Glass Bodies a variant-level encyclopedia of vintage lenses and cameras by iwillpat

Color-Skopar 28mm f/2.8 Aspherical

Cosina Voigtländer · Leica M + LTM · 2023 · 8 elements in 5 groups with an aspherical element

Also known as: Voigtländer Color-Skopar 28mm f/2.8 Aspherical · Voigtlander Color Skopar 28mm f2.8 VM · Voigtlander 28mm f/2.8 Color-Skopar Type II · Cosina Voigtländer 28mm f/2.8 Aspherical · Voigtlander 28/2.8 Skopar · フォクトレンダー カラースコパー 28mm F2.8 Aspherical · カラースコパー 28mm F2.8 · VM · L39

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
VM Type I (2023) Leica M 2023–2026 — —
VM Type II (2023) Leica M 2023 — —
Leica screw mount (2023) LTM 2023–2024 — —
  1. Formula, aperture range, blades, minimum focus, coupling range, dimensions, weights, filter sizes, materials, colours, yen prices and the on-sale and discontinuation dates come from Cosina's product pages and news notices. Leica Rumors' launch report gives the L39 lens a 47mm filter; Cosina's page says 34mm, the same as the VM Type I, and Cosina is followed here. No US price is given: CameraQuest's shop sits behind a Cloudflare challenge.
  2. The Color-Skopar 28mm f/2.8 SL II for Nikon F (2012) shares the name and nothing else; it is a different design for a reflex mount and is not in this catalog.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • All three: ten aperture blades, f/2.8 to f/22, 74.6° angle of view, 23.5mm from the mount face (22.5mm for the screw lens), and the same eight-element aspherical optics
  • Cosina describes the design as matching the optical performance of the Ultron Vintage Line 28mm f/2 Aspherical at a stop slower, in a far smaller barrel

VM Type I (2023):

  • Brass barrel in the nostalgic style, silver or black paint — on the black lens even the mount is finished black; a rotating helicoid¹
  • 34mm filter thread; minimum focus 0.7m; φ52.0 × 23.5mm, 143g¹

VM Type II (2023):

  • Aluminium barrel in the classic-modern style, silver or black, with a straight (non-rotating) helicoid¹
  • 39mm filter thread; minimum focus 0.5m; φ51.0 × 23.5mm, 106g — the lightest of the three¹

Leica screw mount (2023):

  • 39mm screw thread, rangefinder-coupled from infinity to 0.7m; brass barrel in silver or black paint¹
  • 34mm filter thread; φ47.0 × 22.5mm, 122g — the smallest of the three¹

Specifications

Formula
8 elements in 5 groups with an aspherical element
Construction
8 elements / 5 groups
Aperture range
f/2.8–f/22
Diaphragm blades
10
Dimensions
23.5 mm long
Years manufactured
2023
Country
Japan
Original price
¥78,000 excl. tax in silver, ¥81,000 in black paint for the VM Type I and the screw-mount lens (2023) (today ¥80,000–¥87,000); ¥85,000 for the Type II

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

Aggregated from the reviews above — follow the links for the full picture.

Vignetting
Over 3 EV
Flare & ghosting
Excellent resistance
Distortion
Minimal
Optical formula — 8 elements in 5 groups with an aspherical element

History

Sixteen years after the Color-Skopar 28mm f/3.5 went out of production, Cosina revived the idea of a small slow 28 for rangefinders, and this time built it three ways at once. The Color-Skopar 28mm F2.8 Aspherical went on sale on 8 August 2023 as a VM Type I, a VM Type II and an L39 screw-mount lens, all sharing eight elements in five groups with an aspherical element, ten blades, f/2.8 to f/22 and a 74.6° view. Cosina’s claim is that the design matches the optical performance of its Ultron Vintage Line 28mm f/2 Aspherical while giving up a stop for a barrel 23.5mm from the mount face — short enough, it notes, to keep out of the rangefinder frame.

The three barrels are the buying decision. The VM Type I is brass, silver at ¥78,000 or black paint at ¥81,000 excluding tax, with a rotating helicoid, a 34mm filter thread, 0.7m close focus and 143 grams; on the black lens even the mount is blacked. The VM Type II is aluminium, silver or black at ¥85,000, with a straight helicoid, a 39mm thread, 0.5m close focus and 106 grams. The screw-mount lens takes the Type I’s brass and 34mm thread into a 47mm-wide, 22.5mm-long body of 122 grams, coupled from infinity to 0.7m like every screw-mount Voigtländer before it, at the Type I’s prices. Cosina has already been pruning: the screw-mount lens was discontinued in July 2024 and the VM Type I on 2 June 2026, which leaves the Type II as the one still made.

Reviewers have mostly had the Type II, and they agree on its character. BastianK at phillipreeve.net finds it sharp at every distance, low in distortion, outstanding against flare and pleasant in its sunstars, and then names the fault that every 28 in this line carries: more than three stops of vignetting wide open, two stops still stopped down, which he calls a whole lot; his verdict is that the Ultron 28mm f/2 is the smarter choice for most unless size is the whole point. Keith Wee makes the opposite case for the same lens — an assignment lens, 106 grams, smaller than an Elmarit, sharp corner to corner, ideal for street and reportage with zone focus, and not to be asked for speed or bokeh. Matt Osborne tested all three against the field, found it trailing only the Elmarit-M and the Biogon on sharpness and holding contrast into the sun on its modern coatings, and split the recommendation by body: the screw-mount Type I for film and old cameras, the Type II for digital.

The checks are about matching the barrel to the camera. The 0.5m close focus of the Type II runs past what an M rangefinder couples to, so the last stretch is scale-focused; the Type I and the screw lens stop at 0.7m and couple all the way. On a Bessa R4 or a Leica M with a 28 frame the lens is small enough not to intrude; a screw-mount body needs a 28mm finder, and the screw lens on an M needs the 28/90 adapter. Filters are the one incompatibility inside the family — 34mm on the Type I and the screw lens, 39mm on the Type II — and 34mm is not a size a camera bag tends to hold. And since two of the three are already out of production, confirm which one is being sold: the Type I’s rotating front, and the screw thread, tell them apart at a glance.

Expand Collapse

This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Example photos

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Color-Skopar 28mm f/2.8 Aspherical? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $530 across 29 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-19 (middle half $510–$560). First day tracked.

Asking prices from the listings scanned, not sales; junk-flagged rows and auction lots excluded; other currencies are not converted.

Show 59 more listings

Buying from Yahoo! Auctions outside Japan. It is a domestic marketplace: sellers ship within Japan, and most will not register an overseas buyer. A proxy service bids on your behalf, receives the item and forwards it, for a fee and a wait. Buyee, Jauce and ZenMarket each accept a Yahoo auction number directly. Listed alphabetically for information — none is recommended over another, and none of these is an affiliate link.

Listings updated 2026-09-19. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Color-Skopar Vintage Line 21mm f/3.5 Aspherical · Color-Skopar 28mm f/3.5 · Color-Skopar 35mm f/2.5 · Nokton Vintage Line 28mm f/1.5 Aspherical · Ultron 28mm f/1.9 Aspherical · Ultron 28mm f/2

Sources (11)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this lens, know a serial number I'm missing, or can see where I have it wrong, tell me — corrections, serials and sample photos are all worth having.