paul_darman1

I doubt there is any print scan I can perform at 72dpi that can capture the

nuances we're trying to explain. That's the hard part. So no, I did not agonize

over the scan nor manipulate it, it is a pretty fast print scan on a canoscan flat

bed, pure and simple.

Harvey, at 47 I am well beyond the need to seek justification from people for

the things I do, except for two people - my wife, and my Dad.

Per some of the posters, I did take the lab/film out of equation to a first

approximation, as the roll of film went through a Minolta 7 for 10 shots before

being rewound and put into the Leica. So I have several pictures of my son on

the same roll, ergo processed identically, except shot with f 1.4 Minolta lens,

which has always been good performer in my hands. Nevertheless, in all the

time I have used it, it has never (nor 1.4 Nikkor AIS) matched what we saw on

the prints yesterday. And my wife is an accomplished image specialist, retired

from Federal Service, who certainly knows her way around image scanning

and image analysis. She saw it too, BTW.

I have put a roll of Ektachrome VS in the M6 and will shoot half of it in the M6

with the 90mm f2, then rewind it and put it in FE2 to compare against 85mm f2

AIS nikkor, and finally rewind and shoot the last few frames on Canon A1 so I

can use 85mm 1.8 FD (breech lock) also one of my top performers. Hopefully

in a week or so we will have some film scans to send up of all three lenses off

the same film/developer.

I know people can be die hard supporters/detractors of one brand over

another, so I do not get into those threads. I am pleased with the Minolta

glass, going back to Rokkor-X MD days, and have specimens in Canon FD,

Nikon AIS, and Olympus Zuiko (100mm f 2.8) that all give outstanding results.

But I was very impressed with round 1 for the 50mm f2, as something

markedly better then what I've used before - and we have some nice glass

here.

After 34 years of SLR photography, I finally decided to try Leica. Most of my

images now are of my 2-year old son and wife of 13 years, environmental

portraiture. So after reading lots of posts and varied info, thought we'd try

available light with an M6 and 50mm Summicron f2.0 I ran the first roll

through this week.

I was absolutely blown away with the image quality. I posted one, "Jackson

Waking" in my workspace, though the 72dpi web saved jpg does not do it full

justice, needless to say. The original print has more contrast and vivid color

then I'd ever seen in an available light image. (The posted image was taken at

15/th of a second at f2.0, with Fuji 400 Press Color Negative). The detail in

his face and the other in focus areas was unbelievable. I have been a skeptic

for many years, and was kind of skeptical even up to getting the prints back

yesterday. But after just one roll and limited experimentation, I am duly

impressed with the on-film performance.

I also picked up a 90mm f2 Asph last week, and will experiment with that this

week if we have some nice light here in the Shenandoah Valley.

Will I trade in my other cameras? No. Jackson will be in school plays and

play sports and other child stuff as he grows up, and I will still have my

180mm 2.8 Nikkor AIS or 200m Minolta APO AF in hand for those events. For

trips to the Clarke County fair and exposure to cotton candy, ice cream, or

doggie spit other cameras will assume those risks. But there IS something to

this Leica thing. My wife saw it immediately as well.<div></div>

These are all superb technical and artistic images from an obviously talented

photographer.

Why is the choice though a D100 or rangefinder? If its a question of money

(need $$ from D100 to buy other) then ok, I see it, but both tools meet kind of

different needs.

Steve, I have had a couple of FG's over the last five years or so,

and they both had pronounced mirror vibration that DID affect

sharpness as 1/30 and slower, in my hands (47 year-old

hands). I never used it on a tripod, so don't know if that would

make a difference - but H. Keppler in Pop Photo once did study

that measured mirror vibration both w and w/o tripod, and there

were some speeds where tripod made vibration worse.

I left the FG because of the vibration and pronouced mirror slap,

and stayed with FE2 and FA. Some FG's also had battery drain

problems, so get a warranty of some kind before buying.

Paul Darman