MS Optics Elnomaxim 55mm f/1.2

MS Optics · Leica M · 2020 · Ernostar type, 4 elements in 4 groups

Also known as: MS Optics Elnomaxim 55mm f/1.2 · MS-Optics ELNOMAXIM 55mm F1.2 · MS-OPTICS ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55 · MS Optical Elnomaxim 55mm f1.2 · MS Optics ELNOMAXIM M 55mm F1.2 · ELNOMAXIM M 55mm F1.2 · ELNOMAXIM 55mm F1.2 · ELNOMAXIM 55mm · MS-Optics Elnomaxim · Elnomaxim 55mm f/1.2 · ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55 · Elnomaxim 55/1.2 · MS-Optics 55mm F1.2 · MS Optics 55mm f1.2 · 宮崎光学 ELNOMAXIM 55mm F1.2 · 宮崎光学 MS-OPTICS ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55 · エムエスオプティクス MS Optics ELNOMAXIM M 55mm F1.2 · 宮崎光学エルノマキシム · エルノマキシム 55mm F1.2

Variants & identification

Variant	Mount	Years	Serial ranges	Production
ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, black	Leica M	2020	—	—
ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, silver	Leica M	2020	—	—

Design type: MK Direct, the maker's shop, calls it a 4-group, 4-element 'Elnostar' type, and shige an Ernostar. Japan Exposures calls it an 'Ernostar design developed after the Sonnar of the Contax I' in one place and a '4 elements in 4 groups Sonnar formula lens' in another. DPReview's launch report says 'a gauss type optical design', describing it as Miyazaki's take on the Zeiss 50mm f/2 Sonnar. The page follows the maker's shop.
Focal length and aperture: sold as 55mm f/1.2. Miyazaki's own hand-written sheet exists in two versions on Japan Exposures' page: the PDF attachment ('MS Elnomaxim 1.2/57') is headed ELNOMAXIM 1.2/57 and gives fno 1.26, fL 56.6, as does MK Direct's specification (its description says 'f1.2/57mm'); the sheet shown as a product image is headed 'スーパーポートレイトLens（人像鏡） ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55' and gives fno 1.26, fL 55.6, as do shige and the phillipreeve.net overview of MS lenses.
Closest focus: shige gives 1.0 m coupled to the rangefinder and focus to 0.8 m; DPReview and Leica Rumors give 1 m; Japan Exposures gives 0.8 m on Leica M and 0.5–0.6 m on mirrorless cameras, presumably with a focusing adapter; the phillipreeve.net overview gives 0.8 m. The page carries 0.8 m.
Length and weight: DPReview, Leica Rumors, shige and Miyazaki's sheet give 43 mm and 180 g. MK Direct's specification gives 40 mm and 178 g, its description 43 mm and 180 g; Japan Exposures gives 43 mm in its description and 40 mm without hood in its feature list.
Aperture blades: shige, who owns a copy, gives 10; the phillipreeve.net overview gives 16 rounded blades. The page carries shige's figure.
Gold finish: shige lists silver, black and gold among the colours, but no gold lens appears in a listing, dealer photograph or maker's document, so it has no row.
Release: DPReview reported the lens on 31 July 2020 and Leica Rumors on 8 August 2020; the red note on Japan Exposures' copy of Miyazaki's sheet says on sale August 2020 (2020/8月発売); the phillipreeve.net overview gives September 2020 for the first release.

How to tell them apart (expand)

MS-OPTICS JAPAN engraved on the front rim (Japan Exposures' photographs); the front element fills the face of the lens with almost no rim around it, as on the Sonnetar 73/1.5 and the ISM 50/1.0 (shige)
About 50 mm across and 43 mm long, 180 g; the aperture ring sits close to the focusing ring, so one is easily turned for the other (shige)
Cylindrical hood that screws into the 49 mm thread reversed (shige); MK Direct describes it as reversing over the lens for storage
Rangefinder coupled to 1 m; the helicoid continues, uncoupled, to 0.8 m (shige)

ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, black:

Matt black barrel with light engraving; Japan Exposures' product photograph shows MS-OPTICS JAPAN and the number No.027-B on the front rim
Aperture scale 1.2, 1.4, 2, 2.8, 4, 5.6 … and a metre distance scale running 1.2, 1.5, 2, 3, 5, 10, ∞, both with red indices

ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, silver:

Satin silver barrel with black engraving and the same MS-OPTICS JAPAN front-rim marking, scales and red indices as the black lens

ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, black: One of the two launch finishes in DPReview's announcement of 31 July 2020, which calls it black chrome; Japan Exposures describes the barrel as anodised aluminium in a black finish. The -B after the number in Japan Exposures' photograph may mark the finish, and the test sheet Japan Exposures also shows reads "CHECK 039 B", but no source explains the letter, and the number on the silver lens is out of view in its photograph. MK Direct, the maker's own shop, says serial numbers are assigned at random when lenses ship, so a buyer cannot choose one.
ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55, silver: The second launch finish in DPReview's announcement, at the same $1,200. Japan Exposures shows a silver lens beside the black one. Kotocamera (古都カメラ), a used-camera dealer licensed in Kanagawa, sold a boxed silver copy graded Rank A on Yahoo! Auctions as a ¥157,000 Buy It Now on 23 August 2026, with no consumption tax added; the (#149) in its title looks like the seller's stock number rather than a lens number.

Serial-range notes

No.027-B: Engraved on the front rim of the black lens in Japan Exposures' product photograph. No source gives the numbering scheme, a production figure or whether lenses carry a run count; MK Direct says only that numbers are assigned at random when lenses ship.
039 B: Written beside "CHECK" on the copy of Miyazaki's hand-written specification and aberration sheet that Japan Exposures shows as a product image, with "-0.02" and "SA ok AST ok FOCUS ok". It appears to be the test record of one lens, but the sheet does not say that 039 B is a lens number.

Specifications

Formula: Ernostar type, 4 elements in 4 groups
Designed by: Miyazaki Sadayasu (宮崎貞安) — optical design
Construction: 4 elements / 4 groups
Aperture range: f/1.2–f/16
Diaphragm blades: 10
Min. focus: 0.8 m
Dimensions: 50 × 43 mm
Weight: 180 g
Filter: 49 mm (0.75 mm pitch), M49 × 0.75; Miyazaki's sheet adds 'Rives. Set' and phillipreeve.net lists the filter as 49 mm (reversed). The dedicated hood screws into the thread reversed (shige: 逆付け専用ネジ込み)
Years manufactured: 2020
Country: Japan
Coating: Fully multicoated on all eight glass surfaces (MK Direct)
Original price: $1,200 at announcement in July 2020: the dealer price through Japan Camera Hunter, the overseas dealer DPReview pointed buyers to, for black or silver chrome. In Japan, Leica Rumors gave ¥104,500 in August 2020 without saying whether tax was included; shige gives a list price (定価) of ¥90,000 before tax; a red note on the copy of Miyazaki's sheet that Japan Exposures posts reads '2020/8月発売上代 10万円?' (on sale August 2020, retail ¥100,000?), its question mark included; Japan Exposures, a dealer, lists it at ¥119,900 without stating tax. (today $1,450)

What reviewers say

shige (Shige's hobby) (blog) — Wide open its centre is among the best of all MS-Optics standard lenses, crisp and high-contrast, which bears out Miyazaki's description of it as a portrait lens. The corners break down on full frame even though they do not darken, patterned backgrounds can show false colour at f/1.2, and on an APS-C body the whole frame tightens up; he especially likes its contrast in monochrome.

Optical Ratings

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

Chromatic aberration: Fringing wide open
Vignetting: None, full frame

History

The Elnomaxim is Miyazaki Sadayasu’s 55mm f/1.2 for Leica M, reported by DPReview on 31 July 2020 and sold abroad through Japan Camera Hunter at $1,200, in black or silver. It is an Ernostar of only four elements in four groups, two of them in glass with a refractive index above 1.8, fully multicoated on all eight surfaces. shige points out how unusual that is: the Ernostar is normally a type for lenses of about 90 to 135 mm, and Miyazaki made this one because he wanted a fast standard lens of that type. MK Direct, the maker’s own shop, describes it as a test of how bright and capable the simplest four-element lens could be made. MK Direct spells the type “Elnostar”, echoing the lens’s name. Miyazaki’s roadmap for his History Series, published with the Histrio-Prot’s specifications and relayed by Leica Rumors in May 2018, named an Ernostar 50mm f/1.8. shige thinks the Elnomaxim belongs to that series, beside the 40mm Prot and Dagonar (the Histrio-Prot and Histrio-Dagonar), but notes that the instruction sheet does not say so.

The sources disagree on several basic figures. Miyazaki’s own hand-written sheet survives in two versions on Japan Exposures’ page: one headed “ELNOMAXIM 1.2/57” with a true focal length of 56.6 mm, the figure MK Direct also gives, and one headed “ELNOMAXIM 1.2/55” and “Super portrait lens” with 55.6 mm, the figure shige and the phillipreeve.net overview give. Both give f/1.26. DPReview called it “a gauss type”, and Japan Exposures calls it both an Ernostar and a Sonnar formula. The four-element construction and the maker’s own wording put it with the Ernostars. It couples to the rangefinder down to 1 m and focuses on, uncoupled, to 0.8 m. The figures are 50 mm across, 43 mm long and 180 g, though MK Direct’s specification line says 40 mm and 178 g. shige counts 10 aperture blades and the phillipreeve.net overview 16. Like the Sonnetar 73/1.5 and the ISM 50/1.0, the lens has almost no rim around its front element. The 49 mm thread takes a cylindrical hood that screws in reversed.

Miyazaki’s description, on his sheet and on MK Direct, sets out the rendering. From f/1.2 to f/1.6, overcorrected spherical aberration gives a soft portrait look; by f/1.6 to f/2 the flare clears and coma in the middle and outer field is reduced; and by f/4 the lens reaches the sharpness of a Gauss type. He warns that image quality falls off beyond a diameter of 35 mm. In his review shige found the centre wide open among the best of any MS-Optics standard lens. On full frame the corners stayed bright but smeared even at f/4, and patterned backgrounds could show false colour at f/1.2. On an APS-C Leica T the frame was much more even, and on a Hasselblad X1D the lens nearly covered the larger sensor without dark corners but with the soft zone spread further. DPReview’s launch report put it plainly: it will not win sharpness contests but it has character.

Only two finishes are documented by a launch report or a photograph: black, which Japan Exposures describes as anodised aluminium, and silver. Both carry MS-OPTICS JAPAN on the front rim. shige also lists gold, but no gold lens appears in any listing or dealer photograph. No production figure has been published. DPReview says the lenses are made in small batches, Japan Exposures refers to an initial lot hand-assembled by Miyazaki, and MK Direct assigns serial numbers at random when lenses ship. The black lens in Japan Exposures’ photograph is engraved No.027-B, and the copy of Miyazaki’s test sheet it shows reads “CHECK 039 B”; what the letter means is not recorded. In Japan, shige gives a list price of ¥90,000 before tax, Leica Rumors reported ¥104,500 without saying whether tax was included, a red note on Japan Exposures’ copy of the sheet reads “retail ¥100,000?”, and Japan Exposures, a dealer, asks ¥119,900. A boxed silver copy sold on Yahoo! Auctions in August 2026 at a ¥157,000 Buy It Now from a dealer. When buying, check that the aperture ring has its normal resistance. shige found his free of the looseness some MS lenses show, but it sits close to the focusing ring and is easily moved by mistake. Check too that the hood is with the lens, and test the rangefinder focus wide open on your own body. Do not confuse the Elnomaxim with the Nikkor, Canon or Zuiko 55mm f/1.2 SLR lenses, or with any of Miyazaki’s conversions of other makers’ lenses.

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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.

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