M8 and Zeiss external viewfinder thoughts...

[jaapv]

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So with the advent of the M8 Leica decided to solve both the wide angle problem and the finder problem once and for all. Once-and-for-all solutions are usually catastrophic, and so was this one. The Wide Angle Tele Elmar is not only an abortion, and as it seems not very compatible with the camera it was intended for, but the Universal Finder is not only huge and ugly and hugely expensive -- what is worse, it offers the hurried photographer nearly infinite opportunites to mismatch lens and finder focal lengths.

 

There is only one rational course of action left for Leica Camera. This is not to protract the painful market death of the lens and the finder, but to replace them with a decent 4.0 or 4.5 sixteen millimeter prime lens as soon as possible. The present situation is one wonderful windfall for Zeiss and Cosina; and they will surely exploit it.

 

The horrible old man from the Age of Prime Lenses

 

I could not agree more, Lars, as one horrible old man to another, and I am sure that such a lens is very high on the Leica lens R&D priority list. Right next, I suspect, to a 1.8/28 asph, that being the maximum aperture we can expect to be technically possible.

[jonoslack]

It is not clear which Leica auxiliary finder Tony C was complaining about. If it was the three-focal-length Finder M (21, 24 and 28 mm) then he certainly had good reason to grumble. This was certainly not one of Leica's most brilliant creations. The image was extremely fuzzy around the edges, and there was no clear delimitation of the image field. This not only made it difficult to compose the picture, it also made it next to impossible to level the camera properly -- and that is disastrous with super wide lenses.

 

The single focal length bright frame finders that were discontinued in 1998--2001 were however completely OK, just as good as the C/V finders. It is next to incredible that Leica made this gaffe. People had of course complained since 1980 about the fact that the outer casings of these finders now were made of polycarbonate plastic, so perhaps Leica thought that they had an inferior product. And the Finder M was of course shinier ...

 

So with the advent of the M8 Leica decided to solve both the wide angle problem and the finder problem once and for all. Once-and-for-all solutions are usually catastrophic, and so was this one. The Wide Angle Tele Elmar is not only an abortion, and as it seems not very compatible with the camera it was intended for, but the Universal Finder is not only huge and ugly and hugely expensive -- what is worse, it offers the hurried photographer nearly infinite opportunites to mismatch lens and finder focal lengths.

 

There is only one rational course of action left for Leica Camera. This is not to protract the painful market death of the lens and the finder, but to replace them with a decent 4.0 or 4.5 sixteen millimeter prime lens as soon as possible. The present situation is one wonderful windfall for Zeiss and Cosina; and they will surely exploit it.

 

The horrible old man from the Age of Prime Lenses

 

I'm another horrible old man, but I got the WATE with my 30% discount - I also got the finder, expecting to send it straight to ebay.

 

I hear what you say about mismatching the focal lengths (although, with the LCD it's immediately obvious). However, the finder is excellent, bright and absolutely accurate with the framing - the lens is sharp right to the corners, handles beautifully and produces lovely shots.

 

I assume that with such a vehement write off you've actually spent some time with this 'abortion'?