Voigtlander Nokton 75mm f/1.5 Aspherical (VM)

Leica's own 75mm options are the Summilux-M f/1.4, a discontinued Mandler-era cult object that trades for the price of a used car, and the APO-Summicron 75mm, which is sharper than almost anything but stops at f/2. The Nokton sits between them and costs a fraction of either. You get f/1.5, a hair slower than the old Summilux (barely a fifth of a stop on the light meter, whatever the marketing math says), in a modern aspherical design that cleans up the wide-open glow of the Mandler glass. Better than three-quarters of a stop faster than the APO-Summicron, and a fraction of the money. That is the trade, and for most shooters it is the right one.

Wide open the Nokton is already crisp in the center, which is not a given for a fast 75. The aspherical element kills the spherical aberration that made vintage fast teles glow and smear at f/1.5. Stop to f/2.8 and the corners snap into full sharpness. The bokeh is the part that surprises people: smooth, rounded, and quiet, with out-of-focus highlights that stay circular across most of the frame and only clip to cat-eye shapes near the edges. Color is neutral and contrast runs a touch high, the modern Voigtlander signature rather than the lower-contrast warmth of older Leica designs. Focus falloff is fast and clean, exactly what you want for separating a face from a busy street behind it.

This is a portrait and short-tele lens first, and on a full-frame body the 75mm angle is the classic head-and-shoulders length. People shoot it for environmental portraits, for available-light work in bars and theaters where the f/1.5 buys the better part of a stop over the APO-Summicron, and for the kind of tight street frames where you want compression and isolation. It is heavy and long for a rangefinder lens, and that is the honest weakness. The barrel blocks a slice of the lower-right viewfinder on a film M, and at f/1.5 the rangefinder patch on an older body can struggle to nail focus on the eye at minimum distance. Calibration matters here in a way it does not on a slow lens.

Flare control is good but not bulletproof. Point it at a hard backlight without the hood and you can pull veiling haze across the shadows, so keep the shade on. The 58mm filter thread is large for the format but standard enough that ND and polarizers are easy to source, useful if you want to hold f/1.5 in daylight on slow film.

Where it sits today: this is the 75 you buy when you want most of the Summilux character without the collector premium and you do not need the last increment of APO-Summicron resolution. Cross-shoppers land here from both directions, trading down from the Summilux and up from f/2. One metering note, since the whole reason to own this lens is the speed. When you open up to f/1.5 in a dim room, meter for the shadow you actually care about and let Zone Light Meter place it, because at that aperture the depth of field is so thin that nailing exposure on the subject's face matters more than any averaged reading of the scene.