modified Tessar design and is very well corrected for chromatic aberration (colour fringing).  Quite amazing for a lens designed in the late 1940s when you compare it to today's modern lenses and many of them show heavy chromatic aberration.

The lens is very small, but made beautifully, like most lenses in DKL mount.  Sharpness at the centre of the frame is excellent even at f2.8.  Stopping down to f11 and the edges are also very good at the slight loss of sharpness.  The bokeh produced by this lens is exquisite and pleasing.  Colours tend to be more saturated than many other lenses from the same era.

The only negative, is the rather slow maximum aperture for a standard 50mm lens.  However, it should be considered an amazing feat to produce such a small lens with an f2.8 aperture more than 60 years ago.

Overall, a very enjoyable lens that produces nice results.

All pictures below were taken with the Voigtlander Color-Skopar X 50mm f2.8 & Sony A7







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9 comments:

  1. Jeff vanKhaApril 14, 2015 at 10:12 PM

    Heavy vignetting for a 50mm f2.8, nonetheless, beautiful colors. I don't see any chromatic abbé rations. Impressive!

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  2. UnknownApril 28, 2015 at 4:19 AM

    eventually the new lenses we get in the future are going to have flaws like massive distortion and chromatic aberrations as the image processors get more advanced (nikon bodies already correct chromatic aberrations for nikons modern lenses), both sony and fuji point and shoots use onboard image processing to correct distortion - the zeiss vario-tessar on sony point and shoots, and the wider aperture fujifilm x series cameras to keep the lens compact (in the old days wider aperture = bigger lens)

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  3. UnknownSeptember 10, 2015 at 11:24 AM

    How did you mount Voigtlander Color-Skopar 50mm f2.8? What kind of adapter did you use?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lens BubbleSeptember 10, 2015 at 11:34 AM

      This lens has a DKL mount. Adapters for various cameras are available from eBay.

      Delete
    2. D ThorneSeptember 22, 2021 at 2:21 AM

      You'll want to get a helicoid adaptor for your camera and adapt the dil to that. This will allow you to get around the difficult near focal distance problems of these dkl mount lenses, and even allow you to use it as a macro lens, while preserving infinity.

      Delete
  4. aowaOctober 22, 2015 at 8:43 AM

    Voigtlander Color-Skopar X 50mm f2.8
    Voigtlander lanthar 50mm f2.8
    Voigtlander vaskar 50mm f2.8
    Which one best of bokeh

    ReplyDelete
  5. rhalfOctober 5, 2016 at 8:32 PM

    Hi,
    These are fantastic shots. Do you think there is a difference between this and a rangefinder version?

    ReplyDelete
  6. danuNovember 23, 2020 at 6:51 AM

    Can it be adapted for Pentax or micro 4/3?

    ReplyDelete
  7. UnknownJanuary 24, 2021 at 11:13 AM

    Really nice photos. Well done!

    ReplyDelete

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