Street photography with M240: tips

sanadsaad · August 3, 2019

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I've finally got time to take the M240 out for a spin on the streets of London. Any tips? Here's what I've learned so far that I'll start practising:

1. Zone focusing

2. Set max shutter to 1/250. Although doing this on m240 doesn't do the trick. I've set it to max 1/250 in the iso menu but it goes lower at times.

3. Iso set to auto for now with max iso 1600. Is that too high? What's the highest acceptable ISO? I will test this out today in real life rather than indoor shots of inanimate objects at home!

4. Aperture set to f8. Will adjust as the light changes.

The lens I'm using at the moment is the 50mm summicron type 4 (made in Canada version)

Looking forward to your advice. I will post pics here once I get back home. Hopefully some won't be blurry!

August 3, 2019

Hi sanadsaad,

Take a look here Street photography with M240: tips. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!

The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

Steve Ricoh · August 3, 2019

When I practised street photography with the M240 I used a 35mm f2 and zone focussed, altering the zone by the feel of the focusing tab with reference to the clock face. The M240 essentially became a point and shoot scale focus camera. Minimum shutter speed 1/fl, so 60th or 125 should be fine. In street photography absolute focus is not essential, near enough is adequate since it's more about emotions and gestures. Also I set the ISO as high as necessary; in my opinion there's no need to worry about noise, the pictures aren't going to be framed and hung on the wall.

In addition, I'd recommend gaffer tape to cover the Red Dot and the M.

Edit: yes f8 or smaller aperture if you can. Oh, and keep both eyes open.

Edited August 3, 2019 by Steve Ricoh

jaeger · August 3, 2019

wear a tee-shirt written "I'm not paparozzi"

Steve Ricoh · August 3, 2019

1 hour ago, jaeger said:

wear a tee-shirt written "I'm not paparozzi"

No need for the T shirt, I've been caught in the act many times, sometimes the outcome can be a bit disturbing. I've stopped doing 'street' some time back, apart from the odd occasion when I judge the risk to be low, eg if I perceive the old dear with a zimmer is unlikely to out run me.

Like a lot of photographs we make, what do we do with the images apart from share than on forums such as this. I think that's especially so with 'street', and there's more chance of framing a landscape or similar.

Herr Barnack · August 3, 2019

6 hours ago, Steve Ricoh said:

No need for the T shirt, I've been caught in the act many times, sometimes the outcome can be a bit disturbing. I've stopped doing 'street' some time back, apart from the odd occasion when I judge the risk to be low, eg if I perceive the old dear with a zimmer is unlikely to out run me.

Like a lot of photographs we make, what do we do with the images apart from share than on forums such as this. I think that's especially so with 'street', and there's more chance of framing a landscape or similar.

Here's a street photography tip: When doing street photography in Mongolia, do NOT let the drunk Mongolian gents on the city square see you aiming your camera within a 180 degree arc of them. The results can end up being like a pick-up hockey game.

Other than that, soldier on. In western cultures, I have been asked about, talked to and had people attempt to "shame" me ( 🙄 ) for doing street photography. Turns out none of these encounters were fatal.

You just have to want to do your street photography more than you want to be comfortable, that's all.

Ray Vonn · August 4, 2019

The zone focus F8 method does work of course (albeit not as well these days as what the really compact cameras do), but there's always the alternative of keeping it on F8, focusing on the particular scene then letting the person appear into the scene before snapping away. I find this works better with the rangefinder. That way you can do most of the work beforehand, such as noting the light conditions, getting a low iso and tying up the composition. Taking the shot is the easy bit and after a while, you can pretty much anticipate how the shot is going to look. Maybe a bit time consuming but it really pays off in the final image.

Jeff S · August 4, 2019

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Lessons from a guy who knew a bit...

https://erickimphotography.com/blog/2014/12/09/17-lessons-henri-cartier-bresson-taught-street-photography/

Jeff

cobbu2 · August 5, 2019

Excellent article, thanks for the link. I found the section on being an “amateur” especially significant, since my motivation for undertaking photography is the pure enjoyment of the activity and striving for improvement.

ChicagoMatthew · August 5, 2019

Zone focus with a 50mm can be tough. I’d try a 28 or 35.

A “trick” I use a lot is when I find a person I want to photograph I pick something innocuous near them and pretend I’m photographing that, then when they are used to having me there and stop paying attention, I focus on them.

I also, sometimes pretend to take a picture above someone and act like I’m checking my lcd, then I take a candid. Even works when I have my m7, but the acting needs to be on point 🤣

sanadsaad · August 5, 2019

Haha! @ChicagoMatthew I do the same. My work flow was:

Shoot with M240

Sd card reader attached to Galaxy note 9

Images added to LR mobile

Slight tweaks (exposure, white balance, etc)

Trying to figure out how to reduce file size so I can post here for critique.

ChicagoMatthew · August 6, 2019

1 hour ago, sanadsaad said:

Trying to figure out how to reduce file size so I can post here for critique.

I airdrop the jpegs to my phone, then I use “Afterlight” to save them as a smaller size.

sanadsaad · August 6, 2019

Finally shrunk the images. Please bear in mind this is my first foray into M photography and "street" photography. Prior to this, my documentation of the world has been mostly through phone cameras. All photos were shot pre-focussed. London is so fast paced, i found i missed a few shots initially when I tried to manually focus. I have included these in here as well. I had loads of fun shooting with the M. Worth every penny!