Voigtlander ULTRON L 28mm F1.9 Aspherical
Voigtlander’s early aspherical, large-aperture wide-angle lens
A review of the Voigtlander Ultron 28mm f/1.9 used with a Leica M digital camera.
Table of contents
Photo example
- Taken with Rollei 35RF and KODAK Kodachrme64 (PKR) and scanned with DiMAGE Scan Multi PRO
Photo with LEICA M9
Review
1．Usage
The ULTRON 28mm F1.9 (first-generation 28mm Ultron, hereafter Ultron 28) is one of the early Voigtlander lenses, with a refined lens barrel and smooth helicoid rotation. When used with the R-D1, LEICA M8, and LEICA M9 rangefinders, it can capture the focus position with sufficient accuracy, has abundant peripheral light, and does not feel any peripheral light falloff in the shooting results. When the aperture is narrowed slightly, it has sufficient resolution even at the periphery.
The lens is completed with the standard attached crepe-finished hood, and in this form it is the most beautiful lens in the history of Cosina Voigtlander, and I think that the value of the lens is halved without the hood.
It uses an L39 mount, so it can be used with old Barnack Leicas and Japanese-made Leica copy cameras. As described later, it is a large lens, so when attached to a Barnack Leica, the camera gives a slightly exaggerated impression.
2．Lens overview
The ULTRON 28mm F1.9 (original 28mm Ultron) is a wide-angle lens with a large aperture and maximum aperture of F1.9, released by Cosina Voigtlander, using the L39 screw mount (hereinafter referred to as L39).
When used with an M-mount camera, an L/M conversion ring is required.
In order to achieve a large aperture, the lens is long, with a total length of 6.3 cm when the hood is attached, which is almost the same as the 6.45 cm of the L39-mount version of the Color Heliar 75mm F2.5, also with the hood attached, making it a large lens.
It uses the L39 mount and is linked to the rangefinder. The minimum shooting distance is 1.0 m, which is the standard value for Barnack Leica.
The original Voigtlander ULTRON is 50 mm / F2, and this lens has a maximum aperture of F1.9, so it is assumed that it was named only because of its close aperture value to the original Ultron’s F2.
3．Comparison with competitors
There are three generations of Cosina Voigtlander’s large-aperture 28mm lens. The second generation is the VM-mount ULTRON 28mm F2 (released on August 5, 2008) which does not use aspherical lenses, and the third generation is the ULTRON Vintage Line 28mm F2 Aspherical (released on June 10, 2021) which again uses aspherical lenses.
Each of the three generations has a different lens barrel design and lens configuration, which is interesting.
I’ve read that the first generation was not very good at handling the aspherical lenses and the bokeh was stiff, but in my own use I have never seen any images with any noticeable defects.
Compared to the Leica Summicron 28mm F2, which has almost the same specifications, it is an easy lens to buy as it can be purchased at about 1/5 to 1/10 of the price.
Specification and Competitor
| Items | First Ultron | 2nd Ultron | 3rd Ultron | Summicron 28mm ASPH. |
| Aspherical lens | Use | No use | Use | Use |
| Focal length(mm) | 28 | 28 | 28 | 28 |
| Max aperture | 1.9 | 2 | ← | 2 |
| Min aperture | 22 | ← | ← | 16 |
| Leaf blade | 10 | ← | ← | 10 |
| Lens Construction | 7elements 5groups | 10elements 8groups | 10elements 7groups | 9elements 6groups |
| Min distance(m) (distance meter linked) | 0.7 | ← | ← | 0.7 |
| Lens length(mm) | 63.1(Hood included/L39) | 51.2(without hood/M-mount) | 36 | 40.8(M-mount) |
| Max diameter(mm) | 55.8 | 55 | 51.4 | 53 |
| Filter Size(mm) | 46 | 46 | 39 | 46 |
| Weight(g) | 265 | 244 | 190/230 | 270 |
| Release date | 2001.4 | 2008.8.5 | 2021.6 | 2000. |
| Price(Yen/No-tax) | 75,000(Silver) / 78,000(Black) | 75,000(Black) | 100,000 (common to all 3 types) | – |
Reference links
Update history
- 2024.1.29:Added photo examples of PKR
- 2023.9.11:initial draft
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