Leica ii D (1932) & Leica Summar 50mm f2 (1934 ) – NYC Street Shooting

In the waning days of Summer, 2026, I decided to take a flyer on an early Barnack Leica. I was intrigued by the history of the pioneering 35mm rangefinders, and perhaps attracted by the distinctive look, especially the black enamel models.

After a few weeks of eyeing different ‘classic’ packages that paired an early Barnack with an Elmar 50mm f3.5 at moderately premium prices for cameras of that ilk, I decided to go a la carte and bought a reasonably priced 1932 Leica ii D in black.  After some R&D into the lenses of that era, I opted for a nickel 1934 Leica Summar 50mm f2.  My sense from reviews of 1930’s Leitz lenses, including Hamish’s here on 35mmc, was that the Summar might offer something a little more distinct in character compared to my other 50mm lenses, hopefully in interesting ways.

When the camera and lens arrived, I loved the look of the black enamel with bits of brass peaking through the 94 year old paint, and the soft warm glow of the 92 year old nickel of the Summar.  It was instantly the coolest looking camera in my collection.  But would it work?

As soon as I could, I took them out to shoot a couple of rolls to make sure it was all functioning properly.  My first roll was Tri-X, thinking a classic stock with a bit of grain might pair nicely with the vintage/antique camera & lens.

I wasn’t disappointed!

About 200 yards from my front door in Brooklyn on a Friday evening toward dusk, I ran into Simon, a very interesting and highly photogenic young man.  He was a terrific subject — fun to shoot, fun to talk to, and interesting emotions and expressions seemed to flow unchecked as I shot about a dozen frames with him.  Through the finder, I knew they were going to be good photographs as long as there was nothing technically wrong with the camera & lens.  I was delighted when they came back from the lab, and this is my favorite.  In this dusky light I love the flattering softness of the lens and the warm grain of Tri-X, that combination definitely reads ‘vintage film.’

I’d love to share more photos from that first roll with Simon, but for the purposes of this post, I’m limiting myself to a single image per roll for my “Summar Grand Tour.”

The next morning, I tried a roll of Portra 400 to see how the Summar rendered in color.  Not all film expeditions end up being equal, especially when I’m trying to shoot out a quick roll or two to determine if a piece of gear I’m trying out is working.   I didn’t have quite as much luck finding an amazing subject as Simon and it wasn’t my favorite conditions shooting much more stopped down in stronger light — but at least everything is working as it should.

Kenmare 400  is a a stock I rate very highly for a fine grained 400 ISO, especially considering its bargain price point.    This shot of Paula was taken a few hundred yards further along the Brooklyn waterfront from from the carousel.  I think Kenmare 400 shot through the Summar is pleasingly sharp with a nice dynamic range from deep black to bright white, but maybe the look is a little more ‘familiar’ than the shots of Simon on Tri-X.

After rushing those early rolls through the lab, I was happy to see that the basic functions of my 1930’s kit were fully functional.  Between the strange f stops on the Summar (f2, 2.2, 3.2, 4.5, 6.3, 9 & 12.5) and the equally unfamiliar frame rates on the Leica ii, (Z, 20, 30, 40, 60, 100, 200, 500) translating meter readings was a bit of a ‘horseshoes and hand grenades’ exercise of trying to get as close as I could, which seemed to work out just fine.  Helpfully, the lens doesn’t have click stops, so I could dial in to get what felt like f2.8 or f4, etc.

Typically for me, I decided to spend my next couple of photo outings trying out a wide variety of film stocks to see what combinations were the most promising/exciting.

Ilford XP2 is an unusual film, a very fine grained b&w stock that creates a monochrome image using color chemistry that can be processed with C41 color developers.  Some of my favorite early Canadian landscapes were using XP2, but after a while, I found that it started to look a little ‘digital’ to my eye when paired with very refined glass, like my Zeiss Hasselblad lenses or my Leica Summilux ASPH.   I love this shot of Luis Mendes, a legendary NYC street photographer who roams the city selling instant portraits with his Speed Graphic.  He uses old school single-use metal filament flash bulbs just like Weegee did with his Speed Graphic, apparently he found a warehouse of them somewhere in Canada.  I hope I can share this image with Luis some day soon, and also sit for a portrait by him.

Although XP2 with a 1930’s Summar is not exactly a classic combination that would appeal to Barnack purists, I think it works!

Rollei Retro 80S is a very high contrast stock that can be quite tricky with modern lenses that also tend toward high contrast rendering.  A lot of my shots on Retro 80S go so far into deep black that the image gets kind of lost in the inky depths, with very little transition from deepest black to bright white.

One of my emerging theories is that pairing these high contrast films with older low contrast lenses kind of brings out the best of both film and lens.  Higher contrast film stocks make a softer lens render a sharper looking image, and the lower contrast of the lenses add more subtle shading that gets pushed to the extremes of the grey scale on more modern lenses.  This shot of Angela, a very nice young photographer who was out on a very sunny day her Voigtlander Bessa seems to fit that emerging theory.  You can see that ‘black glow’ in the deep shadows around her face and hair and the background, but there is plenty of nice subtle shading on the skin tones.  I really like Retro 80S with the Summar.

My next roll, on the same day in the same location was Svema Foto 100, another fine grain high contrast stock from Ukraine.  I like this shot, which is hitting the extremes of high contrast based on the strongly side lit angle I chose, but I think Svema Foto 100 might pair better with some of my other lenses compared to Retro 80S.

Next up, I made another attempt at shooting color with gear that predated the introduction of Kodachrome, the first widely marketed color film stock, by a couple of years.  I like the way Ektar looks on this shot that mixes the almost abstract reflections of buildings and sky against the text of the memorial on polished black granite.  Unfortunately, the rest of the roll was less successful, in part due to a very challenging shooting situation — a punk concert in heavy backlight with deep shade from the trees in Tompkins Square Park.  It was tough shooting under the best conditions with very dynamic fast moving subjects in low light,  but the inherent challenges were compounded by a light meter mistake, where I was taking readings as if I had the ‘high slide’ in my Sekonic 398 incident meter and ended up underexposing most of the roll.

For the shots that did work from that roll, it feels like Ektar might have a little bolder color rendering than the Portra stocks.   I’ll have to give it another try!

I had better luck on my next roll, which was Ilford FP4, both because I managed to correct my metering mistake, and because FP4 pairs very nicely with the vintage gear.  My favorite was this shot of the First Street Green Art Park on East Houston Street.  I thought the light and shade of this alley of trees was gorgeous.  Perhaps an homage to Eugene Atget, this shot has a very timeless end evocative look to me, and feels like it could have been taken when the camera and lens were new.

My next stop on the “Summar Grand Tour” was Rollei Blackbird, which is a slow (ISO 64) fine grained very high contrast film that has a strong ‘family resemblance’ to Retro 80S, including some of the high risk/high reward qualities working with such a high contrast stock with sometimes overwhelming blacks.  This particular roll ended up getting fogged when the film detached from the cassette, when I opened the bottom of the camera I saw the film in the take up reel.  Fortunately there was a small film lab right on the exact block on Avenue A where I happened to be and they helped me unload with their darkroom set up, salvaging the early shots from the roll.

This shot is of the man with the parrots is my favorite and has a very interesting look, with micro shifts in sharpness within his face, due to the narrow depth of field using a slow stock.  The left side of the frame has more ‘3D pop’ than I saw on other frames with the Summar.  I’ll definitely want to try another full roll of Blackbird, and hopefully won’t fog the next one!

On Portra 160 in backlight, I like the interesting circular rainbow flares that add a bit of nice vintage character to the shot.  I suspect shooting with a  hood probably salvaged this shot from being completely dominated by flare.  Knowing the Summar’s reputation for flare in backlight, I bought a Summar hood in advance at the same time as the camera and lens.  After my first day of shooting I picked up a couple more accessories, including a lens cap, a couple of vintage E34 filters, and an inexpensive contemporary half case with strap loops — Leica didn’t start putting strap lugs on Barnacks until 1933.  With no filter or lens cap, on the first 3-4 photo outings, I carried the camera in my hand the entire time, as I didn’t want to risk anything rubbing against the soft uncoated lens.

Ilford Pan F Plus is a very slow (50 ISO) fine grained black & white stock that came out in the 1930’s, whiich might be the closest I’ve come to the original Leica ii D shooting experience.  Despite small variations in sharpness between Blessing on the left, and her friend, I love the warm subtle shading of the skin tones which almost feel a little translucent,  maybe an early example of the famous Leica “glow.”  Based on shots like this one, and the featured image of the dog riding a skateboard, I feel like the Summar + Pan F Plus has tremendous potential.

This shot of Mayla and Aidan, two young people I met in Tompkins Square Park is probably my favorite shot with the Leica iiD + Summar.  This two shot portrait feels almost painterly with the soft tones and shading between deep black and bright highlights.

This was the last shot on a roll that I started in the same park where I met Aidan and Mayla, that had a number of shots that will feature in an upcoming post.  My wife planted some red honeysuckle at the base of the lamp post that lights the flagstone path from our driveway to the front porch of our house.  There is something whimsical and a bit ‘fairy tale’ about the way the plant has grown up and around the lamp; it feels a bit magic, almost like something from Narnia.  And shooting with gear from 90+ years ago that still works and produces beautiful images also feels a bit magic.

Final thoughts on my ‘newest’ camera?

I absolutely love it!

This was not my first attempt at a Barnack.  In my first couple of months of shooting, I go the itch, and the local camera store in Calgary had a shelf of vintage gear, including a very nice looking 1954 Leica iiif in its original box with it’s case and an empty reusable film cassette if I fancied bulk rolling.  I bought it, with a 24 hour ‘no questions asked’ return policy in mind.  That happened to fall on a bitterly cold December weekend in Alberta, and I just didn’t love the experience.  I didn’t mind the rangefinder, but hated framing through the tiny viewfinder window, and it was fiddly to load the iiif.  One roll felt a little off when I was shooting in the frigid Canadian winter and came back mostly all black leader with about 5 or 6 photographs that were partial frames due to some kind of improper alignment or tension on the frame advance mechanics.  I returned the camera, but kept the LTM lens, a 1949 Summitar, which became my favorite Leica 50mm lens.

From the start, I felt completely differently about the Leica ii D.  Part of the appeal was undoubtedly the mystique of using the OG Leica rangefinder; the 1932 Leica ii D was the first model and year that Leica marketed a camera with built-in rangefinder optics.  Another major factor was how much more experience I’ve built up since winter 2024 and not being overwhelmed by the gear.  And again, while I was a bit indifferent to the looks of the mid 1950’s iiif, I instantly loved the Weimar era design and looks and patina of age of the iiD.*

I am totally taken with the Leica ii, it has the least controls, options and range of choices of any camera I own, but it has exactly the ones I use about 90 percent the time on my other cameras, the essence of rangefinder photography distilled into its purest form.  I haven’t had the M3 out much since it arrived.  Now that I have it fitted with a caps and straps, it is fully as pocketable as my Contax T2, and for the foreseeable future it will be the default camera that I’ll want to have on hand just in case something cool happens.

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