Leica on the way! (1 Viewer)

Thanks to all those who have followed my little quest for binoculars. While I have mentioned it in numerous threads, the main one was here:

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=276836

I decided on the Leica 8x42 Ultravid HD and have been waiting until I saved the rest of the needed funds up. I was seriously planning on going with Cameraland NY and one of their demos, but found an even better deal today, Although I only joined the ABA about a week ago, I was on the ABA page today and found a used pair in their listings described (in follow up communication) as "mint" for about $200 less than the CLNY demo, which was already about $450 off MAP pricing.

Soooo...I'm saving about $650 off new pricing... This also meant I could order them TODAY instead of TWO WEEKS FROM TODAY.

As a self-described "kid at Christmas" I'm excited as can be. I hope to have them early to middle of next week.

I am aware of some folks stated experience with used Leicas, but I'm willing to risk this for $650 off new prices.

The owner stated that one objective lens cover was missing, but I can order one pretty easy. Any advice on where (Leica direct? Or other dealers?)

David in NC said:

Thanks to all those who have followed my little quest for binoculars. While I have mentioned it in numerous threads, the main one was here:

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=276836

I decided on the Leica 8x42 Ultravid HD and have been waiting until I saved the rest of the needed funds up. I was seriously planning on going with Cameraland NY and one of their demos, but found an even better deal today, Although I only joined the ABA about a week ago, I was on the ABA page today and found a used pair in their listings described (in follow up communication) as "mint" for about $200 less than the CLNY demo, which was already about $450 off MAP pricing.

Soooo...I'm saving about $650 off new pricing... This also meant I could order them TODAY instead of TWO WEEKS FROM TODAY.

As a self-described "kid at Christmas" I'm excited as can be. I hope to have them early to middle of next week.

I am aware of some folks stated experience with used Leicas, but I'm willing to risk this for $650 off new prices.

The owner stated that one objective lens cover was missing, but I can order one pretty easy. Any advice on where (Leica direct? Or other dealers?)

Click to expand...

Hi,

Glad you got a good deal. Eagleoptics should have the suitable lens caps.

Andy

David,

I just got back from a week in SE AZ with my 10x50 BR, which stayed hot, as birds were thick. The performance was impressive in all conditions. Color error was never an issue, and it is very sharp. With a little practice, the jumpy knob jumps to the right place, so that it is in fact extremely quick on target.

HD, harrumph! who needs it? Seriously, I can't imagine how you could possibly be disappointed. Have fun!

Ron

David in NC said:

The owner stated that one objective lens cover was missing, but I can order one pretty easy. Any advice on where (Leica direct? Or other dealers?)

Click to expand...

Greetings. Congrat. You will really like you new pairs. Enjoy in good health.

I recently acquired objective lens caps under warranty from Leica, and am sure that they can provide you with a pair, perhaps at a small fee. To keep a spare, I also obtained an after market pair at very reasonable cost from ebay.co.uk. They are listed under leica binoculars and in that list, they are pictured under "rubber stay". Please observe that you want the 42mm size. Quality and fit are very acceptable.

It is noteworthy that the 32mm size from the same source works perfectly with the Trinovid BA/BN 8/10x32 series. Although the Trinovid BA/BN did not come originally with lens caps, it is a nice functional addition.

Once more, congrat. The Ultravid 8x42 HD will serve you very well.

David ....I've been following your posts sharing your discoveries as you searched for the best binocular for you. Glad to hear they are on the way and I hope they work out great! I look forward to your report after you have had a chance to check it out.

ronh said:

David,

I just got back from a week in SE AZ with my 10x50 BR, which stayed hot, as birds were thick. The performance was impressive in all conditions. Color error was never an issue, and it is very sharp. With a little practice, the jumpy knob jumps to the right place, so that it is in fact extremely quick on target.

HD, harrumph! who needs it? Seriously, I can't imagine how you could possibly be disappointed. Have fun!

Ron

Click to expand...

Arek from allbinos agrees with you.

"Testing the Leica Ultravid HD we could compare it with the previous model (without the HD symbol). To tell you the truth there was virtually no difference between these models. In case of all optical and mechanical properties they fared the same. Even the degree of aberration correction, which was supposed to be better because of the fluorite glass, remained the same. If any difference occurred, it was minimal."

Leica 10x50 HD review

Brock

Brock,

Actually I have never looked through a Leica HD so don't know what I'm talking about. And I'm certainly not saying the 10x50 BR is perfect, nor the world's best. The 10x56 FL beats it on brightness and color saturation. But the Leica gives a birder the views he needs in a most elegant package.

Ron

ronh said:

Brock,

Actually I have never looked through a Leica HD so don't know what I'm talking about. And I'm certainly not saying the 10x50 BR is perfect, nor the world's best. The 10x56 FL beats it on brightness and color saturation. But the Leica gives a birder the views he needs in a most elegant package.

Ron

Click to expand...

Ron,

Well, you made a good guess, anyway.

The Leica 10x50 UV has the widest FOV in its class (6.7* TFOV/67* AFOV), which I would find very appealing. I'm surprised that the 10x56 FL has better color saturation. Typically, the FL series light transmission graphs show a big bump in the green-yellow, slight bump in the blue and a steep fall off in the red. Leica is usually the alpha brand best known for its color saturation, although the EDG has the flattest light graph, with a boost in the red. But neither Nikon nor Zeiss offer 10x50s on the top shelf, but the new 10x54 HT comes close in size and weight -- it's only 2 ounces heavier than the UV.

While I prefer the larger exit pupils and better light gathering power of a 10x50, the oxalic acid in spinach gives me rashes and interferes with the absorption of calcium, so I think I just sticks with me's 10x42s.

Whimpy

"I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."

Brock,

Your argument about the shape of the transmission curve is reasonable, and thanks for bringing it up. But it must be missing something, because it does not work out that way. I will make a guess as to what is happening, protected under the freedom of spouting ammendment: a distinction needs to be made between color saturation and color skewing.

Color saturation or contrast is sensitive to the overall transmission percentage, not to the shape of the transmission functin. Light that is not properly focused and transmitted into the image bounces around inside the binocular and reaches the eye as a blurred unfocused colorless mess called veiling glare. That seems to me the probable saturation robbing culprit. Even if the shape of the transmission is perfectly flat, transmitted percentage has to be very high to escape the veiling glare effect. Zeiss HT owners claim they can see that 95% looks cleaner than the FL's 93%. Certainly, the Leica BR's 87%ish is not as clean looking as the FL's 93 to me.

But it's still a hellofagoodbinocular.

Ron

ronh said:

Brock,

Your argument about the shape of the transmission curve is reasonable, and thanks for bringing it up. But it must be missing something, because it does not work out that way. I will make a guess as to what is happening, protected under the freedom of spouting ammendment: a distinction needs to be made between color saturation and color skewing.

Color saturation or contrast is sensitive to the overall transmission percentage, not to the shape of the transmission functin. Light that is not properly focused and transmitted into the image bounces around inside the binocular and reaches the eye as a blurred unfocused colorless mess called veiling glare. That seems to me the probable saturation robbing culprit. Even if the shape of the transmission is perfectly flat, transmitted percentage has to be very high to escape the veiling glare effect. Zeiss HT owners claim they can see that 95% looks cleaner than the FL's 93%. Certainly, the Leica BR's 87%ish is not as clean looking as the FL's 93 to me.

But it's still a hellofagoodbinocular.

Ron

Click to expand...

Ron,

Color saturation may be sensitive to overall percentages, however, most people can't detect a difference of 3% light transmission, so the 3% the FL has over the UV HD shouldn't matter for most people, neither should the 3% between the UV HD vs, BR, nor the 2% difference between the FL vs. HT. With 6% difference, you might notice more color saturation with the FL vs. UV BR, but that's likely to be most obvious in low light, because in sunlight, your stopped down irises will keep all that light from getting in unless you're using a bin that matches your exit pupils such as a compact.

So I'm not sure I'm following your reasoning about veiling glare being related to the level of light transmission. If the light isn't transmitted, it doesn't necessarily mean that it's bouncing around inside the bin. More likely, it's being reflected back off the objectives. My understanding is that veiling glare is caused by something inside the tubes reflecting the already transmitted light such as an shiny metal surface or an uncoated glass surface. You could have high transmission coatings and still have a problem with veiling glare if there are reflection issues inside the bin.

In Arek's reviews, flaring around the exit pupil seems to vary model to model with the Ultravids. For the 10x42 UV, he found "noticeable flares near exit pupils," but for the 8x32 model, he found it "Perfect. An example to be followed. Perfectly black background around the pupils." Perhaps your 10x50 is more like the 10x42 in this regard, and that's why it seems a bit "muddy" compared to the FL? Here's what he had to say about the 10x50 UV's internal reflections: Circular pupil on a black background which could have been a bit more black. Good work against bright light.

Anyway, I'll stop here before i also have to evoke the same protections under the freedom of spouting amendment (spelled properly this time .

Brock.

OK Brock, truce, under the treaty of 1812. Or thereabouts. Good discussion though.

David,
I apologize for the digression. Mainly, I am really interested to hear what you think of the HD. There aren't enough Leica slingers around here, and we're eager to learn something from your experience. Please give us the full report, as it develops.
Ron

ronh said:

OK Brock, truce, under the treaty of 1812. Or thereabouts. Good discussion though.

David,
I apologize for the digression. Mainly, I am really interested to hear what you think of the HD. There aren't enough Leica slingers around here, and we're eager to learn something from your experience. Please give us the full report, as it develops.
Ron

Click to expand...

I could write about my non-HD 8x42 Ultravid BL which I have been enjoying for 3 months since I got it as a Demo from Camera Land but I know that no one would be interested in it's old technology. Despite that it has no problems with chromatic aberration or handling glare and it's ease of view along with it's brightness under adverse lighting conditions is laudable!

On the basic essentials: As noted it was purchased as a Demo, it has a full warranty and the money saved was considerable. Additionally its ergonomics are exemplary and it is a masterpiece of understated elegance!:t:

Bob

ceasar said:

I could write about my non-HD 8x42 Ultravid BL which I have been enjoying for 3 months since I got it as a Demo from Camera Land but I know that no one would be interested in it's old technology. Despite that it has no problems with chromatic aberration or handling glare and it's ease of view along with it's brightness under adverse lighting conditions is laudable!

On the basic essentials: As noted it was purchased as a Demo, it has a full warranty and the money saved was considerable. Additionally it's ergonomics are exemplary and it is a masterpiece of understated elegance!:t:

Bob

Click to expand...

Hmm...I like my non-HD 8x42 BR a lot and agree with most of what you say, but mine certainly shows a lot of lateral chromatic aberration.

--AP

PS. There's no apostrophe in possessive its, only in the contraction of it is.

Alexis Powell said:

Hmm...I like my non-HD 8x42 BR a lot and agree with most of what you say, but mine certainly shows a lot of lateral chromatic aberration.

--AP

PS. There's no apostrophe in possessive its, only in the contraction of it is.

Click to expand...

I don't have the problems with CA that many people experience. I've seen a very bad example of it once in practical use while looking at Turkey Vultures in a bright overcast sky and it turned out that the binocular I was using had a lagging focus in an objective tube.

In my typical test to look for it, I never see it along straight vertical and horizontal edges of houses and level mountain ridges if I keep them sharply focused in the center (sweet spot) of the view. Only if I move the binocular to look for it through the edges of the view does it become visible and even then it is not obtrusive.

You are right about the unneeded apostrophe. It was late and I was tired. I will correct it.

Bob

Received binoc today...took out of box and watched birds at midday...seems just like new even though I'm technically (probably) 3rd owner... No thoughts yet...seems like demo I tried at the Expo in April...

If no problems pop up, I got a KILLER deal. :t:

ronh said:

OK Brock, truce, under the treaty of 1812. Or thereabouts. Good discussion though.

David,
I apologize for the digression. Mainly, I am really interested to hear what you think of the HD. There aren't enough Leica slingers around here, and we're eager to learn something from your experience. Please give us the full report, as it develops.
Ron

Click to expand...

Ron,

Being that we're both Americans, I don't get the reference to the Treaty of 1812, unless you think I'm a Tory, but I was thinking about what you originally posted and the important difference between the UV BR and the FL, namely, the FL's use of ED glass.

What "muddies" the colors is how normal glass causes them to focus at different wavelengths whereas the FL glass causes the colors to converge at the same point after passing through optical glass, which creates more vivid colors, and that's the definition of color saturation. Of course, if much of the red is being reflected back, and from the light graphs and the color reflecting off the objectives in the FL, that seems to be the case, reds and oranges are not likely to be as vivid as in the UV BR.

On top of the normal dispersion, roofs with internal focus tend to show more CA because of the internal focusing elements (worse while the elements are focused all the way in or out, not sure which), so internal focusing roofs start out with an extra challenge in terms of delivering pure colors, which is probably the reason ED glass became widely used in roofs today.

In theory, the UV HD should give you the best of both worlds, more overall color saturation like the FL due to the better convergence of the spectrum, but also a "warmer" color bias than the FL, providing better color contrast. If David has tried both the BR and HD versions, perhaps he can comment on this.

Brock

brocknroller said:

Ron,
...
In theory,
...
Brock

Click to expand...

Brock,

David's review is so lackluster we might as well get back to our spouting! (Typical Leica man, strong silent type.)

There are so many things going on that it's hard to know what is causing what. But I have an example from my experience which has some of the stuff of a well designed experiment, but with one possible exception. Nevertheless, here goes.

I have owned Leica Trinovids (8x42 and 12x50, still have the latter) and the Ultravid BR 10x50, and think comparing their views and build characteristics might tell us something about these things.

Both Trinovids had exit pupils floating in perfect blackness, while the Ultravid has a thin bright ring around the exit pupil (you can see that in Arek's photo). It is probably a reflection from the objective mount because it looks so sharp at the exit pupil. As you might expect the Trinovids are better in terms of controlling obvious veiling glare against bright light, although the Ultravid is still quite a bit better in this regard than most binoculars including FLs and Swaro EL and SVs.

Both Tri and UV use only normal glass objectives, in fact many have said their optical designs are identical. So, it's a draw there.

The Ultravid, however has better coatings. Looking into the objective with a bright light behind the observer, every single reflection is dimmer in the Ultravid. Also, the UV is the first Leica to have the then ballyhooed dielectric prism coatings, vs good old silver in the Trinovid. Taken all together, the coating improvements boost the UV transmission something like 6-ish%. (Surveyor did some measurements in his lab, and also employed another lab to check himself, and that is the source of this number.) Now according to my hypothesis, I'd expect more light to be bouncing off the Trinovid's coatings (more backwards than forwards yes, but still more forwards off the worse coatings), and I have claimed that will result in more veiling glare and a less contrasty, less color saturated view.

Let's also consider color balance, which in your first contention you claimed to be the main contrast driver. The Trinovid's silvered prisms do not reflect deep blue as well as dielectric, so you'd expect the Ultravid to be better balanced and might say that is what results in its greater contrast. What mitigates this fact, as far as the side of the debate I taking, is that Leicas are notably blue-deficient overall. Leica ads have claimed that they could achieve higher average transmission easily, by not suppressing the blue as they do, but choose to keep it that way because it's what their fans have come to appreciate. Arek's transmission plots mostly support that. But as the two are not identical here, so my demonstration can't really eliminate this as a driver, and this is probably the weakest part of my rant.

The bottom line is, the Trinovids do indeed give a view that is not merely dimmer, but less contrasted and less color saturated. It seems to me that the cause can't be anything but the coating difference, since the Trinovid is superior in baffling, and equal in color control. I think it's the UVs greater transmission that does it. If this Tri/UV example does not prove it, what does, in my mind, is the high correlation between transmission and clarity/contrast that runs through all the binoculars I've ever looked through, and there must be a zoo of color balance schemes there.

This is fun but I'm about blathered out. Maybe I can just tire you out? (Naaa...)

Ron

Ron,

I know what you're seeing in regard to better contrast and color saturation in the bin with more advanced coatings, and not just “theoretically.”

Don’t you just love the way he follows me around from thread to thread like a puppy dog and posts snarky remarks, always with the same one-trick pony theme? This shows his lack of deductive reasoning to use specfic examples to extract general principles, and therefore he must try every bin in the world in order to understand basic principles that encompass all of them. Sad.

Anyway, I saw this same difference in comparing the black body 8x30 EII to the earlier gray body version, which is at least 10 years older. The newer coatings increase contrast and color saturation. The color bias is the same and the optical design is the same, the only variable is the coatings although I don’t have figures on the difference in light transmission, only the BB version, which Arek rated as 89.1%, same as the 550 8x32 SE.

And yes, the BB version does a bit better job of controlling flare, though not as good as the 550 8x32 SE, which very likely has the same level of quality in its coatings since the BB EII and 550 SE were made around the same time. The difference in the SE controlling flare better is in the optical design rather than the coatings since even the 501 SE from 1999 controlled flare better than the GB EII made the same year.

You can see this difference by looking at the two photos below from allbinos. The first shows the exit pupil of the EII. Arek comments: A lot of gleams near the exit pupils.

The second shows the exit pupil of the SE. Arek comments: A bit of flares in the area nearest to prisms.

They both have the same percentage of light transmission, so that can't be the reason one is showing more flare than the other. In fact, the SE shows very little flare in the field.

So in this case, at least, the stray light can't be due to difference in transmitted light bouncing off low transmission optical elements. It could be due to the larger prisms of the EII. That's just conjecture, but one based on observation. I've seen this time and again with old porros I've owned, the wider the FOV, the more likely flaring will be a problem. The smaller the FOV, the less likely.

Don't worry, I have too much work to do to continue our debate, so I will just rest my case, although I don't think we are that far apart in our reasoning. The problem is that when it comes to assessing the source of flare/lower contrast in specific bins, you'd have to dig inside to see what's causing the flare because there are multiple factors that contribute to it - could be light bounce from lower transmission coatings, could be something shiny inside the tubes, or it could be oversized prisms.

One thing is certain, however. The latest coatings and ED glass in modern bins produce better contrast and color saturation than in bins with older coatings and normal glass. I can even see this difference in the $300 8x30 Nikon M7.

Brock

brocknroller said:

Ron,

I know what you're seeing in regard to better contrast and color saturation in the bin with more advanced coatings, and not just “theoretically.”

Don’t you just love the way he follows me around from thread to thread like a puppy dog and posts snarky remarks, always with the same one-trick pony theme? This shows his lack of ability to use deductive reasoning to extract general principles from specific examples, and therefore he must try every bin in the world in order to understand basic principles that encompass all of them. Sad.

Anyway, I saw this same difference in comparing the black body 8x30 EII to the earlier gray body version, which is at least 10 years older. The newer coatings increase contrast and color saturation. The color bias is the same and the optical design is the same, the only variable is the coatings although I don’t have figures on the difference in light transmission, only the BB version, which Arek rated as 89.1%, same as the 550 8x32 SE.

And yes, the BB version does a bit better job of controlling flare, though not as good as the 550 8x32 SE, which very likely has the same level of quality in its coatings since the BB EII and 550 SE were made around the same time. The difference in the SE controlling flare better is in the optical design rather than the coatings since even the 501 SE from 1999 controlled flare better than the GB EII made the same year.

You can see this difference by looking at the two photos below from allbinos. The first shows the exit pupil of the EII. Arek comments: A lot of gleams near the exit pupils.

The second shows the exit pupil of the SE. Arek comments: A bit of flares in the area nearest to prisms.

They both have the same percentage of light transmission, so that can't be the reason one is showing more flare than the other. In fact, the SE shows very little flare in the field.

So in this case, at least, the stray light can't be due to difference in transmitted light bouncing off low transmission optical elements. It could be due to the larger prisms of the EII. That's just conjecture, but one based on observation. I've seen this time and again with old porros I've owned, the wider the FOV, the more likely flaring will be a problem. The smaller the FOV, the less likely.

Don't worry, I have too much work to do to continue our debate, so I will just rest my case, although I don't think we are that far apart in our reasoning. The problem is that when it comes to assessing the source of flare/lower contrast in specific bins, you'd have to dig inside to see what's causing the flare because there are multiple factors that contribute to it - could be light bounce from lower transmission coatings, could be something shiny inside the tubes, or it could be oversized prisms.

One thing is certain, however. The latest coatings and ED glass in modern bins produce better contrast and color saturation than in bins with older coatings and normal glass. I can even see this difference in the $300 8x30 Nikon M7.

Brock

Click to expand...

I don't "follow you around." You're effin' unavoidable. And mostly you haven't seen anything anyway, unless someone mails it to you or shows up on your doorstep so you can look at the grass with it. Pathetic.

Mark