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Leica M in gold - all that glitters


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Shadow play. From the shoot in Austria recently.

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The details on this 1980 M4-2 are really exquisite. I really do not like the lizard thingy though.
I wonder why "Made in Canada" got such a bad reputation among Leica aficionados...

 

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Edited by Al Brown
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  • 2 weeks later...

Two items with value today - crypto and gold.

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On 11/15/2021 at 10:10 AM, Al Brown said:

A very interesting converted gold plated M3 double stroke with 14K gold surface... now and then, a golden M2, M3, M4 and even M5 surface that have been converted on customer request. Probably the cheapest "gold" Leicas, although not factory originals.

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Hello Al,

There is a gold plated 3 lug M5 in Rogliatti's 60 years that he said was made on special order by Leitz. No serial number is provided. The camera is shown with 50mm f1.4 Summilux serial number 2822222. The lens number dates the LENS to 1976. The color photo is on a page between pages 96 & 97.

Best Regards,

Michael

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I have no problem with Gold Leica's or any other brand. Whatever your taste. Having said that it most definitely is not my taste. As long as Leica keeps making black and silver versions, I'm happy. 😁

BTW, I enjoy all the other versions, Hammertone, Safari, Titanium and others too numerous to name.

Edited by kivis
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7 hours ago, Michael Geschlecht said:

Hello Al,

There is a gold plated 3 lug M5 in Rogliatti's 60 years that he said was made on special order by Leitz. No serial number is provided. The camera is shown with 50mm f1.4 Summilux serial number 2822222. The lens number dates the LENS to 1976. The color photo is on a page between pages 96 & 97.

Best Regards,

Michael

Yes, I am aware of that camera. It was a special order. According to Laney (who also shows the custom M3 intended for the Tiranty family, the Leitz distributors in France), this golden M5 with the golden Summilux 50 (similar serial number to the Summiluxes made for 1979/80 gold M4-2 "Barnacks" in 1977) was never delivered.

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On 11/11/2021 at 8:37 AM, Al Brown said:

But of course I use it. Life is too short to have a golden Leica collecting dust on a shelf.

I would too!

 

“There's an old joke - um... two elderly women are at a Catskill mountain resort, and one of 'em says, "Boy, the food at this place is really terrible." The other one says, "Yeah, I know; and such small portions." Well, that's essentially how I feel about life - full of loneliness, and misery, and suffering, and unhappiness, and it's all over much too quickly.” (Woody Allen)

Edited by Ornello
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This is a back side of an Italian magazine LA LEICA: Fotografia – Tecnica - Antiquariato by Gianni Rogliatti from 1983, Year II, Number 1 (32 pages).

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On 12/11/2021 at 12:06 AM, ppkarppi said:

I think it's great that collectors are keeping these rare Leica cameras alive. There were 1000 Gold Barnack M4-2s made in the 1970s, right? I wonder how many of those have survived. I checked on eBay and could not find a single Gold M4-2 Barnack listed there at the moment.

Yes, there were 500 in 1979 and another batch of 500 in 1980 according to several books. Impossible to know the remaining numbers. Sometimes only the lens alone shows up on eBay. Sometimes only the box. Sometimes just the top plate...
This M4-2 Barnack in 24k gold is (paired with Summilux 50/1.4) by far the most affordable analog golden Leica M (there were so few golden editions of analog Ms they can be counted on the fingers of one hand). An amazing addition to any Leica collection.

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Meh, gold plating leaves me uninterested. It doesn't change the heft, weight, structural properties of the camera. It's just a fancy coat of paint. If you like it, just go ahead and do it, just as you'd repaint your camera any other colour. But I fail to see any extra value in a plated camera, especially gold. Plating is a cheap, routine process and for such small parts the material used is minimal. So even with gold plating, I don't see how it would justify a much higher price than, say, a chrome plating, given that the majority of the cost is in labour and the material used just a miniscule amount (since you can plate gold really thin, any gold plated €10 jewellery from the mall would prove so).

 

On the other hand, honest use of alternative materials is more exciting. How about a stainless steel (solid) Leica M? Talk about heft and toughness! Or a titanium one. How about a tough but super lightweight carbon fibre M? Or even a sterling silver one, to get all the oxidation and patina. How about a silicone escapement for the shutter timing on a clockwork shutter, that is dead accurate like a quartz and requires no lubrication? (Some swiss watches already use silicone escapements, so it's not just a proof of concept). See, those would be exciting things that I could see myself getting behind and being excited about. Or at worst, some solid gold or solid platinum plates, as a novelty it'd at least draw my interest since someone decided to waste so much precious metal on a camera. But some basic gold plating? Meh. You can get that in any gadget, from smartwatches to smartphones, it's not even that special. (On top of looking heinously ugly imo).

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