gerard_captijn

There is a filter adapter for the 15mm Super Wide Heliar, have a look at:

 

http://www.fotoapparatuur.nl/Voigtlander/Adapter/Ad39036.html

 

Filters will be expensive because of their size.

As Henri Cartier-Bresson used to say:

"sharpness is a bourgeois concept".

There continues to be a good niche market for M bayonet camera's and

lenses as proven by Ebay business, magazines and the number of

Internet forums.

 

One should not look at Leica Camera individually but at the total M

bayonet market. This market is supplied by 3 players: second hand

market, Leica Camera and Cosina/Voigtländer (and soon 4 with Zeiss

Ikon). Parties 1 and 3 have reasonable, normal prices. Party 2 is

outrageously expensive. I am sure that Leica's share of the total M

bayonet market is steadily decreasing while Cosina/Voigtländer is

doing fine.

 

I live in Switzerland: a M7 plus a Summilux 50/1.4 ASPH is now in

the order of CHF 10.000, i.e. over USD 8.000. If Leica does not

understand why their M sales are decreasing so much: the above (plus

digital recording), are the answers. Many, many people want M gear,

but can not, or do not want to, pay these prices.

 

I don't know what the answer is: contract manufacturing in China?

There is regular criticism on prints produced by recent Leica ASPH

and APO lenses. Image: too clean, bokeh: too harsh, transition from

focused to non-focussed: too unpleasant, new Summicron 90 ASPH: too

sharp, etc. I understand this and obviously, we are all entitled to

our tastes and opinions. But how much of the existing opinions are

the result of having lived all of our life with pictures produced by

insufficiently corrected glass?

 

In terms of MTF, the ideal lens would be one that that has 100%

contrast transfer in any part of the image and at any cycle level

(i.e. for large, small and micro detail). If optical engineers would

be able to design lenses without any aberrations, how would the

resulting images look? Most probably cleaner, sharper, contrastier

and more precise.

 

The uncorrected errors in an optical system result in wider circles

of confusion. An ideal optical system will produce dots close to

zero (2-4 micron). This means that all light energy from a given

subject point will be concentrated on a very small film surface,

resulting in only a small number of silver crystals becoming

developable. When the circles of confusion get wider because of

insufficiently uncorrected lens aberrations (in the order of 10

micron), more crystals receive light energy and thus become

developable. The picture becomes less precise. It is like a painter

painting with large brushes only. As Leica reduces the aberration

content of its lenses, the brush becomes smaller and the resulting

imagery cleaner.

 

The point I want to make is this: as Leica produces better corrected

glass, maybe, at our end, we should get accustomed to the resulting

imagery. As better corrected optical systems become available,

imagery will continue to evolve from what it was in the double gauss

days.

 

But, as said, to each his own taste!

This is not good news at all. The Schmidtheiny's and the Deutsche Steinindustrie were very long term shareholders who knew Leica Camera AG, the Leitz/Leica entities before Leica Camera AG and their respective management very, very well. They are experienced businesspeople, know how to judge business situations and decided to pull out ........

Scott, you reacted to things that were not said. My remarks related to 35 mm (24 x 36 mm) Kodachrome slides. It is evident that bigger formats deliver better image quality. Smoke after you shoot, not before.

I like Kodachrome, for its sharpness and for its colors. The

combination of Kodachrome and Leica glass produces, in my opinion,

the finest color imagery in 35mm (and is, by the way, equivalent to

16 megapixel). I started making color pictures on Kodachrome II in

the sixties and must have about 40.000 Kodachrome slides by now.

 

I just came back from a visit of the Kodachrome laboratory in

Lausanne (Renens), a department of the Kodak Laboratory in

Switzerland. I was very kindly received by their head of Kodachrome

processing, Mr. R鮩 Agassis. They develop for all European

countries and now also for Australia. The countries that send them

most film are the UK, Germany and Switzerland. They develop with a

classic K-14 processor as they believe that the level of process

control, dependability and most of all quality, is superior to the

newer K-Lab processors. The laboratory develops 35mm film and movie

stock. As the front- and back ends of the Kodachrome development

process is a rather manual exercise, they are able to offer a series

of options: Push processing (2 options), framing in classic

pressboard mounts (mainly for professionals who like to write on the

paper boards), framing in plastic slide mounts, film return uncut

and film return cut in strips of 4 pictures. You want Kodachrome 400

in pressboard mounts? They can do it.

 

It takes about an hour to get the K-14 processor working in the

morning. When the control strips from Rochester come out right, they

start processing. Three people control the running of the

development train (this excludes chemistry, maintenance, etc.). The

laboratory has enough film to process to develop every day and to

ensure process stability. As slide film, including Kodachrome, is a

shrinking medium, the laboratory is now housed quite large, probably

half the space occupied would be sufficient. There are a number of

unused machines.

 

One of Kodak's problems is maintenance and repair of their aging

equipment. They retain some older technicians who adjust and repair

the gear and can manufacture spare parts, if necessary. Many spares

have become unavailable but the laboratory has found solutions to

these problems.

 

Another problem is the constant fight against dust and dirt. The

plastic slide mounts, for instance, have a tendency to charge static

electricity which attracts dust. The laboratory maintains a very

clean environment.

 

I was really impressed by the attitude of the Kodachrome processing

staff. "Despite diminishing volumes" they say "we will maintain an

absolutely first class processing environment". And they do. They

complained that there has been no advertising for Kodachrome for 10 -

15 years and remarked that despite this the demand from

photographers who want quality imagery did not disappear. They

insisted a couple of times that any observations, even the

slightest, should be brought to their immediate attention for

correction and analysis of their work methods. I had no problems

though in almost 40 years. Very good people indeed and I hope for

them (and for all of us!) that Kodak continues to make Kodachrome

for a reasonable number of years.

 

The people in Lausanne would very much like to continue quality

processing of Kodachrome longer term but are afraid that Kodak will

shut down Kodachrome production, probably sooner than later.

Kodachrome 25 is gone already and Kodachrome 200 was ditched but

came back after massive protests. Shutting down Kodachrome

production probably means that the Kodak laboratory in Switzerland

would have to close down operations at the expiry date of the last

Kodachrome batch manufactured.

 

A solution to continue Kodachrome for another number of years after

Kodak's final run, could be for Kodak to transfer (lease?) their

Kodachrome production know-how to a small film factory (EFKE in

Croatia? Foma in the Czech Republic? Forte in Hungary? Ilford

contract manufacturing in the UK?). Kodachrome is easy and cheap to

make and difficult and expensive to develop. If Kodak does not want

its name on the box anymore, as they do not control quality after a

transfer, the film could be called Efkechrome, Fomachrome,

Fortechrome or whatever. And Kodak Switzerland would love to

continue to develop the stuff.

 

Maybe Kodak is listening out there, somewhere.

 

Kodachrome is easy (and cheap) to manufacture and difficult (and expensive) to develop. I think that Kodak should give a small film factory (Foma?, Bergger?, Efke?, Ilford? the Russians?) the rights to manufacture Kodachrome after they decide to stop manufacturing. With one manufacturer worldwide and one processing entity per continent, Kodachrome should be able to continue for another 25 - 50 years.<div></div>

Hi Erik,

 

Goed een nieuwe Nederlander in het forum te hebben.

 

What Erik told, i.e. that he became interested in Leica through Erwin Puts articles in Camera Magazine, struck a chord as this was also the reason why I got interested in Leica again (after a 15 year Hasselblad/Nikon F detour). The interest of Erwin's articles, in my opinion, was that he did not compare Leica vs Nikon/Canon but Leica vs Leica. Comparisons between different brands are useless as one is locked into his camera system's bayonet. I found, for instance, Erwin's comparing Leitz/Leica's 35 mm glass very interesting as one can decide to photograph with any of the lens generations: the mounts are all the same.

 

I changed my opinion though on the practical use of these tests. The differences between many glass generations are so small that one has to enlarge above 30 X 40 cm to start to see differences. Finally, it is a lot of hyperbole about small differences. The cases where the differences are important are rare (for instance: Summilux 1.4/35mm vs Summilux 1.4/35mm ASPH wide open).

 

In order to get the improvements out of recent Leica glass one has to lavish extreme care and effort to exposing his images (tripod, high speeds, aperture not too small, etc.). The small differences in sharpness disappear in handheld photography. Differences in contast are limited since the sixties. Read Stephen Gandy on the subject, he is spot on. It is great though to see that Leica continues to improve its lenses (once they offer an improved Summilux 1.4/50mm, I will buy immediately).

 

Again, welcome to the club.

The information that the new non-flare finder (or rather: the diminished flare finder) was installed in the M7's starting with no. 2.885.000 came directly from Leica Switzerland, in writing.

The new non flare rangefinder was installed in the M7 starting with no. 2.885.000.