I admit I was very curious how the Leica APO-Summicron-SL 75 mm f/2 ASPH would deal when it comes to the performance against bright light. On the one hand the task seemed to be not so simple. You deal here with a closed optical construction, where all elements move inside limiting available space for baffles and ribbing. As if it wasn't enough, the front element is not hidden deep inside the casing and the construction consists of 11 elements positioned in 9 groups which means as many as 18 air-to-glass surfaces where you can catch unwated light reflections.
On the other hand the lens is relatively narrow and long so there is a bit of place where you can 'lose' unwanted light. What's more, you deal here with a very expensive model that doesn't provide wide angles of view and was produced by a renowned company with impressive heritage.
When you work at the maximum relative aperture there are no significant problems almost at all. Reflections you can catch are few and far between and not especially intense. The situation changes a bit when you stop the lens down. Firstly, colourful lines coming radially out of sun become more intense. Secondly, when the sun is situated right outside one of frame corners a quite intense and big white flare can appear in this corner. Thirdly, when the sun is moved further away from the frame you still can catch greenish light artifacts of low intensity. Fortunately in all these cases the overall contrast of images remains high.
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To sum up, maybe the situation is not tragic, fitting medium levels, but I expected a better performance. Of course the lens doesn't give you any serious reasons to complain.
