The King of the Night is dead.

Although still listed on the Leica website, the legendary 50mm f/1 Noctilux is no longer on Leica pricelists and it seems that production has indeed stopped. It seems that the very tiny market for this available light darkness lens was too small to bear the extreme price increases due to the US dollar going belly-up. However there quite a few people that insist that an even faster replacement must be coming from Leica. Even if that turns out to be true, this is certainly an end of an era.

This lens was designed in, and up to very recently, made in Canada at the Ernst Leitz Canada (ELCan) facility in Midland, On. Even the latest "Made in Germany" examples all have optics produced in Midland. There is no lens that gives such a wonderful, magical and unique rendering similar to that of the Noctilux wide-open in the dark.

Some images made with the Noctilux :
http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=noctilux&s=int

You should get one, Nando so I can get a Canon EF adapter and borrow it.

If I had $6000 burning a hole in my pocket I would!!!

A farewell article written by Roger Hicks:
http://www.rogerandfrances.com/photoschool/ps%20king.html

The insanity has begun! I've read a few forum threads on the escalating price of this lens. I anticipated that the prices would rise but I'm astounded as to how much prices have gone up. Some dealers like Photo Village in NYC are now setting their price at $10,000 USD for new Noctiluxes! That's a 70% increase! Prices for used Noctiluxes are now exceeding $6000 sometimes. Before Leica stopped production, the lens sold for $6000 new and about three years ago, before the US dollar went belly-up, they were about $3000 new. As high as the price are now, I'm sure that there will be a few people that will still shell out the cash for this lens.

There is no chance of me getting one now Ken. I'm satisfied with what I have anyway.

Famous last words.

Unless I win the lottery, a Noctilux is out of the question.

So you admit there is a chance, then?

Yes.

The last 100 Noctiluxes made are coming in a specially-made, commemorative humidifier box. The box is hand-made by Elie Bleu, a highly regarded box-maker from Paris that specializes in making boxes for cigars, watches and jewelry. The price? A dizzying $15,000 each!



I'm not crazy about this as it seems to indicate that Leica is moving back into becoming a boutique camera maker like it was when the fashion company Hermes owned a big stake in it.

Leica should be catering to people like...


and not to people like...


The rumour that Leica is working on a new 50mm f/0.9 Super-Noctilux does have some substance now. It will be interesting to see what happens to the over-inflated values if and when the Super-Noct is released.