The “old” style looking new Ultron lens.
Two small news about new Voigtländer M-mount lenses you can use on Sony E-mount cameras with an adapter:
1) Fotocommunity unveiled the pricing/shipment of the new Ultron 35mm f/1.7 lens. It will cost 1.000 Euro and ship in May. The lens is M-mount but has been “optimized” to be used on digital cameras.
2) The Sony FE optimized Heliar 15mm f/4.5 lens will ship from early April at [shoplink 34591 ebay]Fotomundus Germany (Click here)[/shoplink] and [shoplink 34590 ebay]Shenikon Hong Kong (Click here)[/shoplink]. A review of the lens on the Sony can be seen here on SAR.
Thanks Martin for finding and sharing the news.
48 Responses
it the image quality is as beautiful as the exterior of these lenses, they will have winners here
I can’t see any sense for this lens …..
It’s a slow lens (f4.5) and you can’t do astrophotography.
On the other heand for the same price you can buy the original Fe zaiss 16-35 lens that has autofocus
Can someone explain to me the sense?
The 15 f4.5 is half the price and a prime. While it can’t be used for astro, it does have its applications (landscape being the prime example).
Somebody mentioned before that the 15mm v3 is not really Sony optimised, but rather digitally optimised which makes sense. It’s an M-Mount – so you can use it in a Leica or film cameras that takes M-Mount lenses.
Some people just want small lenses.
Wide aperture and autofocus don’t matter on a 15mm lens imo. That said, I’ve heard nothing but bad about this lens so far
SMH
1. This is an m-mount lens, not necessarily made to compete with the FE
2. It is not the same price as the FE, check again
3. It is relatively small and light, which is great for landscapers
4. It has mechanical focus, which is great for landscape (and other purposes)
5. Astrophotography is a niche, not sure why you started with that (although, given the latest sensors, I don’t see why you won’t be able to do some); this lens will be great for landscape work
Yes,u r right…. they have alot different prices i cheched..
The Voigh lens can be small and light but with the adaptor it can’t convince me enough. Mmmmm
f4.5 it’s alot as max aperture.
In landscape most of the time u requires small apertures i know but….sometimes u need fast primes for starlight.
Btw thanks for explanations and your point of view
Yes, for starlight and northern lights, there are better solutions, but looking at the size of, say, the Samyang 14mm 2.8 and it is me who’s not convinced. When hiking somewhere, every ounce counts and water/food/shelter/etc have priority in my backpack.
In the end f4.5 is not much different than a f4 zoom and I’ve used those for stars without much issue. Horses for courses though.
Yeah…I can explain it to you…it’s built for Leica, hence the ‘M’ mount. I for one will buy it as it should be an awesome landscape lens on my M240.
Man. I haven’t heard of this new ultron 35mm…. when did that happen?
The original ultron 1.7 was discontinued after the 1.4 came in with its two flavours and the 1.2 became the prime lens.
If this 1.7 can be as sharp as the 1.2 and with better bokeh then we surely have a winner.
I was told by a friend that tests voigtlander equipment that the 15mm has major chromatic aberrations. I haven’t seen any photographs and cannot confirm if this is true but I would wait until seeing a review before buying one
Thank you for the useless unverified information, keep up the good work.
It’s not useless. The use is to simply wait rather than make a pre-order
You are useless .. thanks bob
Ultron is very bad, trying to destroy mankind and kill the Avengers. Buy it at your own risk. Very bad.
Unlike the movie Hank, I know it was you who created Ultron, not Tony Stark
Yes, the biggest mistake of my life.
No adaptors. Voigtlander can screw themselves if they don’t want to make native FE lenses for me.
Zeiss is superior Sony glass.
I see the adapter as a welcome feature:
– you can use a helicoid adapter which is very convenient for macro and close-up work
– M-mount is more adaptable than E-mount, so you can use the lens on other systems, i.e. if you have a second system camera or stop using Sony some day
That’s true, but can’t beat native glasses, and I’m pretty sure if Voigt were to create native FE lenses, it’ll still sell well.
Beat in what?
Performance, between an adapted lens vs designed for it lens. Like if you compare the lens performance on a M camera (designed for) vs E camera, it’ll perform better on the M camera.
Cause with adapters, you got to take account the adapter tolerances and some in fact many, has a slightly over the infinity because of different lens variations.
You just dial it back then. Adapter tolerances are negligible in my opinion. However, the point in adapting is generally to have cheaper or unavailable in the system lenses; difficult to beat that 🙂
The 35/1,7 is a beautiful lens to look at. Voigtlander are demonstrating real sound business judgement to make sure their M-mount lenses work well with Sony cameras. Although we’re not short of 35mm Zeiss options for the A7r I still find it hard to understand why the Zeiss ZM 35/1,4 wasn’t designed to work better on Sony cameras given the market for them is so huge compared to M mount. Interestingly many of the lenses Voigtlander had already been making already did work perfectly. The 35/1,2 for example is wonderful on the A7R with no corner issues. Indeed it’s so good that I do wonder where this 1,7 will fit in as I would expect more people to go for the 1,2 unless the 1,7 is a lot smaller and it’s hard to tell from these images.
Many have expressed doubt about the 15/4,5. It’s true that it will be a bit compromised for astrophotography – if you want the 2.8 get the Samyang 14mm (as long as you get a good copy!) The old version of the 15/4,5 was a legendary performer on film M-mount cameras. It had problems on the M9 but on film it was wonderful with incredibly low distortion and was probably the best 15mm lens for the M mount. If the new one can pull off the same trick we should be thankful. For landscapes and cityscapes the lack of distortion is a real help. Of course one could use the Canon 17mm T/S but the size difference is immense.
Autofocus lenses can NOT be same in size nor smaller in size as manual focus lenses. If Zeiss lens will be f1.2 instead of f1.7 this lens will be bigger and heavier.
What about the Voigtländer Nokton 35mm f1.4 with an A7x? I haven’t heard much about it.
I have one that I use with my M4/3 kit. Eventually I’ll get an A7x and a lens adaptor for it.
I’m not sure if the 15 VM III is truly optimized for E mount, as you can only optimize for 1 mount, either M or E, if both it means they’ll be some compromise. So my guess is when Voigtlander says it is optimised, it means that it’s updated for the digital sensor, but it’ll still work best on a M mount camera and okayish on E mount cameras.
I’m sure if it works on E-mount it will also look good on M-mount. The Leica sensor is more forgiving with ray of light angle compared to the A7 sensors.
Exactly.
I don’t understand what the point of this lens is when the Voigtlander 35mm f1.2 is excellent and not far off in price.
But I really hope Voigtlander continues to release M-mount lenses with A7 series cameras in mind.
The difference would be weight. Also, the 1.2 has its quirks, maybe the 1.7 has different ones 🙂
That is like saying ‘why do they make the f1.5 50mm when they make the f1.1 50mm for not much difference in price?’. These lenses are Voigtlander’s ‘high grade’ lenses, they might not be as fast but are usually optically their best. The older 35mm Ultron is well regarded, much MUCH more so than the Noktons.
Imho, “optimized to be used on digital camera” does mean nothing, particularly for a7x cameras so different each other because of the resolution of the sensor, single photodots dimension and optical specifications, microlenses that are present only on one model… The only common element should be, if I’m not wrong, the critical thickness of the glass in front of the sensor of all the a7x. What sort of ibrid compromise for the a7x could be this optimization ?
Well it might mean something: all the Sony E mount cameras (APSC and FF despite what someone else said) share the same cover glass thickness, and you can certainly optimise for that.
But my question is does SAR really know it’s optimised for the Sony coverglass? It might be optimized for the much thinner Leica coverglass (which would make an improvement on Leica compare to the old model optimised for film). That would still make it better on Sony than the old one, but far from optimised…
Well that is a good question. Would not surprise me at all if the majority of modern Voigtländer M lenses ends up being used on mirrorless cameras (MFT, E-mount, Fuji…). It would in that case make a lot of sense if they were adjusted for the thicker cover glass.
“old” style look? I’m sure you meant to say “Classic” style look. Madonna is old style looking.
Only test shots will tell how well this was optimized, but it’s not looking favourable. It has the rearmost lens element protruding deeper behind the mount, which causes the same issue that plagues all non-retrofocal wide and ultra-wide Leica lenses on FE-mount: lightrays hitting the frame corners at extreme angles, causing colour shift (purple fringing).
Actually, seems like the older Ultron wasn’t really an issue, neither were the two Noktons.
1000,- for the 35mm? I would stick with the Loxia …
Because you know for sure it is better for the extra $300 and half a stop slower?
Coolness overload. 🙂
Found this online that compares the Voigtlander Nokton 35mm f1.2 to the Ultron 35mm f1.7
http://www.nicholsportraits.com/2014/08/07/ultron-vs-nokton/
Looks like Nokton is far superior in image quality. The Ultron has a softer vintage more classic look, if that’s the feel you’re going for.
That’s the old Ultron.
Voigtlander: here is what you need to do (you can pay me in instalments!), make yourselves a new close focus adapter that has a rangefinder coupling that TRANSMITS distance information to E-Mount bodies while keeping making M-Mount lenses. Two advantages to this, 1) we can see distance info in the viewfinder and 2) it can enable automatic focus magnification if desired by the user. This would mean we could use Voigtlander lenses more like native lenses, but only pay for it once and lenses would still be compatible with other systems including native M-Mount. Bring out this adapter and I will buy nothing but Voigtlander M-Mount lenses for my A7S.
It would also enable full 5-axis stabilisation on an A7II as well.
The chrome versions are traditionally more expensive than the black ones. I expect 899€ (or 999€) for the silver and 749€(or 849€) for the black. Street prices will be around 100€ lower.