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A BIG Leica?


john_r_smith

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Guest user8952
There was one of these in production. I saw pictures of it and noticed the 5-figure price as well. Couldn't tell you if it's still in production, but I haven't seen anything abouut it in many years.

 

MUST have been a hoax...

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I don't think it was a hoax. Many people do not remember Leica's first digital camera, the S1 and S2 which were intended as studio and copy cameras. I think that Leica wisely chose not to go down that road, which would have required extensive R&D and had to evolve into a digital offering to survive.

John

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It was not a hoax, and was a studio camera. The picture I saw showed it on a studio mount (not the tripod type, but the heavy duty mount). I recall that it was called the S1. I believe it also had to be tethered to a computer for storage of the images.

 

For Leica, I'm sure it was a great learning experience, and, of course, there may only have been one built. If it escapes, imagine the collectible value!

 

And, look where we are now; the R8/9 under their belt and on the verge of releasing the digital-M.

 

Is there another company in the world of such capabilities? The best lenses, some of the best survival instincts (how many new owners by now?), and a devoted clientele (some of whom are WAITING ANXIOUSLY for the Digital-M).

 

Bill

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Guest flatfour

A prototype was shown in the Frankfurter Zeitung on 1st April 1991. It was a new format 43x43 and had two focal plane shutters selectable from a dial on the top of the box. I don't think anyone bought it.

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I saw a photographer here locally in 1992 who did pack shots (studio shots for catalogs of mugs, trailers, pens, etc) who bought one or two of these. It was VERY hightech then and very expensive. I belive it took several minutes to take a picture and they used special digital light equipment (a series of daylight tubes).

 

But even then - with a new studio building and completely new setup of equipment - he saved a lot on it compared to film.

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Actually there were THREE versions of the S-1 - the basic version, a faster lower-res version (still many seconds exposure) and a ??higher-res?? version. Sort of like the Nikon D1, D1x and D1h.

 

 

Englewood Camera (englewood colorado) has one in their collection case. It will indeed take M lenses as well as R or Hassy lenses, via different adapters. I think it had a modified R5 viewfinder behind a 43 x 43mm focusing screen, that slid out of the way (like the old Leica copy/microscope "focoslide") for the scanning CCD to do its thing.

 

Original price for the basic camera was ~$19,000. Took approx 25 Mpixel images (5000 x 5000)

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See the LEICA S1 high precision digital camera system for archiving and documentation. Leica presents three S1 digital cameras. The LEICA S1 Alpha for print sizes up to A4 in 300 dpi (offset) quality, the LEICA S1 Pro for print sizes up to A2 and the LEICA S1 HighSpeed - the fastest available scanner-camera - for print sizes up to A3. Reproductions of artwork, photography of sculptures, multiple Scans, digitising of transparencies and even images for Web publishing are possible. The output files can be RGB, CMYK, LAB - tifs including CMM profiles - from 2 to 155 MB. All cameras allow nearly unlimited types of lenses from Leica, Contax, Rodenstock, Schneider, Hasselblad with Tilt and Shift and others.

 

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00GqzV

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"A prototype was shown in the Frankfurter Zeitung on 1st April 1991. It was a new format 43x43 and had two focal plane shutters selectable from a dial on the top of the box. I don't think anyone bought it."

 

1st of April is a joke. In Germany they say: "In den April schicken"

Gerd

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Guest user8952

the S1 was a scanner camera - NOT a medium format camera.

 

a medium format leica never was in production. by the way: if the "Frankfurter Zeitung" reportet on it in the 90s, it must have been a hoax, because "Frankfurter Zeitung" was only published until 1943.

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I think that the S1 / S2 cameras had 5140 x 5140 pixel configuration, a 79 MB file size. The sensor appears to have been larger than 35 mm format, although I don't know the specifications (the pixel count is sized at what is being used today as a medium format sensor). At the time the camera was introduced the company I was consulting for was looking for museum quality documentation capability. If I remember correctly the S1, S1 Alpha and S2 had an excellent reputation for this kind of work.

 

J.W. - I know that my DMR gives "medium format" results. I still have my Hasselblads but they hardly get any use. The files out of the DMR are great, as Guy M has reported. The DMR sensor and M8 sensor are supposed to be the same.

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The DMR sensor and M8 sensor are supposed to be the same.

 

The sensors are both from Kodak, but I don't believe they'll be identical since Leica quotes different crop factors for the two cameras (DMR 1.36 I believe, and M 1.33).

 

Since crop factor is equal to the ratio of the format diagonals, that would imply a slight difference between the two.

 

:) Of course, in two months we can stop speculating!

 

--HC

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