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Distortion for Leica 50mm f/1.4 Summilux-SL ASPH, with Examples
The Leica 50mm f/1.4 Summilux-SL ASPH sets an EXIF flag that requires software correction for both color fringing and distortion. This page looks at the real optical distortion.
For a lens claimed by Leica to be a “reference lens”, requiring distortion correction repudiates the claim all on its own. It is noteworthy that with decades of history of including distortion graphs in data sheets, Leica does not include a distortion graph in the data sheet for the Leica 50mm f/1.4 Summilux-SL ASPH.
A lens that required distortion correction guarantees reduced performance in some part of the frame—the outer zones for barrel distortion and the central area for pincushion distortion. Since the Leica SL 50/1.4 has pronounce barrel distortion, we can expect that its outer zone performance will never be all that strong—it cannot be, since pixels have to be stretched to correct the distortion.
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