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A day with a M240 and a 50mm Summicron


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5 hours ago, fotografr said:

If you were referring to my comments, I wasn't being critical. I merely said I found his impression of the base plate situation "amusing" in light of his willingness to go through the much more complex and time consuming process of changing films in a 503CX.

I fully understand that the M experience isn't for everyone, and that's absolutely fine. Maybe the OP will find a Leica product that suits him, maybe not. It sure doesn't matter either way to me.

As I explained before: The 503 is based on 60 year old technology, and its a film camera. It is complex and cumbersome to use, so I am looking for a second camera - digital - like I had before many times (SL, X, X1 and so on), that is going to be my travel companion. Hope this finally clarifies things.

And the M "experience", namely using a RF to focus, and some quirky nostalgic details that have been carried over into their digital era, was not "not for me". I enjoyed the day, but I did not find it that impressive. That is all.

But here is an offer: If something i wrote in my post is hurting your feelings, I would be happy to delete or edit it.

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8 hours ago, Quarterpounder said:

As I explained before: The 503 is based on 60 year old technology, and its a film camera. It is complex and cumbersome to use, so I am looking for a second camera - digital - like I had before many times (SL, X, X1 and so on), that is going to be my travel companion. Hope this finally clarifies things.

And the M "experience", namely using a RF to focus, and some quirky nostalgic details that have been carried over into their digital era, was not "not for me". I enjoyed the day, but I did not find it that impressive. That is all.

But here is an offer: If something i wrote in my post is hurting your feelings, I would be happy to delete or edit it.

I'm not sure where this is even coming from, but it's off base. The comment you copied here wasn't even directed at you. It was a clarification to someone else. As I've already said, I don't really care what you shoot with. Hurt feelings? Give me a break. 😁

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  • 1 month later...
On 9/5/2024 at 7:40 AM, Quarterpounder said:

What I realized is that while the modern digital M cameras are indeed beautifully crafted—especially the M11, which seems like a fascinating piece of gear—they didn’t give me the kind of "revelation" that made me want to buy one.

Sounds familiar. Leica was an "aspirational" brand for me for quite a while until I took a plunge and got into the system and initially I was also quite underwhelmed. I had been playing with various rangefinders before and although everything was heavy, butter smooth and clicked merrily, I didn't get what all the fuss was about. There was no fanfare, no angels singing. Just me and a weird box shaped camera with all manual controls. I already owned some M lens, so the image quality didn't improve magically overnight. So forth come the questions, why spend all that money, etc etc. If you've been around for a bit, you know the questions "outsiders" have and what arguments the indoctrinated Leica fans got.

I recently started shooting a Nikon DSLR again (after a pause of several years) and the reverse culture shock made me realize a few things.

First, at least film Leica's are very simple to use. Not easy to use, not simple mechanically, but you literally have the bare minimum of controls. My long-time film shooter is an M6 which at least has the luxury of a built in light meter. Otherwise there's only aperture and focus ring, shutter speed selector, trigger button and the winder lever. Oh, and the viewfinder with a relatively dim rangefinder patch and inaccurate framing lines to get at least some feedback on where you have focused and what you have framed up. There really isn't much and it's not really exiting. TBH, I think they are rather dull cameras, in a good way. No gimmicks there.

I absolutely love the Nikon and it's great... (SLR is/was an evolutionary step beyond rangefinder for sure, new opportunities, etc, this is a separate discussion.) But, imagine my initial frustration with the new camera, digging through seemingly endless menus, trying to figure out why it behaves one way or another, getting it tamed to my tastes. In the process, to be honest, I realized that I never missed the bulk of these features-options-controls on the M cameras.. And the bastard is heavy. My back feels it. At least autofocus helps make up for my eyesight.

M6 has no exposure compensation, you do yourself it yourself with aperture/shutter controles. There is the parallax error (somewhat managed, but never truly gone). There is no built-in diopter correction of the viewfinder (this requires a separate 200$ part). Minimum focus distance is crap (was? things are evolving). Let's better not talk too much about various problems with the digital models.. For a price that makes you double think if you ever want the camera to leave the house we've had issues like M8 coffee stain, M9 sensor corrosion and SD card issues, ... (I don't really know what went on between here...), and now M11 is freezing. Wait, I was supposed to say how awesome Leica's are, right? Well, there are irrational quirks and issues that take time to get used to and money to fix and it just gets silly sometimes. And yet, I don't want to give it up.

Digital bodies do have a bit more to them, options and controls wise, as it seems that Leica is starting to warm up and get more courage in the modern world, but I find that after I've configured a few basics, I hardly ever twiddle with the settings.

All-in-all.. My point is, it probably takes a bit more than a day to figure out where the charm is. It grows on you, eventually, like moss. People say Leica cameras are designed to be tools and their biggest strength is that they get "out of the way". They are things to forget about when you have mastered the controls and you can focus on your photography instead. I think this is very accurate about film models. They are simple enough that you can completely master them by touch and intuitively know what's going on. Which is kind of rare these days of tech.

Edited by xtimmu
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9 hours ago, xtimmu said:

Sounds familiar. Leica was an "aspirational" brand for me for quite a while until I took a plunge and got into the system and initially I was also quite underwhelmed. I had been playing with various rangefinders before and although everything was heavy, butter smooth and clicked merrily, I didn't get what all the fuss was about. There was no fanfare, no angels singing. Just me and a weird box shaped camera with all manual controls. I already owned some M lens, so the image quality didn't improve magically overnight. So forth come the questions, why spend all that money, etc etc. If you've been around for a bit, you know the questions "outsiders" have and what arguments the indoctrinated Leica fans got.

I recently started shooting a Nikon DSLR again (after a pause of several years) and the reverse culture shock made me realize a few things.

First, at least film Leica's are very simple to use. Not easy to use, not simple mechanically, but you literally have the bare minimum of controls. My long-time film shooter is an M6 which at least has the luxury of a built in light meter. Otherwise there's only aperture and focus ring, shutter speed selector, trigger button and the winder lever. Oh, and the viewfinder with a relatively dim rangefinder patch and inaccurate framing lines to get at least some feedback on where you have focused and what you have framed up. There really isn't much and it's not really exiting. TBH, I think they are rather dull cameras, in a good way. No gimmicks there.

 

Maybe that is how life should be, free of OMG moments.

Maybe it is also a cultural thing, U.S.culture vs. Europe.

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9 hours ago, xtimmu said:First, at least film Leica's are very simple to use. Not easy to use, not simple mechanically, but you literally have the bare minimum of controls. My long-time film shooter is an M6 which at least has the luxury of a built in light meter. Otherwise there's only aperture and focus ring, shutter speed selector, trigger button and the winder lever.

Aperture and focus ring, shutter speed selector, trigger, winder lever - not overly specific to Leicas? Unless we are talking digital.

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