The M9 on a week's trip to NW China

[Peter Walker]

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I have just returned from a week's photography trip up into northwest China. Just took the M9 with 35, 21 and 75 lens and a small Gitzo tripod. The M9 performed perfectly.

 

Firstly and foremost, it achieved my goal of portability. Some days I walked non-stop for 4 or 5 hours, twice a day and, on one day, walked a very mountainous trail. Never once did I find the camera bag / tripod to be a burden. I could not have done that if I had taken my Hasselblad in its backpack.

 

Secondly, the M9 took some excellent photos. I was able to get it into action quickly and capture the image fast and accurately. I am almost at the place when I can call the focal distance, the shutter speed and f-stop first time, every time. Sometimes I manually bracketed with the shutter speed but that was more of an insurance than a necessity. About the only thing that I screwed up was two or three times I forgot to switch the camera on* and once I forgot to take off the lens cap and missed a great shot of the train curving around a mountain. Doh!

 

* I only had 2 batteries with me because Leica seems to now have a supply problem with batteries. On a couple of days I was shooting from early morning to late evening without an opportunity to recharge the battery. On the 2 days with overnight train journeys there was no chance to charge the battery. So, to preserve the battery, I was turning the camera off every time i put it back in my bag. With a 3rd battery I would have left the camera in sleep mode while out and about.

 

The M9 captured some great people images. Sometimes I was able to employ stealth mode* so as not to disturb or distract the subject from whatever they were doing that I found interesting, often taking 3 or 4 photos without the subject being aware that I was photographing them. I also did some "handheld overhead shots" in crowds that would be impossible with a larger camera. No other camera that I know of could have captured those type of images so effectively.

 

* Stealth mode is useful when you know that a subject is going to stop what they are doing or change their facial expression if they know they are being photographed. In stealth mode I:

- face my body at 90 degrees to the subject so they don't feel me looking at them,

- watch the subject in my peripheral vision,

- hold the camera at wasit level and look down at it as if I am trying to change a setting or solve a technical problem,

- frown at the camera as if the camera is absorbing my attention, not the subject,

- judge the distance and set the focal length,

- use a larger f-stop to compensate for any errors is distance estimation (e.g. 35mm lens at f8),

- point the camera sideways so that the lens points at the subject,

- press the shutter with my thumb.

 

Would I have been happier with a new 39 megapixel Hasselblad CFV? For a couple of the shots, yes. I am sure that the larger sensor of the 'blad would capture finer detail. But, for many of the people shots, the size and presence of the 'blad would have freaked out the subject, whereas the M9 is almost invisible. And, there is no way I could have walked the distances that I did with that kind of weight. Just getting the camera out of the backpack and getting ready to shoot adds a delay that can make you miss "the moment". The M9, in its easily opened Billingham-Leica shoulder bag can be out and shooting in seconds.

 

The quality of the images is great. I can zoom into them and see very sharp details. I have not printed any yet but I am sure they'll hold up well to at least 30x40cm (A3) which the largest that I ever print.

 

So, yep, quite happy with the M9. Now just gotta figure out how to take it underwater...

 

Regards

Peter

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[arthury]

Thanks for sharing with us this good news. That image has excellent tones. Couple of questions:

1. What lens was used for that image?
   
2. what did you use for post-processing?
   

[rennsport]

Peter,

 

For going under water, try this:

 

Leica M8 Underwater Case

 

;-)

[Baptiste]

IMO, the M9 images fit A2 as well. I went to the Montparnasse Tower (Paris) 1 week or so, made some shots over there, some of them have been gathered into a 12 000 x 5 000 pixel (pics taken in portrait mode) size panoramic, that I have printed at the 60 x 140 cm size. You can put your nose on the print and see the details... Makes A2 completely accessible.

[Peter Walker]

Thanks for sharing with us this good news. That image has excellent tones. Couple of questions:

1. What lens was used for that image?
   
2. what did you use for post-processing?
   

 

I used the APO Summicron 75mm at f4.8, shot at ISO 200 at 1/125sec. The shot was taken at 7:30am under the shadow of trees.

 

Post-processing was in Lightroom 2.7. With this image I did minimal post-processing. I tweaked up the exposure about 1/3 of a stop and made the tone curve a little steeper (Lights +5, Darks -5). Then saved to TIF and exported to JPG to fit the forum size rules.

 

It is a very sharp image. On the full TIF, I can zoom into 100% and see individual hairs in the subjects eyebrows.

 

Regards

Peter

[Peter Walker]

Peter,

 

For going under water, try this:

 

Leica M8 Underwater Case

 

;-)

 

Looks interesting. But very pricey. And no dome-port. A Leica M8/9 underwater would excel at wide-angle but would need a dome-port.

 

I was thinking of contacting a custom housing builder and getting a dome-port housing with just one control (shutter release) and a wet-port flash sync connection. The disadvantage is that I would need to preset everything on the camera (camera on, focus, speed, aperture, ISO, etc) before the dive. The advantage is that there would be just two o-ring seals (shutter release and the main door) to minimise the leak risk.

 

Maybe I should put this dream aside and go with a cheaper UW set-up.

 

Regards

Peter

[gravastar]

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.........................................Would I have been happier with a new 39 megapixel Hasselblad CFV? For a couple of the shots, yes. I am sure that the larger sensor of the 'blad would capture finer detail. ...........................Peter

For landscapes I'm having success taking several handheld pictures and stitching them using Autopano Pro. I'm finding it much better coping with slight parallax errors between frames than CS4 or CS5. Provided there aren't any very close foreground objects hand holding seems entirely satisfactory with Autopano.

 

Bob.

[rennsport]

Looks interesting. But very pricey. And no dome-port. A Leica M8/9 underwater would excel at wide-angle but would need a dome-port.

 

I was thinking of contacting a custom housing builder and getting a dome-port housing with just one control (shutter release) and a wet-port flash sync connection. The disadvantage is that I would need to preset everything on the camera (camera on, focus, speed, aperture, ISO, etc) before the dive. The advantage is that there would be just two o-ring seals (shutter release and the main door) to minimise the leak risk.

 

Maybe I should put this dream aside and go with a cheaper UW set-up.

 

Regards

Peter

 

I wish I could help you more but I have zero knowledge about underwater photography and diving. I just bought the Panasonic FT2 and went snorkeling recently. It's really not bad for the price! LOL.

[rob_w]

Great photo Peter. And love your description of "stealth mode". One question, not photographic, what are those people in the background doing -- is it an exercise machine they are using? I can see that the people to the right of the picture are also doing Tai Chi, but the ones in the background at the left have me puzzled.

 

Leica batteries are back in stock here in London, AFAIK. I picked one up at the Leica Mayfair shop on Thursday and they seemed to have plenty in the drawer. Hopefully the drought is now over.

 

Cheers

 

Robert

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[Peter Walker]

GOne question, not photographic, what are those people in the background doing -- is it an exercise machine they are using? I can see that the people to the right of the picture are also doing Tai Chi, but the ones in the background at the left have me puzzled.

---------

 

That park stretches for several kilometres along the city wall of Xian and, in the early morning, is full of thousands of mainly older people doing exercises of various sorts. The city has provided them with exercise machines, dance floors, cement table-tennis tables, and lots of paths. Here is another photo from that same park.

 

Regards

Peter

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