Voigtlander ULTRON L 35mm F1.7

A review of the Voigtlander Ultron 35mm f/1.7 used with a Leica M digital camera.

Gallery

The photo examples were taken with LEICA M9

Lens configuration diagram is taken from Koshina’s official page.

Review

The Ultron 35mm F1.7 Aspherical is an early lens released by Cosina under the Voigtlander brand. Along with the Ultron 28mm F1.9, it uses aspherical lenses, and is a lens that was put together with the brand’s efforts in the early days.

The original screw-in hood is short and has low light blocking effect, so the appearance of the lens with it attached does not look very good. The lens will look even more beautiful with the IROOA hood for the Summicron-M 35mm, which I will explain later.

The lens’s depiction is not bad even in the corners, even when used with the full-size sensor of the M9, and although there are some scenes where the bokeh is slightly rough, I think it is not bad overall. Early Cosina Voigtlander lenses were in a transitional period between old lenses and digital-compatible lenses, and the lens configuration also moved away from the general Gaussian type, and it seems that the design was trial and error.

The Ultron 35mm’s maximum aperture remains at 1.7, but the lens configuration was changed and it was renewed to a VM mount in August 2015. In addition, the Ultron 35mm series will continue with a change in lens configuration and maximum aperture of F2 in March 2021.

This lens is designed so that the external thread pitch remaining after removing the original lens hood matches the Leica Summicron 35mm hood IROOA, and the lens barrel diameter is almost the same as IROOA, so the aperture ring part becomes a narrow lens, creating a very beautiful lens principal appearance. This seems to be a design that Cosina has deliberately completed.

If the factory hood is removed, this hood can be attached.

Specification

Items	Ultron 35mm	SUMMICRON 35mm ASPH.
Focal length(mm)	35	35
Max aperture	1.7	2
Min aperture	16	16
Leaf blade	10	9 or 11
Lens Construction	8elements in 6groups	7elements in 5groups
Min distance(m)	0.9	0.7
Lens length(mm)	44.7(with hood / L39)	34.5(M mount)
Max diameter(mm)	55	53
Filter Size(mm)	39	39
Weight(g)	203	255(Balck) / 340(Silver/Titan)
Release date	1999.8	1996
Price(Yen/No-tax)	65,000(Silver) / 68,000(Black)	–