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Lens Skew, Optical Swing
High performance lens designs are difficult to manufacture, but according to the video with Peter Karbe of Leica, the optical design is such that small spacing errors of lens groups should have little effect on performance. Similarly, the claim is made that assembled lenses have real MTF very close to the computed-best MTF.
Does this mean you can take a Leica SL lens out of the box and assume it is a 'good sample'? Unfortunately, this page proves that you must be vigilant with Leica SL lenses, just as with every other brand. No brand ever gets sample variation down to what I would consider acceptably low variability. It's a 'thing' some photographers I know try 2 or 3 or even 10 samples of a lens and find high variability and sometimes no acceptable samples. My guess is that the odds are far better with the Leica SL lenses, but it might still take 2 or 3 samples.
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