Leica MD shutter speed dial M6/MP/M3/M2/M4 way... Petition...

I've been thinking about wich way they are going to built the shutter speed dial in the Leica

MD...

I hope both ways!

If not i'm ready to do a petition ...

Help needed...

I'm so used to the M6 way that I'm afraid they won't do it...

I think there is a lot of people in the same situation...

Let's unite!<div></div>

They should notch the dial for the MC/MR meter coupling pin so you can tell the shutter speed by feeling for the notch with your fingernail.

Stay with the original design.

 

If Al can tell by feeling for a notch position, he has been doing this too long!

I never really found this to be a big issue. I use an MP and an M7, and I never find I get the

knobs screwed up...

If you spin the ial all the way and back one click it's 1/500, my usual outdoor speed. With the notch poining straight towards the front it's my usual flash/basic available light position of 1/30. Much faster than"counting clicks". It'll be too long when I can't hold the camera anymore...LOL

The M Digital will use the R9's shutter.

 

It may also use part of the R9's electronic and its shutter speed dial.

 

We will see.

I doubt that it will use the R9's shutter speed dial...it is massive. Way too large for the M

camera body, even if the digital version is slightly wider.

I would like it the M5 way, even tho i use m6 classic my self.

With the notch on the M3, one can feel were 1/25 second is; one click over is 1/10th. Cool beans when using a Noctilux at F1, asa 800 print film, and one cannot read the dial in low light.

Depending on the 'logic' of the metereing system that will be employed, it makes sense to conform to "turn in the direction of the arrow" for simple reflexive response.

 

So much else will probably be different from the analog models, you will really be 'learning to drive a new car', with all the benefits that brings.

 

Our older models have their foibles (as do we), lets hope the new baby kicks of well configured, regardless of what we are used to.

Kelly, do you mean 1/30 and 1/15? (that's where the click stops are on my M3).

Sheesh! You young kids! The first M3's, the old double strokes, had speeds of 1, 1/2, 1/5, 1/10, 1/25, 1/50 and I can't remember (old age) if it was 1/100 or 1/125, 1/250, 1/500, 1/1000. X synch was at 1/50.

....and you could get dials for the M series meters marked with those speeds.

Well, if Solms is on the stick, it won't matter. The speeds will be seen in the VF.

 

Jerry

The advantage of the notch is that you can preset the speeds by feel long before you ever raise the camera to your eye, or if using flash, when it's too dark to see the numbers.

Off the top of my head, it will probably have to be larger to fit all the additional SS settings. An R9- M5 style configuration my not be too far off the mark. But my money is with an M7 type set up.

I never bought a Leica because I think they're expensive. But I do like them and from time to time I like reading the messages in this forum.

 

This very one is quite interesting: the fact that Leica might do the shutter dial in a way or another really worries you. In animal species, the ones or individuals who are not able to adapt, die.

 

I'm not saying "go digital" or stuff like this... but try not to exagerate, because sometimes (seen from the outside) it is really ridicolous...

Bruno

 

Not discounting the adapt or die reality of the corporate world

 

One of the nice things about Leicas is a continuity of user interface between all the models. If you've used an R4 for years, then going to an R9 and the DMR is a seemless transition. Everything is where you expect it to be. You don't need to read the manual to make an R9 work.

 

With the Ms for example, that philosophy of continuity and no planned obsolesce means that Leica users can sill use lenses made in 1954 on a camera that came off the production line yesterday.

 

On a manual camera a SS dial is an important thing. The new SS dial set up for the M6TTL was logical... but people had to change the way they worked. I small design change but one that did have on-the-ground effects simply because the seasoned Leica (as oposed to new) user had to adapt to a changed interface. That's not what Leicas are about.

 

C.

Also, Bruno, many of us are used to working with two or three bodies, each with a different lens. I usually carry 21, 35 and 90mm lenses set up and ready, and might switch lenses between two bodies because it's faster than a film change. That's not a time when you want to have to remember which shutter speed dial moves which way. If the light changes I want to be able to turn all the SS dials so many clicks in the SAME direction. Readings are by incident meter, usually made ahead of time.

I think we need TWO dials - one on the top you have to lift slightly to set (and which rotates in a rather confusing way after each exposure), and another on the front for the slow speeds. This is clearly the definitive version of the Leica shutter speed interface.

They could put in a custom function to reverse the dial rotation, as my 5D has. The dial itself could have a magnet at its centre, with a metallic inset disk numbered on both sides that the owner could flip over. That way the owner could reverse the direction and back again at a moment's notice in order to be in-line with the prevailing concensus on internet fora at any given moment.

Craig, Al, I see your point and I think it is right until some extent. What I wanted to stress is that Leica users seem to be extremely conservative.