blakley

I'm surprised not to have seen the 75mm Summicron ASPH mentioned for this purpose. It's a great portrait lens; a combination of excellent sharpness with enough glow to make portraits of women look great, especially wide open or nearly so.

 

Here's a sample, taken on film, with this lens.<br>

 

<a href=" title="pam"><img src="https://c2.staticflickr.com/1/92/257780425_6c90cc738a.jpg" width="400" height="500" alt="pam"></a>

The award for "best line in any Leica T review" goes to Ming Thein, for this gem:

<p>

<i>there is a 12500 setting, but this looks like a storm of jellybeans</i>

The X-T1 and X-E2 dust problem is not with dust "on" the sensor, it's with dust UNDER the sensor glass but in front of the photosites. Fuji happily replaces cameras which have this problem. There's also a problem with light leaking into the X-T1 from the HDMI port if (1) the port's protective door is left open, and (2) the camera is used in very low light. And there's also been a problem with the rear control wheel just not working. In all instances, Fuji is replacing or repairing affected units.

After a remarkable few days, the New55 Kickstarter has in fact crossed the finish line and will be funded. Very exciting news.

The Casca and the Chevron are weirdly awesome. I would totally snap those up if they sat on the shelf at a dealer I stumbled upon...

Stephen, your camera is slightly different from the one in the photo I uploaded - the lever below the lens has a different shape. Is this a model difference, or aftermarket repair?

Thank you!

This photo shows a camera owned by a serviceman in Vietnam in the 1970s. Can anyone identify the camera<div></div>

If it's your first RB67, get a manual and study it carefully - the beast has a dazzling array of interlocks designed to prevent you from doing anything stupid, which often have the effect of making it rage-inducingly hard to get it to do anything at all - including get the film backs on and off.

I like the gutter hose picture, Gene. It's lighthearted.

Like Ralf, I really like these. They manage to make the modern world look like the 1950s, which makes me wonder if styles in the real world have changed as much as we think, or whether our mind superimposes the look of old photos on the world the photos were taken of.

When I grow up, I want to be Steve Deer.

Damn, gents... this is a good week indeed. Wonderful shots all around.

Damn, gents... this is a good week indeed. Wonderful shots all around.

If you want to cheat, 15mm is just a little narrower than the field of view you see within the frames of a "normal sized" pair of eyeglasses. If you wear glasses, you can just use the CL to focus and then pop your head up, look at what you see, and press the button.

He means he doesn't understand either optics or sensors. But that's OK, because he's on TV.

In 1990, if you wanted to take a picture, you shot film. Not because film was "best", or even "cheapest" - but just because it was the only way to get the job done. Huge volumes of film were sold because everyone who wanted to take pictures HAD to use film.

 

In 2010, if you want to take a picture, you use your (digital) phone. You only buy film if you want to take a FILM picture.

 

The question, for film manufacturers, is "how many people want to take FILM pictures" - how many people want to work in the medium of film.

 

Sooner or later the size of the population of film-medium people will be known, and film supply and demand will stabilize. Film won't "die", and it won't "revive" - it will just tick along at the rate that can be sustained by the population of film-medium people.

 

We're probably approaching the point of stability; a few more years and we'll be back in a normal - but smaller - market. And then there will be nothing left to argue about (well, probably not...)

I'm a big fan of the 50/1.4 Nikkor in LTM.

<p>Very nice work, Federico. Thanks for posting it.</p>

I had the opportunity to be a guest lecturer at a previous Austin Leica Academy event. It was a fun day; the participants got to test drive the M9, and we all had a nice discussion. It's not as "instructional" as the Nikon School (or the Photo Mentor Series, which is pretty hardcore), but it's enjoyable & depending on who's speaking you'll probably learn something if you're new to Leica digital.

Good week.

That's a really great idea.

There are lots of excellent cameras out there these days, but, as usual, fewer excellent lenses. The M9 lets me use what I consider to be the very best 35mm-format lenses made. It's also small and light, and I can handhold it without motion blur at much slower shutter speeds than any DSLR or mirrorless digital I've used. Since I like photographing when it's ridiculously dark, this matters to me. I've not been able to get shots like this one with other cameras I've tried:

<p>

<a href=" title="L1004462 by blakley, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm7.staticflickr.com/6121/5993247894_8833e3e819.jpg" width="500" height="400" alt="L1004462"></a>

This was <a href="http://www.photo.net/photography-news-forum/00ZZe4">posted</a> in the news forum today; Kodak has

sold the division that makes Leica's M8, M9, and S2 sensors to a private equity firm.

 

It will be interesting to see what effect this has on Leica's plans going forward; manufacturing stocks of

sensors for the current product lines are probably not in danger, and Platinum Equity may well resell the

business to another firm which rests on firmer foundations than Kodak, but future Leica camera designs might look

different.

Oh, man. I've gotta buy a lottery ticket now.