A LEGENDARY Leica Lens Reborn: Light Lens Lab 50mm f/1.2 (1966) Review

Thanks to Westcott, PetaPixel's preferred lighting partner!

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The Light Lens Lab 50mm f/1.2 is designed to recreate the legendary original Leica 50mm f/1.2 as closely as possible. How does the design of a luxury lens from 1966 hold up today? Chris Niccolls is determined to blur that background to oblivion and find out!

0:00 - Intro
0:17 - Light Lens Lab vs Leica
2:38 - Sample Images
3:06 - Handling and design
4:18 - Bokeh
4:56- Flare
6:46 - LoCA
7:28 - Sharpness
8:54 - The wrap

[markyteo]

Not measured in Noct, I have absolutely no idea how heavy the lens is.

[kurocamera]

Funny that LLL puts more effort & love into making exact reissues of Leica lenses than Leica does with their reissues. Love what they're doing.

[davidwoods]

An f1.2....and you didn't test it at NIGHT? Tisk, tisk...

[Project_]

Finally! A photographer using a reflector in the correct angle! And I don't even say this in an ironic way - which kinda makes it sound as if I did, but I actually didn't!

[DavidDatura]

A lovely lens. And I really like the flair and “glow” you get with it. Reminds me of vintage photos from the 60s/70s. And it allows you to get that nostalgic effect today 👍

[blotafton]

Light Lens Lab is the most interesting lens maker out there with their design philosophy. I'm waiting for their 75mm f2 Speed Panchro replica.

[senatorfrisbee]

I'm a fashion photographer and have been shooting this lens exclusively at shows - used the lens flare to get some really cool shots! It really helps my photography not have the typical look.

[kgkvideo]

I hope that using the LoCA shirt itself to do the LoCA test becomes the standard!

[robkamanda]

Chris and Jordan. Thank you for your awesome videos. I hope you could continue to do content about glass and kit that some of us broke people can afford. Like stuff that educates and inspires us to reach your level in photography and videography skills. Like maybe even focusing on adapting old glass to current gear. I think that would help to grow your channel more because you are discussing issues the most of us are dealing with as beginner and intermediate folk are dealing with. Still, thank you fr your channel.

[empiricusdremomys]

Good stuff. The lens performs indeed like the original bank vault lens. The lens hood included is actually a copy of the Leica 12503 shade (another $6-9K collectors item) and also fits on the original. One can unscrew the two halfs of the hood to take out the UV filter. LLL ships the 1966 lens also with an ND filter included.

[johnehman]

Very interesting insight into a lens that I, otherwise, would never have known about. Thanks!

[martinhertsius]

It's really not fair to evaluate sharpness when using such a lens (short exit pupil distance) on a Sony camera with a thick sensor stack, that the lens was never designed to cope with.

[JimVajda]

Bright sunny days are made for HDR, Jordan

[ArmaniFlyHigh]

The Light Lens Lab 50mm f/1.2 is a "fast" lens and to grind the glass so that it has an equal flow of DOF at all distances in all its character is unique..
for €1.845, 95 EUR (AL) not a bad pricing..the problem becomes the brand and warranty issues..

NB it have the looks of the Voigtländer family

[jamescaldwell]

I love the concept, however comparing it to some of the other high quality manual lenses coming out of china, the price seems a bit steep. That’s considerably more expensive than my Voigtlander 50mm f1. For anyone wanting to try out a very fast manual lens with some character, yet very affordable, I highly recommend the 7artisans 50mm f1.05. Very creamy background bokeh while giving you plenty of detail wide open if you get the focus right.

[klastorps]

Great little cameo by Mike Drew - first time not in a Canon video? 🎉

[dans.]

That LoCA shirt is going to be interpreted in a different way by Spanish speaking non-photographers 😉

[nilssieper]

Well one thing seems a bit strange to me... When they are really hand grinding the ASPH. Elements like the did in the first version of the Canon 55 1.2 Fd as well for example, why are there so strong onion rings visibel in the bokeh? From what ive learnd over the last years, they come from the much cheaper style to create ASPH elements by cementing lens parts together. Ive used the old Canon FD 55 1.2 ASPH. SCC Version and it dose not have onion rings like this in the bokeh?!? I think by the way that a Close Fokus adapter would be a perfekt combo with this lens. With it you can knock down the minimum fokus by a long shoot. If the DOF is still to wide for you at 1m at f1.2 xD. Well well but i think that the pictures with this lens together with a close focus adapter would be terrific.
Cheers.
PS: If you want to have fun with lenses like that but dont have more than 2k just by a Canon 55mm 1.2 FD or the 58mm 1.2 Minolta or the best from the 80ts the Pentax 50mm 1.2. A good one will set you back from 200-500 Euros. And its a lot of fun. Use a hood with lenses like this!

[dumchidumchi]

Why tested this lens with the Sony camera which has thick sensor stack? A more relevant and useful test would be using the Leica M series camera IMHO.

[sipper]

A fast, manual, lightweight, and affordable lens with good center sharpness would trump the nostalgic experience this offers for me, but it's nice that people who weren't able to afford this look before are now able to. Probably makes more sense for a film photographer who can't emulate these characteristics as easily in post. I still wonder if cheap chinese lenses with poor sharpness exhibit enough of these characteristics for most though.