Canon -- Voigtlander 20 and 40 mm lenses

[JeanMichel]

Hi,

Anyone looking for small size lenses for their Canon (full frame or cropped sensor) would do well to consider the Voigtlander Color Skopar 20 mm (f 3.5) and the Ulron 40 mm (f 2). I very recently purchased both and I am most pleased with the results. Prior to using digital equipment -- I first purchased a 5d and then traded it for a 5d2, mainly because of the time I was spending cleaning the 5d's sensor -- I was using Leica's and less frequently a Hasselblad. I mostly used a 35 Summicron with eyes and a 50 and 21. Holding the 5D and the excellent 24-105 zoom is quite different and I sorely wished for a small lens, yet the Canon L fixed focal lenses are almost as large as the 24-105. Mounting the tiny 20 or 40 on the 5d2 brings the equipment closer to that of what I was used to. A Leica M9 would be nice but...

The quality of the images is what I was expecting -- there isn't much information on the lenses online but I found that my results duplicate those of the trials done by Volker Gilbert ( http://www.questionsphoto.com ).
For the 40 mm I did have to set a microadjustment so that the focus confirmation in the viewfinder matches the live view focus. There was no need to adjust the 20 mm. With the focus confirmation in the viewfinder I do not feel any need to buy a different focusing screen, but maybe it would make a difference if I did.
The 20 mm has much less distortion than the 24-105 at 24 mm, although it does exhibit the same wave distortion on the top and bottom edges. There is vignetting but so what?
The 40 has an unusual lens shade, into which you can screw in the included close up lens!
The construction is excellent and pretty much all in metal. The focus ring moves very smoothly; you set the aperture with the camera.

I am in Canada, about 80 km from Toronto. I purchased the lenses from a retailer in Montreal ( www.leicaboutique,com) since the one retailer in Toronto (Downtown Camera) is not expecting these lenses anytime soon. The 40m cost $452 CAN and the 20 cost $564 CAN; a lens shade for the 20 was another $36.

All in all quite a find.

Jean-Michel

[stever]

i've been planning to try the 20mm as soon as it becomes a little more widely available (and hopefully cheaper) in the US.  how is the corner resolution compared to the 24-105?  Lloyd Chambers (diglloyd.com) has tested the 20 and 40 on Nikon.  for the 20mm he rates the CA and flare pretty good, but the lens needs to be stopped down for decent edge resolution (as does the 24-105).  less distortion than the 24-105 would certainly be a plus as i find many images of involving straight lines are unsettling before resorting to PTLens

i have travel situations where i'd like to have a wide angle alternative but can't justify carrying a big lens

how is the 40 wide open?  after testing and selecting a Canon 50 1.4 and then sending it to Canon for repair it's still pretty sad on the right edge at f2 (but at least it's now pretty goood at 2.

[JeanMichel]

i've been planning to try the 20mm as soon as it becomes a little more widely available (and hopefully cheaper) in the US.  how is the corner resolution compared to the 24-105?  Lloyd Chambers (diglloyd.com) has tested the 20 and 40 on Nikon.  for the 20mm he rates the CA and flare pretty good, but the lens needs to be stopped down for decent edge resolution (as does the 24-105).  less distortion than the 24-105 would certainly be a plus as i find many images of involving straight lines are unsettling before resorting to PTLens

i have travel situations where i'd like to have a wide angle alternative but can't justify carrying a big lens

how is the 40 wide open?  after testing and selecting a Canon 50 1.4 and then sending it to Canon for repair it's still pretty sad on the right edge at f2 (but at least it's now pretty goood at 2.

Hi again,
I have not used the 40 extensively at f2 so far except for the test I did for the focus accuracy. In those images the corners are rather sharp -- my 'target' includes some b&w and colour halftone screens at the corners and the image shows the dots very clearly.
I have used the 20 wide open and I am pleasantly surprised with the edges sharpness - they may well be soft but, in images I made in a store with hardwood floors and a high wood planked ceiling the grooves show very clearly. I am sure that photographing a flat surface at f 3.5 would show much more difference between the centre and the edges but that is not what I plan to use this lens for.

[stever]

Photozone has recently posted a test of the 20mm in Canon mount on the 5D2 - performance is very close to the Canon 17-40 in virtually all respects.