Telegraph's M9 Review

[stunsworth]

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Or that some cameras feel faster and more responsive in their operation due to better electronics or implementation of the electronics and support technology.

 

It is of course a personal thing. After buying my M8 I hardly even used my 5D and after a couple of years I sold it. I haven't regretted that for a second. In much the same way I abandoned my auto everything AF film SLR when I bought my first M - an M2.

 

Now I'm sure that the point you make about electronics and support technology could have been made when I bought my M2. Compared to the SLR someone with a Nikon F4 would have found positively crude - and I'm sure if the forum had existed then there would have been people explaining how far behind the technological curve it was, and how it needed AF and matrix metering if it was to remain competitive. The point being - for me at least, and I suspect many other M users - those things weren't important.

 

None of this is meant as a dig at you Alan, as a pro your priorities are different from an amateur (though I know a few pros who use mainly Ms), but for many of us the M system has qualities that no other system does.

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[AlanG]

None of this is meant as a dig at you Alan, as a pro your priorities are different from an amateur (though I know a few pros who use mainly Ms), but for many of us the M system has qualities that no other system does.

 

I'd be pretty comfortable shooting a lot of my jobs on 4x5 if my clients would pay for the film and scanning these days. And you don't get much slower and "old tech - not low tech" than that. It certainly has qualities that no other system has too. But having faster electronics in an M wouldn't change its special qualities for the worse in any way I can think of. And I doubt if adding some additional features would either. Of course it took Leica quite a while to realize that some photographers would be happier if they could load and rewind their film a bit faster.

 

"Both David Burnett and Hoang van Danh changed film in their cameras during the peak moments of the action. Danh managed a few pictures when Kim Phuc had reached the line of photographers and soldiers and sold a few of them to UPI. "Nicky, you got all the photos," said David Burnett."

 

http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0008/ng2.htm

 

"I was still struggling to slide the Tri-x into my Leica, with one eye watching the planes and one on the camera. The planes made a couple of passes, the film still resisting to go into that narrow loading slot on the Leica."

 

http://werejustsayin.blogspot.com/2009/03/closing-circle.html

[Rick]

I actually have learned to embrace my p&s and cell phone to force me to think only about creativity and not the process at all. This is very liberating considering I often bring an entire truckload of gear to a shoot.

 

There is hope for you after all.

 

I suspect that, for example,the romantic days of the beat photographer have about ended. And, that the business of being a pro has gotten pretty tough for a lot of folks. The world is changing.

 

When I was in Europe with a tour, someone asked me if I was a professional photographer; I thought, I am starting to sell pictures at my wife's graphic art sales/fairs, so yes I am. But, I don't make a living at it. So, no I'm not, really. I am an Optometrist and an amateur photographer in that context. But, really I don't even want to be an amateur photographer. I only aspire to be a part time gentlemen artist and I respect the pro's for putting it all together day after day.

[Xmas]

er. Of course it took Leica quite a while to realize that some photographers would be happier if they could rewind their film a bit faster.

 

tusk tusk tusk

 

It is not a good idea to throw in a falsehood, and use it as a truism to prove a subsequent point.

 

Leica have gone back to the knob rewind for the MP, and one of the reasons they introduced the 'fast rewind' was to clear the MR meter...

 

There are those that like the knob cause they cradle the M top plate in hand when shooting vertical, while using the wind on lever (which you cant do with the fast rewind) and those that don't like the ease at which the fast rewind can be damaged.

 

Third party and Leica fast rewind aids added/clamped to the knob are preferable.

 

Noel

[lct]

...Leica have gone back to the knob rewind for the MP...

Pure snobism IMHO. Rewinding my M3 was a PITA. All photogs were happy when the M4 was launched IIRC. I just regretted the plastic parts in the then new body personally.

[AlanG]

Pure snobism IMHO. Rewinding my M3 was a PITA. All photogs were happy when the M4 was launched IIRC. I just regretted the plastic parts in the then new body personally.

 

David Burnett was using a III when he was fumbling the loading in Vietnam. And he also had an M2.

 

In any case, are you saying that slower electronics are better?

 

I remember being in a helicopter with a good friend who is an accomplished aerial shooter and operates cameras faster than anyone I know. When using the motorized rewind, he'd open the back just as the film end was sliding into the cartridge.

[stunsworth]

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I'd be pretty comfortable shooting a lot of my jobs on 4x5 if my clients would pay for the film and scanning these days.

 

I guess that's one of the advantages we amateurs have, we can use cameras we want to use rather than having our choice forced on us by a client.

[stunsworth]

Pure snobism IMHO. Rewinding my M3 was a PITA

 

As someone who has used an M2/3/6, I have to say I much preferred the rewind crank on the M6. However there is a fast rewind technique that involves holding the M2/3 rewind crank and spinning the camera as fast as possible around it <grin>.

[AlanG]

I guess that's one of the advantages we amateurs have, we can use cameras we want to use rather than having our choice forced on us by a client.

 

That's why after shooting 4x5 since 1970, I sold my system recently. I hadn't used it in some time and didn't see when I would use it again. I got rid of most of the 6x6 and other MF gear 6 years ago. I gave away my darkroom last year.

 

There is a line between being attached to something and actually deciding what works best for your needs. At one time I think I was up to about 35 cameras - underwater models, panoramic models, 3 4x5s, 2 8x10, two different 6x9 systems, various 35mm. Around 50 lenses, a large color darkroom. I still have about 25 different flash units and lots of hot lights, 10 tripods... it's just crazy. Then the client hires the cheap starting out photographer who has a couple of lenses and doesn't even light the interiors. By the way, I wouldn't be writing these posts if I had a much faster computer and didn't have to wait for the raw file conversions and pano stitching I've been doing.

[andybarton]

Rewinding my M3 was a PITA.

 

Some people have too little pain in their lives if they consider such a thing a PITA, IMHO.

[andybarton]

I still have about 25 different flash units and lots of hot lights, 10 tripods... it's just crazy.

 

Do you not have a partner who can challenge this obvious madness?

[AlanG]

Do you not have a partner who can challenge this obvious madness?

 

Yes, fortunately we have two homes and one serves as my office. So she doesn't care what I do with my money or home.

 

The studio electronic flash got accumulated over the years as systems got lighter, smaller - finally ending up with Alien Bees and Cyber Commander radios being the most efficient way I've found to work. Even though it all works fine I can't sell the old heavily used Balcar stuff for enough to balance keeping it in case I have to light up a city block or two.

 

It is hard to find the perfect tripod and some are for heavier gear or when I need to get up real high with three cameras at a time. And I rarely could pass up a nice Linhof tripod if the price was low. (I actually understated how many I own) Yes one is a Leica table

tripod!

 

I'm looking for a 12 step program and you guys should understand that it was real progress to get down to the amount of gear I use now.

[andybarton]

Well, at least you have divested yourself of all your crapy Leica gear that is so left behind in the technology stakes...

 

I am convinced that you waste your time on the wrong forum. You should spend more time with your partner...

[lct]

Some people have too little pain in their lives if they consider such a thing a PITA, IMHO.

Let's say that the M4 was a relief then. That is the way we felt actually but the M3 remains my favorite M anyway.

[stunsworth]

Let's say that the M4 was a relief then

 

Personally I found the film loading mechanism of the M4 onwards much more of a relief than the rewind crank.

[lct]

Had the M4 a motor? I don't remember that. My first motorized M was the M4-2. Anyway, none of those cams had the least electronics unless one consider as such the Leicameter.

 

David Burnett was using a III when he was fumbling the loading in Vietnam. And he also had an M2.

In any case, are you saying that slower electronics are better?

I remember being in a helicopter with a good friend who is an accomplished aerial shooter and operates cameras faster than anyone I know. When using the motorized rewind, he'd open the back just as the film end was sliding into the cartridge.

[diogenis]

Well it is not as advanced in the same way that a Pentium is not an i7. Years ago, I was kind of disappointed when I spent $8,000 on a camera body and the LCD was not as good as the one in my point and shoot. Or that some cameras feel faster and more responsive in their operation due to better electronics or implementation of the electronics and support technology. So I know about technology from the view of a user.

 

Yes but Alan, -and here is the great paradox- as a user that also has not met technology from the "inside" you cannot claim that Leica is not technologically advanced, just because you think or you feel like it. If as a pro your demands are very specific: for instance I remember you were shooting using a p&s for whatever the reasons... then just ask a seller to present you a product that will fulfill your very specific needs.

Leica just isn't for you. I don't know why you are here.

You are losing your time here, because Leica will never turn out to be Nikon or Canon. It earns money just by doing what it does.

[AlanG]

Yes but Alan, -and here is the great paradox- as a user that also has not met technology from the "inside" you cannot claim that Leica is not technologically advanced, just because you think or you feel like it. If as a pro your demands are very specific: for instance I remember you were shooting using a p&s for whatever the reasons... then just ask a seller to present you a product that will fulfill your very specific needs.

Leica just isn't for you. I don't know why you are here.

You are losing your time here, because Leica will never turn out to be Nikon or Canon. It earns money just by doing what it does.

 

I thought the great paradox is I love bacon so much but it is not good for my cholesterol levels. OK, let's say the M9 is very technologically advanced.

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica M

[adan]

Alan - thanks for opening up about your own needs and your background assumptions. I certainly appreciate the stress that paid or "pro" photography is under - especially any area linked to publication and advertising money. One of the former picture editors at my late employer the Rocky Mountain News (RIP) is becoming a fireman, a news shooter is now a wedding photographer, a graphic designer has joined a theater troupe.

 

I opened a Newsweek the other day and there were eight pages of ads in the whole issue - not a good sign for either advertising photographers or editorial photographers.

 

I don't argue that Leica should not look at expanding its reach into new markets beyond the traditional art, street, photo-essay, or amateur markets of the Leica M. I think where the controversy lies is in trying (or appearing to try, even if that wasn't the intention) to bend the M line of rangefinders to those new functions.

 

It may appear cost-effective, for both the company and for photographers, to piggyback more features onto the M line. It is the flagship of the line (at least until the S2 is fully established). The lenses are already designed and photographers already own them. So everyone saves money by just adding more and more stuff into the existing line. That has been the SLR model, and it can be very tempting.

 

But in the long run I don't think it is the best approach.

 

One of the M's prime selling points is that it is basic (we'll set aside the much-abused word "simple"). It offers the absolute minimum necessary to take a photograph - shutter speed, aperture, ISO, manual focus, manual (almost) exposure.

 

It leaves everything else up to the photographer, to do with what s(he) will. Including screw up if not attentive (and I understand that that is not a welcome feature for working pros who have to deliver every time). It is the one camera that does that vigorously and uncompromisingly in the digital arena, and long may it live unchanged.

 

But - that does not mean Leica can't look towards additional, different cameras to reach additional different markets. When the SLR tidal wave made it clear that RFs would be a niche market - that is precisely when Leica abandoned the "add-on" approach of the Visoflex and a complex list of other M accesories - and simply build an SLR as well.

 

Trying to patch stuff onto the M had become a losing game. And it still is today. Better that Leica should leapfrog the competition for the pro-studio market. How about a live-view S3 or an X-whatsis with an iPad-sized screen built-in and firmware to allow playing with crops and overlays? "Tethering" without having to lug the computer around? A 5x7 view camera without everything being dark and upside down? (And - absolutely - some TS lenses, or more radically, a mount that allows ANY lens to be a TS lens).

 

While continuing to build the "basic" M for those who like that approach and can make it sing.

[diogenis]

I thought the great paradox is I love bacon so much but it is not good for my cholesterol levels. OK, let's say the M9 is very technologically advanced.

 

It absolutely is. It uses the best lenses in the world which by definition are the highest tech available currently, it's precise, accurate, uses the latest electronics, the latest sensor which is designed/manufactured in the latest year by Kodak... How much more advanced do you expect a product to be? It is small, minimal (NOT simple), easy to use, unobtrusive, discrete... am I wrong?

How do you think Leica is able to make the newest 35 lux? by grinding using sandpapers from Joe's pawnshop?