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

Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical

Cosina Voigtländer · LTM + Leica M · 2000 · Symmetrical, aspherical

via machine translation — corrections welcome

Known as “UWH”

Also known as: Voigtländer Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical · Voigtlander Ultra Wide Heliar 12mm F5.6 Aspherical · ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical · ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical II · ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical III · Voigtlander Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 II VM · Voigtlander Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 III VM · Voigtlander 12mm f5.6 L39 · Voigtlander 12mm f5.6 LTM · Voigtlander 12/5.6 Leica M · Cosina Voigtlander UWH 12mm · Voigtlander 12mm 5.6 Heliar · フォクトレンダー ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical · フォクトレンダー ウルトラワイドヘリアー 12mm F5.6 · コシナ ウルトラワイドヘリアー 12mm

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
L39 screw mount (2000–2010) LTM 2000–2010 — —
VM II (2010–2016) Leica M 2010–2016 — —
VM III (2016–2019) Leica M 2016–2019 — —
  1. The specification block above is the original L39 lens of 2000: ten elements in eight groups, nine blades, 0.3m, φ50.5 × 38.2mm, 162g, ¥105,000 in silver. The VM II shares the optics but focuses to 0.5m, weighs 230g and takes 67mm filters; the VM III is a different twelve-element design at 283g with ten blades. Every figure is from Cosina's discontinued-product pages, read through machine translation.
  2. Weight of the screw-mount lens: Cosina and Bastian Kratzke's 2025 version table both give 162g; his 2016 review of the same lens lists 175g, presumably with hood and caps.
  3. The Nikon F-mount Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 SL of 2003–07 is the same optical block as the L39 and VM II lenses in a different barrel and mount; it is catalogued separately as sl-ultra-wide-heliar-12mm-f56.
  4. Cosina's Japanese pages give release and discontinuation months. Bastian Kratzke's table gives the same spans (2000–2010, 2010–2016, 2016–2019). The US importer's dates would be a third source, but CameraQuest's pages could not be reached for this draft.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • 121° across the diagonal — the widest rectilinear lens for 35mm from 2000 until the 10mm arrived in 2016 — and f/5.6 to f/22 on every version
  • Needs an external 12mm finder on every rangefinder body; no M or Bessa frame goes wider than 21mm
  • Three versions, three weights: 162g screw-mount, 230g VM II, 283g VM III

L39 screw mount (2000–2010):

  • 39mm Leica thread; silver or black-paint finish, ¥105,000 and ¥108,000 respectively
  • Nine blades, focus to 0.3m, no rangefinder coupling — the barrel carries no cam
  • Removable hood with an adjustable angle, and a separate filter adapter as the only way to fit a filter
  • Metal 12mm finder in the box (camera-wiki); the 15mm of the same era shipped with a plastic one
  • Smallest of the three: φ50.5 × 38.2mm and 162g, against 230g for the VM II and 283g for the III

VM II (2010–2016):

  • Engraved ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical II; VM bayonet
  • Rangefinder-coupled from infinity to 0.7m, with the focus ring continuing uncoupled to 0.5m
  • 67mm filter thread behind a hood that is part of the barrel — the widest front of the three versions at φ74.6mm
  • 42.5mm long, 230g, nine blades

VM III (2016–2019):

  • Engraved ULTRA WIDE-HELIAR 12mm F5.6 Aspherical III; matte black anodised barrel with red and white engraving and a red mounting dot
  • Twelve elements in ten groups — a new design, not a re-housing — with ten blades
  • Rangefinder-coupled to 0.7m, focus ring to 0.5m; no filter thread at all
  • The tallest version: φ64.8 × 58.4mm and 283g, a barrel that matches the 10mm and the 15mm III

Specifications

Formula
Symmetrical, aspherical
Construction
10 elements / 8 groups
Aperture range
f/5.6–f/22
Diaphragm blades
9
Min. focus
0.3 m
Dimensions
50.5 × 38.2 mm
Weight
162 g
Years manufactured
2000–2019
Country
Japan
Coating
Multi-coated
Original price
¥105,000 in silver, ¥108,000 in black paint, excluding tax, finder included (2000) (today ¥117,000–¥120,000)

What reviewers say

Optical Ratings

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

Vignetting
severe every version
Flare & ghosting
well controlled
Coma
strong on I/II
Distortion
low
Optical formula — Symmetrical, aspherical

History

When Cosina released the Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical in September 2000, nobody had ever sold a lens this wide for 35mm that kept straight lines straight. It covers 121° across the diagonal — ten elements in eight groups in a symmetrical layout, with an aspherical element carrying the distortion correction — and it did so in a barrel 50.5mm across, 38.2mm long and 162g, screwed into the same 39mm Leica thread that the Bessa L had revived the year before. Cosina listed it at ¥105,000 excluding tax in silver and ¥108,000 in black paint, with a finder in the box; camera-wiki records the finder as metal, where the 15mm of 1999 made do with plastic, and the hood as a removable one that could be turned to suit the frame. Filters went on through a separate adapter. It kept the title of widest rectilinear lens for sixteen years, until Cosina’s own 10mm took it in 2016, and it is the lens the finderless Bessa L was really for: a body with no viewfinder loses nothing when every lens on it needs an external one anyway.

There are three versions in Leica-compatible mounts, and they are easy to tell apart by weight alone. The screw-mount original ran, on Cosina’s dates, from September 2000 to January 2010 and is scale-focus only, to 0.3m, on nine blades. The VM II of April 2010 is the same glass re-housed in an M bayonet with a rangefinder cam: coupled from infinity to 0.7m, with the ring running on uncoupled to 0.5m, a 67mm filter thread in a hood that is now part of the barrel, 74.6mm across, 42.5mm long and 230g, and at ¥85,000 the cheapest list price the lens ever carried. It ended in May 2016. The VM III of November 2016 is the redesign — twelve elements in ten groups, ten blades, recomputed for digital sensors so the corners hold from full aperture, in the tall matte-black barrel it shares with the 10mm and the 15mm III: 64.8mm across, 58.4mm long, 283g, ¥115,000, rangefinder-coupled the same way, and with no filter thread at all. It lasted three years to November 2019, while its two stablemates are still in the catalogue; Phillip Reeve’s explanation, that it sold too weakly beside the 10 and the 15, is the only one on record. An E-mount III with the same optics ran from September 2016 to April 2019. The Nikon F-mount SL of 2003 is the original optics again, in a different barrel, and has its own page.

The reviews are all Sony and Leica digital, and they agree about the character of the lens even where they disagree about whether to buy it. Bastian Kratzke, testing the screw-mount lens on a Sony A7 and A7s in 2016, called the handling superb — click stops on the focus ring, a lens that vanishes in a bag — and the distortion low, and then listed severe vignetting at every aperture, a magenta corner cast on the A7 and a green one on the A7s, field curvature that wanted f/11 for the corners and coma too strong for astrophotography. His 2025 review of the VM III on a Leica M10 and an A7rII finds the corners and the coma much improved and the flare resistance excellent, but the vignetting still at 3.4–3.5 stops, the far corners still poor and greenish, and the lens stranded between a wider 10mm and a faster 15mm; he points to Laowa’s 9mm and 11mm instead. Phillip Reeve, with the E-mount III on an A7 III, is warmer: about 2.8 stops of vignetting and a blue cast on snow, but very good flare resistance, beautiful sunstars and a well-balanced, pleasant lens for anyone who knows 10mm is too wide. Jordan Steele bought his III at clearance and thinks the focal length fills a wonderful gap. None of them shot film, where the corner casts do not exist and the vignetting is what the symmetrical design has always produced; Bill Montgomery’s Bessa R4A frames from a Central Park blizzard, above, are what the lens looks like on Neopan.

Buying one means deciding first between coupling and size. The screw-mount lens needs an L-to-M adapter on any M body, and which frame the adapter brings up is irrelevant, since no M or Bessa finder frames anything wider than 21mm and the picture is composed in the shoe-mounted 12mm finder; check that the finder is in the box, since it is a separate item on the used market. Its hood comes off, so a listing without one is a listing without one. The VM II and III couple to the rangefinder, which matters less than it sounds at f/5.6 and 12mm but does let the lens focus properly on a Bessa R4 or an M without guessing; the II is the version to want for filters, the III for digital corners. On any version look at the front element, which sits close to the front of the barrel and takes the knocks, and confirm the finish matches the description — the original came in silver or black paint, at two different list prices. A listing headed 12mm f/5.6 SL is the Nikon F lens, and a listing for the E-mount III will not fit anything with a rangefinder.

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 taken with the Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical
Bridle Path, Central Park, in a February 2013 blizzard — Bessa R4A, Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6, Fujifilm Neopan SS 100; the photographer does not say which version (Bill Montgomery) — Bill Montgomery, via 500px and Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Sample photo taken with the Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical
Belvedere Castle across a frozen Turtle Pond — Bessa R4A, Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 on Neopan SS 100 (Bill Montgomery, 2013) — Bill Montgomery, via 500px and Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 Aspherical? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $460 across 19 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-19 (middle half $400–$600). First day tracked.

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

Show 11 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: Heliar-Hyper Wide 10mm f/5.6 Aspherical · Ultra Wide-Heliar 12mm f/5.6 SL Aspherical · Super Wide-Heliar 15mm f/4.5 Aspherical

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.