Downloadable Leitz/Leica Instruction manuals library on Wiki?

[wlaidlaw]

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Between all the members who will own between them, a huge range of almost every photographic item ever made by Leitz, there must be a large resource of unobtainable manuals for these devices. 

 

Would it therefore, be a good idea to have a downloadable pdf manuals library section on the Wiki, particularly manuals for some of the more obscure accessories and Leitz products. There was someone who had a website called something like furnfeathers.net, run by David Young, who had a long list of downloadable Leica manuals and I sent him a few that I had but that seems to have disappeared. Someone gave me a link to an web archive of the site but I have lost it.  I think the only thing we would have to be careful of is not to post manuals downloaded from Mike Butkus/Orphan Cameras, which is a very good resource and I don't think we should be treading on his toes. I am sure that Leica themselves would give us a copyright waiver. 

 

If folks think this is a good idea, I will put it to Andreas. 

 

Wilson

Edited July 19, 2017 by wlaidlaw

[Benedictine]

I think this is an excellent idea. I am a new user of both Leica and this Forum as I have only recently purchased a Leica III B, in fact I have not yet collected it from the dealer in Sheffield UK but will do so on Saturday. I am interested in learning about early Leicas also I would like to locate a manual for this camera and a resource such as suggested here would be invaluable to me. 

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[wlaidlaw]

I think this is an excellent idea. I am a new user of both Leica and this Forum as I have only recently purchased a Leica III B, in fact I have not yet collected it from the dealer in Sheffield UK but will do so on Saturday. I am interested in learning about early Leicas also I would like to locate a manual for this camera and a resource such as suggested here would be invaluable to me. 

 

I am fairly sure you will find that Mike Butkus http://www.butkus.org/chinon/index.html will have a copy of this manual. The nice thing about Mike's site is that you can download the manual, to make sure you have the correct manual for your needs, before making a modest Paypal contribution. 

 

Wilson

[Benedictine]

Thanks for the link. 

[wlaidlaw]

I have tracked down where David Young's website went http://furnfeather.ca/Manuals.html 

 

Wilson

[Benedictine]

I have tracked down where David Young's website went http://furnfeather.ca/Manuals.html 

 

Wilson

 

Doesn't open for me, get a "not found" message.

[wlaidlaw]

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Try a shorter version http://furnfeather.ca and then go to Leica Manuals.

 

Wilson

[Benedictine]

Works fine that way. 

[wlaidlaw]

Just to update folks, Andreas, our Forum-meister, is enthusiastic about the idea of a searchable library of Leica documents. However please do not send me screeds of files just yet. We have to work out the best way to do this. It is likely that this will not be within the Wiki but will be a separate facility for forum members. I will be investigating potential software formats and packages. Andreas suggested that Wordpress may have a suitable product. 

 

Does anyone have experience of a document management system called Mendeley https://www.mendeley.com/reference-management/reference-manager . It would appear to be the only truly cross platform document library and referencing management system. The library would need to be searchable via a number of descriptions, references and tags. For example: category, description of item, Leitz/Leica telegraphic code, later numeric codes and so on. 

 

Wilson

[willeica]

I have a fairly complete collection of original manuals for LTM and M models which I bought as a job lot from a collector some years ago. I was offered R and Leicaflex manuals but I turned them down as those models do not interest me. I have a few more of the M and LTM manuals than are listed on David Young's site. I have also got some (occasionally in German) with cameras I have purchased at auction and also from http://www.oldtimercameras.com who are a good source as well as Mike Butkus already mentioned. Hove books have also published manuals for some models and I have a fairly complete collection of their books. 

 

My issues in getting involved in this would be time, expenses and copyright issues. I believe it is possible for anyone interested to get the instructions for any Leica camera ever made if they look around hard enough.

 

William

Edited July 20, 2017 by willeica

[wlaidlaw]

William,

 

Hove book publications would be a problem. I previously drew a blank with the successor copyright owners, trying to get them to agree to a limited release of a pamphlet on Leica flashes they had published, with tables for various bulbs. I went twice to their listed addresses in Hove and Steyning and rang the door bells - no reply. I left letters but never had an answer. When I get back to the UK in October, I have to have a conversation anyway with Malcolm Taylor, on getting my 5cm Summarit and 8.5cm Summarex cleaned and the Summarit tweaked to optimise for f1.5. Malcolm will know exactly what the current state of play is, given he used to work for them (where I first met him in the late 1970's - when he had long hair  ). 

 

My thinking once Andreas and I have agreed exactly how we are going to set this up, is to start with manuals which are less easy to obtain than most of the cameras. Things like flashes, assorted accessories, projectors, enlargers, and so on. I am currently looking at pdf document library management and indexing tools but of course in today's fashion, what they all want to do is to sell you cloud space, with the software a bit of an afterthought. Andreas thinks that Wordpress may be the answer but I am not so sure. 

 

It always amazes me how many original camera manuals are available. I recently bought a original replacement manual for my M4 in as new condition. Its previous manual, box and sadly V1 50mm Summilux, disappeared in a tea chest along with a lot of the family silver, when we moved house in 1983. It was only because I had my M4 out to take photos of the move, using a 35 Summicron, that the M4 did not disappear as well. I would like to get an original M4 box as well as the manual but these seem more difficult to find. Plenty of the M4-2 and black Canadian M4-P boxes but no German M4 ones. 

 

Wilson

Edited July 20, 2017 by wlaidlaw

[willeica]

Keep us posted, Wilson. I suspect that the copyright issue is why Mike Butkus is asking people to contribute to the support of his family rather than charging a fee, per se. I bought my collection of original manuals from a major collector of all types of cameras who spent many years putting it together. I don't know what Hove will have done to get over copyright issues. Readers will recall the incident some years back where Leica's lawyers got somebody who had published copies of LFI magazine online to take them down.

 

William

[jaapv]

William,

 

Hove book publications would be a problem. I previously drew a blank with the successor copyright owners, trying to get them to agree to a limited release of a pamphlet on Leica flashes they had published, with tables for various bulbs. I went twice to their listed addresses in Hove and Steyning and rang the door bells - no reply. I left letters but never had an answer. When I get back to the UK in October, I have to have a conversation anyway with Malcolm Taylor, on getting my 5cm Summarit and 8.5cm Summarex cleaned and the Summarit tweaked to optimise for f1.5. Malcolm will know exactly what the current state of play is, given he used to work for them (where I first met him in the late 1970's - when he had long hair  ). 

 

My thinking once Andreas and I have agreed exactly how we are going to set this up, is to start with manuals which are less easy to obtain than most of the cameras. Things like flashes, assorted accessories, projectors, enlargers, and so on. I am currently looking at pdf document library management and indexing tools but of course in today's fashion, what they all want to do is to sell you cloud space, with the software a bit of an afterthought. Andreas thinks that Wordpress may be the answer but I am not so sure. 

 

It always amazes me how many original camera manuals are available. I recently bought a original replacement manual for my M4 in as new condition. Its previous manual, box and sadly V1 50mm Summilux, disappeared in a tea chest along with a lot of the family silver, when we moved house in 1983. It was only because I had my M4 out to take photos of the move, using a 35 Summicron, that the M4 did not disappear as well. I would like to get an original M4 box as well as the manual but these seem more difficult to find. Plenty of the M4-2 and black Canadian M4-P boxes but no German M4 ones. 

 

Wilson

What I gather from an author that published with Hove, the way they went down in flames makes it highly doubrful th they even owned the copyright in the end. I would approach the original authors.

[wlaidlaw]

What I gather from an author that published with Hove, the way they went down in flames makes it highly doubrful th they even owned the copyright in the end. I would approach the original authors.

 

Jaap, 

 

As I only have the middle sheet of the pamphlet on aperture settings for various flash bulbs, I have no idea who the author is. I did contact someone who had written for Hove Books and the bookshop in Steyning, who do keep a limited range of their books. It was those two sources who gave me the two addresses for the supposed copyright successors. I would not be surprised if a former director, bought the copyrights from the liquidators. That is the sort of thing that often happens, usually to the disadvantage of the poor individual creditors, who always come last in the queue. As I said above, Malcolm Taylor will know what is going on. 

 

Wilson

[Benedictine]

FYI "Hove" still advertises on eBay.

[pico]

It might help to know that Adobe Acrobat Pro does a pretty good job of scanning documents that can be searched by words, at least in English. I did an awful lot of such for a university project several years ago.

 

(It does this by presenting a raster image of the original with an underlayer, so-to-speak, of actual word  location within the image.)

[jaapv]

AFAIK at least some of the authors did not receive one penny and simply reclaimed their copyright without considering any legalities.

[wlaidlaw]

FYI "Hove" still advertises on eBay.

 

Their address is one of the addresses I was given. It does not really seem to exist. I rang a number of bells and asked the few people who answered did they know of a camera company or book publishing company amongst their neighbours. No was the answer I received. it may be a post box. There was an un-numbered door where the number would make you think it could be but it looked derelict. I posted a letter through their letter box but received no reply. The address from memory was 8 St Johns Road, Hove. Is this the address still given in eBay? 

 

Wilson

[greyelm]

Is this link of any help. They bought the Hove book stock list.

 

 

http://www.iwestsussex.co.uk/local/click/362378/

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[wlaidlaw]

Is this link of any help. They bought the Hove book stock list.

 

 

http://www.iwestsussex.co.uk/local/click/362378/

 

Really nice folk, who I bought a new copy of Laney from last year after a borrowed copy never returned. They say don't own any of the old Hove Books copyrights but just bought the stock when Hove books closed. It doesn't really matter as the intention of the library to begin with is to cover Leica manuals, not available from elsewhere, rather than general Leica publications. Once it is up and running, it will be dependant on the goodwill of forum members to look through their cupboards and drawers to find copies of old Leitz or Leica manuals, scan them and send them to me to post on the library, after I have indexed them and added tags, to assist the search facility. 

 

Wilson