M8 Dillemas..

[pgk]

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I too am a freelance (18 years). I shoot Canon (1DSs & 5D) with L glass and Leica M8/6s. IMHO output file comparisons are quite simply, NOT conclusive. I choose the camera to shoot with depending on what I have to shoot and the end requirement - sometimes this means the Canons, and other times the Leicas. Although I do shoot with the M6 I'd have to say that I use film pretty rarely now.

 

If you are familiar with M series cameras, you will be very at home with the M8 - okay it has 1.33 crops downsides but you can't have everything at first.

 

I'd echo other comments already posted - if you can try one out and shoot a few files they should help you to appreciate exactly what the M8 offers. I find its files to be very usable indeed and they also suit my workflow well.

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[chris_livsey]

i looked more at the prints that come from the MP and I rather like them.

)

 

I don't want to hijack the thread but; are you talking scan/print from the MP or wet print direct from neg ?

[Rolo]

I don't want to hijack the thread but; are you talking scan/print from the MP or wet print direct from neg ?

 

Scan & print from the neg is what I nearly always do.

 

Silver printing is a very different product IMO and it's been quite a while since I took the dust cover off my enlarger.

 

Silver print is the ultimate end product IMO, but before I get there darkroom v lightroom skills and turnaround speed have quite an impact.

 

Rolo

[garyvot]

A bit too sombre Gary.

 

Sorry, got up on the wrong side of bed this morning...

[jaapv]

You were right to point it out, Gary, it is an issue for some.

[garyvot]

Agreed with Gary, with the key exception that IMO nothing over 35mm needs the coding, since colour vignetting (which is what the coding takes care of) is next to negligible on 35s and above.

 

None of my lenses--except my new Nocti--is coded except the wides (21, 24, 28).

 

Yes, I agree with Jamie coding is not really necessary to correct for cyan drift with longer lenses. However, coding is essential if you want the camera to record the focal length in the file's Exif information. It is also necessary if you use Cornerfix software to add the lens type and derived shooting aperture to the file's metadata in post-processing.

 

Whether you care about having this information in your files is a strictly personal preference, but I like to know that years from now I can look at an image and know how it was shot. (Funny, we never had this luxury with film without keeping extensive shooting notes, but digital has spoiled me I suppose.)

[Guest rweisz]

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my dilemma is whether to shoot film and scan (at my leisure) or go for 2 m8s..

 

Why two at once? I'd suggest trying one and not buying the second one till your sure its for you, or when it breaks and has to go back to Solms for months. Mine did the latter and I still haven't bought a second one and probably won't.

 

the perceived value of a film print is higher than a digi print..

 

Not unless you're talking about an optical print made by someone who really knows how. Scanning is nothing more than taking a digital shot of a chrome or a neg. Someone with enough image processing skill to make a scan look like an optical print also probably has (or someone with equal skill can be found who does have) the ability to make a digital capture emulate the characteristics of an optical print, at least well enough to fool 98% of viewers. Most scanned-to-digital film captures I've seen scream "digital" more than digital captures.

[robsteve]

im an established freelance photographer of 15 years.. im looking for personal experiances as i find reviewers tend to be either for or against the leica m system..

 

especially of interest is anyone producing fine art prints..

 

thanks to all who take the time to answer..

 

Since you are a professional, try calling the Leica Professional services contact and ask to borrow a M8 to try for yourself.

 

The contact numbers were posted in the customer forum section of this site.

 

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/customer-forum/49499-official-leica-contact-info-us.html

 

Robert

[chris_livsey]

Scan & print from the neg is what I nearly always do.

 

Rolo

Thanks for that.

Interesting comments on grain. I must get some decent scans done, those high street lab ones are cr*p.

[adan]

1. Yes I have (see below) - also see http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/leica-m8-forum/23027-scanned-film-velvia-50-vs-m8.html, which compares $900 Sony R-1 to M6/Velvia 100.

 

2. No. But I have found virtually NO difference in detail image quality in 13 x19 prints from practically ANY source. Prints tend to be great equalizers compared to pixel peeping. I do strongly suspect the D3 will come out ahead at ISOs above 1000, assuming the glass is decent.

 

3. How many hours do you have? The short answer is: for the same reason one would not try to shoot on 6x6 film with 35mm-format lenses. Because the lenses aren't designed to handle it.

 

SLR lenses are designed with a long back-focus to allow room for the swinging mirror. By coincidence, long-back-focus lenses are rather friendly to digital capture on a piece of engraved silicon. They can handle a full-frame sensor.

 

Rangefinder lenses are design to take advantage of the fact that they do NOT have to clear a swinging mirror, and thus can sit deep in the camera, close to the film, and be very compact (compare the M-mount Voigtlander 15mm to any SLR 14mm, or the Leica 21 f/2.8 to a Canon f/2.8 - for size - to see this).

 

By coincidence, these rangefinder lenses designs are NOT very friendly to the architecture of engraved silicon used for digital capture - they vignette, cause reflections and other nasty stuff the farther out the corners of the sensor are.

 

Leica could easily have made a full-frame M8 - so long as they threw away all their current lenses below 50mm (and also all of those that photographers have purchased over the past 40 years) - and completely redesigned all the wide-angles to be more SLR-like (in optical path and size/weight).

 

Thankfully, they chose instead to go with the largest sensor that still performed adequately with their compact wideangles already in the market.

 

4. Real-world? 2 stops better than scanned slide film, about equal to scanned color negs, usually (but not always) equal to scanned B&W negs.

 

Other: Yes I am getting into producing fine-art prints (had my first shots accepted in an exhibition this month (2 M8 shots, 1 M6/film shot) - all printed B&W archival with an Epson 3800 10" x 15"). Have spent a lot of time in galleries recently studying prints - and am convinced the M8 will not be the limiting factor in producing glowing silvery images. Need to keep practicing my own skills to reach that level, though.

 

Perceived value? I was in a gallery yesterday where there were both digital and silver prints hanging and selling side by side. If anything the digital color work was commanding higher prices than the silver prints - say, $6000-7200 vs. $4500-$6000 (big prints - 30 x 40 on up) - whether any of them were worth those prices is in the eye of the beholder, of course.

 

In the chart linked to in a previous response - the M8 with 10 Mpixels and 6.8-micron pixel pitch ranks right beside the Canon 1D MkIII, just below Medium-format fine-grained film, and well above 35mm - which is exactly what I've seen comparing the M8 to Hasselblad/Mamiya 7 film images (In fact the M8 will BEAT MF unless the MF lenses are absolutely top-rank.)

 

Bottom line (IMNSHO) - the M8 will generally do just what you are asking - be a lighter, easier to carry equivalent to the D3, with all the rangefinder limitations that your M6/7s had.

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[Guest rweisz]

1. Yes I have (see below) -

 

No you haven't. Comparing a raw scan to a raw DNG doesn't prove anything, unless that's your end use. If your end use is a print, then you have to have both files post-processed for optimal results by someone who knows how to do it, and then compare the prints. In my experience, a really good scan on a really good scanner (like a Tango or even a high-end Imacon) from really sharp film, processed and printed by an expert, might be a little grainier and maybe lose a bit of dMax to a good digital capture, but it isn't anywhere near as striking a difference as your examples would falsely lead someone to believe who doesn't know any better.

[chris_livsey]

a really good scan on a really good scanner (like a Tango or even a high-end Imacon) from really sharp film, processed and printed by an expert,

 

Seems a bit extreme. I don't have an expert to process and print my film nor access to an imacon scanner nor the expertise to use it so I use an M8 instead and get a little less grain and maybe gain a bit of dMax over that process.

[Rolo]

I agree with Chris here.

 

We can't bring Ansel Adams back to determine what can be done with B&W film, nor include David Adamson into the equation for his wonderful colour printing knowledge IMO. Yes it shows in the extreme, but if reality is home developing, scanning and local printing, then shouldn't we be talking at the highest level.

 

I have a dedicated film scanner, but it's not an Imacon 949, nor a £300 Epson. I'll never pay my money for a drum scan, so advising that a Tango is hard to beat is not useful information for me. If an M8/DSLR isn't good enough for an exhibition print, I get around that by just going up a format and scanning on a 'decent MF scanner' because in my experience/system/skill, a small sensor doesn't match a big neg. However, we're talking small sensor here & 35mm film

 

Our problem is that we all have different kit, albeit in the middle of it is a Leica lens system.

 

Rolo

[jaapv]

No you haven't. Comparing a raw scan to a raw DNG doesn't prove anything, unless that's your end use. If your end use is a print, then you have to have both files post-processed for optimal results by someone who knows how to do it, and then compare the prints. In my experience, a really good scan on a really good scanner (like a Tango or even a high-end Imacon) from really sharp film, processed and printed by an expert, might be a little grainier and maybe lose a bit of dMax to a good digital capture, but it isn't anywhere near as striking a difference as your examples would falsely lead someone to believe who doesn't know any better.

Although theoretically true, beside the point. The real-life question is: How does it compare in everyday use? The answer is: In the hands of a decent to good photographer a good quality digital camera of 8+ Mp will produce results that are as good or better than comparable film cameras, technically speaking. The differences there are on the artistic side are a matter of taste and inclination.