Light Lens Lab 35mm f/2 Collapsible Eight Element
Light Lens Lab · LTM · 2022 · Double Gauss
Also known as: LLL 35mm f/2 Collapsible Eight Element · Light Lens Lab collapsible 8 element · LLL collapsible 35/2
Variants & identification
| Variant | Mount | Years | Serial ranges | Production |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Leica Thread Mount (LTM-M adapter supplied) | LTM (Leica M via the supplied adapter) | 2022 | — | — |
- The maker states the optical identity outright: "Lens uses the same optical formula as the original Eight Element." The spec line agrees with the rigid version's on both counts — "Double-Gauss Design, Eight Elements in 6 groups" — and nothing in the published specification distinguishes the two optically.
- Minimum focus is quoted twice: 0.7 m with rangefinder coupling, 0.5 m uncoupled. The rangefinder stops following the lens below 0.7 m; the helicoid keeps going. The 1958 original reaches 0.65 m in its goggled M3 form and 0.7 m in the plain bayonet version, so the coupled figure is a match and the uncoupled 0.5 m is an addition.
- There is no E39 thread. The maker's wording is "No filter thread" with a "removable UV filter integrated into the lens" — a filter that lives in the front assembly rather than screwing onto it. Every ordinary 39mm filter and every screw-in hood the original accepts is therefore unusable here.
- Compatibility claim: "Fully compatible with all LTM/M-Mount cameras, including the M5/CL and digital M Rangefinders." The claim is pointed rather than routine — a collapsing barrel is precisely the design the M5 and CL carry cautions about, because the meter cell swings into the space a collapsed barrel wants. The maker asserts the clearance; no independent test of it was found in writing.
- Timing: Leica Rumors trailed the lens in December 2021 as coming the following year; Photo Rumors reported pre-orders open on 28 February 2022, for release "this summer", and the maker's storefront entry is dated 29 July 2022.
- ALL THREE FINISHES WERE OFFERED FROM THE START. Photo Rumors, reporting on the day pre-orders opened, says the lens "will be available in silver chrome, black paint, or chrome with nickel plating (all brass made)". The commonly repeated account in which Nickel Chrome joined the other two later in 2022 is not supported by any source located; the three were on the order form together on 28 February 2022.
- PRICE: THREE FINISHES, THREE PRICES. The maker's product feed on 4 September 2026 lists Chrome at $1,049, Black Paint at $1,149 and Nickel Chrome at $1,199, all sold out with the page live. Keith Wee's October 2022 review quotes $1,050 and $1,150 for the first two, which is the same pair rounded. Only the $1,049 figure appears in the storefront's headline price; an entry quoting it alone understates the range by $150.
- ELEMENT COUNT IS THE COPY'S OWN PUBLISHED FIGURE. "Optics: Double-Gauss Design, Eight Elements in 6 groups" appears on this lens's specification block, not only on the rigid Eight Element's. Eight in six is therefore stated for this lens directly rather than inherited from the 1958 Summicron it descends from.
- THE OPTICAL-IDENTITY CLAIM HAS NOT BEEN TESTED. "Lens uses the same optical formula as the original Eight Element" is the maker's sentence, and the reviewers repeat it rather than check it: Keith Wee gives both as Double-Gauss eight in six and attributes the difference in flare to the built-in UV filter, not to the glass. No published measurement compares the two, and none compares either with an original Summicron.
How to tell them apart
- A collapsible barrel — the single feature that separates it from the rigid Eight Element
- No filter thread at all; a removable UV filter is built into the front instead
- 135 g, the lightest lens Light Lens Lab has made in this focal length
- 54.5 mm diameter against the rigid version's 51 mm
Leica Thread Mount (LTM-M adapter supplied):
- 39mm screw thread only; the LTM-M adapter is in the box
- A barrel that collapses into the body — 32 mm closed, 8 mm of extension
- Leica Thread Mount (LTM-M adapter supplied): The only mount offered. There is no native bayonet version: an M body reaches this lens through the supplied adapter, which is the reverse of the rigid Eight Element's arrangement.
Specifications
- Formula
- Double Gauss
- Construction
- 8 elements / 6 groups
- Aperture range
- f/2–f/16
- Min. focus
- 0.7 m
- Dimensions
- 54.5 × 32 mm
- Weight
- 135 g
- Years manufactured
- 2022
- Country
- China
- Material
- Solid brass, stainless steel or titanium, by finish
- Original price
- $1,049 Chrome, $1,149 Black Paint, $1,199 Nickel Chrome (maker's storefront, all sold out September 2026)
What reviewers say
- Keith Wee (blog) — First impressions from a production sample lent for about a day and shot on a Leica M10-P in October 2022 — evidence the lens was in circulation that autumn rather than still a prototype. He finds the collapsed barrel "really, really tiny" and credits the UV filter built into the front assembly with better flare control than the rigid Eight Element, while taking the shared Double-Gauss eight-in-six formula from the specification rather than testing it. He quotes $1,050 chrome and $1,150 black paint.
History
This is the one recreation in the range that does not recreate anything optical. The maker says so in a single line on the product page: “Lens uses the same optical formula as the original Eight Element.” The specification backs it — double Gauss, eight elements in six groups, f/2 to f/16 in even half stops, 0.7 m coupled — and that count is printed on this lens’s own page rather than borrowed from the rigid version’s, which is worth knowing, because the whole argument of the entry turns on the two being identical. There is no published difference between the glass here and the glass there. There is also no published test of the sameness: reviewers restate the formula from the specification sheet, and nobody has put the two lenses, or either of them and a 1958 Summicron, on a bench together.
Everything that is different is barrel. It collapses, which the 1958 Summicron never did, into 32 mm with 8 mm of extension. It weighs 135 grams against 206 to 261, which makes it the only Light Lens Lab 35 that comes in lighter than the original’s 150 grams. It is 54.5 mm across rather than 51. It is sold in screw mount alone, with the adapter supplied to put it on an M. And it has no filter thread at all: a removable UV filter sits inside the front assembly, so the E39 accessories the original takes have nowhere to go.
That combination is why the entry exists separately rather than as a row in the rigid version’s table. By the catalog’s own rule a lens with the same optical design is a variant, and by that rule this is a variant. Against the rule sits the size of the mechanical change — dimensions, mount, filter fitting, weight and stated body compatibility all move together, which is more than any variant elsewhere in this catalog carries. The entry is kept apart and the judgement is flagged rather than buried.
One claim is worth reading closely. The product page says the lens is “Fully compatible with all LTM/M-Mount cameras, including the M5/CL and digital M Rangefinders.” Naming the M5 and the CL is not filler: those two bodies swing a metering cell into the film chamber, and a barrel that collapses into that space is the classic reason a lens is warned off them. The maker asserts the clearance. No independent written test of it turned up.
Pre-orders opened on 28 February 2022 after a trail in the rumour press the previous December, and all three finishes were on offer that day: Photo Rumors lists silver chrome, black paint and chrome with nickel plating together, so the account in which Nickel Chrome arrived later in the year has nothing behind it. The lens reached buyers by the autumn — Keith Wee shot a production sample on an M10-P in October 2022 — and the maker’s storefront entry is dated that July. Prices ran $1,049 for chrome, $1,149 for black paint and $1,199 for nickel chrome, a $150 spread that a single headline figure hides. All three have been sold out since, with the page still live.
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 Light Lens Lab 35mm f/2 Collapsible Eight Element? We'd love to feature it (with credit).
Live listings
The listings collector hasn't run for this family yet — check back soon, or search the marketplaces directly meanwhile.