mark_wrathall

Tony, you are correct to take a position against the sarcastic tone

of my first post. I should have considered my arguments and presented

them maturely the first time. The Forum shouldn�t descend into flame

wars.

 

<p>

 

Are we still allowed to strongly disagree?

 

<p>

 

Erwin,

I felt I was reading an infomercial. I sincerely felt this review

does you no credit. I recognized your efforts and knowledge in my

first post.

 

<p>

 

You have a well founded reputation as being a authority on Leica's,

but such blind devotion to Leica as this essay showed risks your

credibility. You can't be both an independent reviewer and the

marketing department at the same time. I would like to suggest Phil

Askey�s reviews on DPreview as an example of objective journalism.

 

<p>

 

If the M7 is a worthy product, it must stand on it's own strengths.

The Leica M is a design which heavily compromises many area�s of

functionality, to optimize a few others. Anyone who uses one accepts

this trade off. To sell it�s limitations as features benefits no

one, but is the source of the Leica Religion.

 

<p>

 

To me the piece that did the most damage to your credibility was the

paragraph justifying the M7's 1/1000 top shutter speed. You had

already given a thorough technical justification for it. It is

clearly a compromise driven by technical decisions, to then justify

that by indicating that 1/4000 is really needed, denies one of the

true strengths of Leica, fast lenses, sharp wide open, with excellent

Bokeh.

 

<p>

 

Another example was the statement devaluing the Hexar RF for it�s

small line-up of lenses, when the M mount is the reason for it�s

existence.

 

<p>

 

The incorrect facts I jumped on, (more than 50 years use of a 1954

camera, the shutter curtain velocity, the relationship of 1/1000@5.6

to 1/4000@2.8), were easy targets, which you should have caught

during your proof reading.

"He has his facts wrong, at least the ones that we can check, so why

believe anything he has to say about the stuff you can't check? Think

of him not as a world-renowned Leica guru but as a journalist, and

you realize what he has written is trash. It isn't credible"

-- Masatoshi Yamamoto

 

<p>

 

A perfect summary of what motivated me to write me previous post.

Erwin,

 

<p>

 

I am glad you are on this forum, because I'd like you to know that

was one of the worst product reviews I have ever read. Pompous,

inaccurate, irrelevant and condescending. It is a shame as you are

obviously knowledgeable and have reseached the article thoroughly

(like most of your life :).

For me it kind of captured all that is bad about the mythos Leica.

It's a tool, not a religion!

 

<p>

 

A more objective review would would have done your effort and Leica's

more justice.

 

<p>

 

 

"M3 cameras from 1954 are still functioning perfectly after more than

50 years of use."

 

<p>

 

- Duhh..LMAO...getting a bit ahead of ourselves here Erwin!!

 

<p>

 

 

"...the silent, slow moving, vibration free horizontally running

cloth shutter."

 

<p>

 

- Since when was the Leica shutter silent? It sounds cool, but my M2

is much noisier than my Rolleflex. About the same as my EOS 50 just

to me a nicer sound.

 

<p>

 

"This speed must be forced to zero and compares to the force of a car

crashing into a wall with 70km/hour."

 

<p>

 

-Except the mass is a little less, so actually ..no.

 

<p>

 

 

"Presumably the engineers had no idea how difficult this simple

decision would be in the real world of engineering mechanics and

electronics. The M7 was targeted for Photokina 2000, but marketing

wishes have no precedence over sound engineering requirements."

 

<p>

 

- I didn't realize Leica had an engineering staff large enough to

completely separate design engineers from production engineers. Both

of your statements sound seriously detached from reality, and an

insult to Leica's excellent engineers.

 

<p>

 

"we should note that with ISO100 film and a blazing sun, we need

1/1000 and f/5.6 for a correct exposure. That will do for most

situations and subjects. If you wish to use a narrow depth of field

that you get when using f/2.8 or f/2.0, even 1/4000 will not be of

much help."

 

<p>

 

- Duhh...1/1000@f5.6 = 1/4000@f2.8

 

<p>

 

"Take pictures with an M6 and then switch to Konica Hexar

RF or Contax G2. You will have a long period of adjustment and a

steep learning curve to change your way of picture taking."

 

<p>

 

- Not crediting your readers with much intelligence are we? Hands up

how many Leica owners also have an AF SLR, maybe some MF cameras.

 

<p>

 

 

"The Hexar RF...<snip>...The lineup of lenses is small...)"

 

<p>

 

- Yep, exactly the same size as the pool of lenses which fit the M7.

Big advantage for the M7?

Steve, good decision, the move to digital light room gave my

photography a huge boost, mostly as you a not restricted to a certain

length of time (like minimum 4 hours) to be productive.

 

<p>

 

Get one of the new Nikon scanners with ICE and GEM, batch scanning,

and software which does histograms (the Nikon software does). I

didn't due budget but it was false economy, as manually scanning

every frame then spotting, and trying to correct color is a big time

waster.

 

<p>

 

If you only shoot B&W then you can forget ICE with convention films.

I have a Rolleiflex T with the built in light meter, but wouldn't bother trying to set ISO. The light meter does a pretty good job of indicating if it is night or day, but is otherwise pretty worthless. A decent handheld incident / reflected light meter is much more accurate.

Luther,

 

<p>

 

One more thing to my previous post: rereading it I think I came

across as too negative. Since moving to the hybid film/digital

workflow from the temporary darkroom set up in the family bathroom I,

have gone from <20 films in a good year to around 90 last year. It

has given me a huge sustain motivation boost. The Workflow learning

curve has been long and steep, but if you enjoy learning, and

computors...

 

<p>

 

As Robin pointed out, I have to scan whole rows as I just get my negs

developed and I need to scan them to proof. If you get a good scanner

with a Dmax great enough to look into your slides shadows and pull

out the info, you can keep shooting slides and just scan those you

want to print. You should probably make the change to an E-6 slide

film, as this is what scanners are optimized for (But don't you love

those funky weird Kodachrome greens).

 

<p>

 

It doesn't sound like your budget is too tight, so I would recommend

you invest in the best scanner you can. Printers are very cheap as

the manufacturers know they can take you to the cleaners for the

consumables.

 

<p>

 

PC's and ram are so cheap, that anything below 1 Ghz machine with

512mb makes no sense, and such a machine can be put together cheaply.

Luther,

 

<p>

 

I use a $400 Minolta Dual Scan (Low end discontinued 2400dpi Film

Scanner) and a $200 Epson 870 with PS5.5 on my Celeron 450 and 200mb

ram.

 

<p>

 

My experience is that slides require a much better scanner due to

their greater contrast range. I used Sensia for a while to avoid the

need for a proof sheet, but my scanner blows out all highlight while

blocking up shadows. Nasty look. Supra 100 scans quite well on mine.

Kodachrome has a reutation of being quirky to scan. Dmax of the

scanner is very important. The top Nikons seem to get good reviews.

 

<p>

 

Scanning is a pain. If Digital ICE works on Kodachromes (???) get a

scanner which supports it. Spotting dust in photoshop is easier than

in a darkroom, but gets old really fast.

 

<p>

 

Resolution of the scanner is not as important as Dmax and noise. Who

cares how many DPI you have in blocked up, noisy shadows. The whole

film/developing/scanning/color correcting workflow is suboptimal

compared to shooting digital, but since you already have the images,

a good scanner with high Dmax and ice will save you hundreds, if not

thousands of hours over the next few years, what is this time worth

to you? Same goes for batch scanning.

 

<p>

 

I find the noise (looks like monet painted my scans, the blue sky

made of a mosaic of color) has me resampling my images down and

printing most at 5x8" or smaller. You can see how many feel a D30

pixel is easily worth two scanned 35mm pixels as it is so clean.

 

<p>

 

I have to manually advance to each photo. A 36 film takes 2 hours to

scan. A 50 slide bulk loader for nikon allows you to set it up for

max resolution and color depth multi pass scans and go to bed.

 

<p>

 

For scanner software I use Hamrick Vuescan, as Minolta's was a joke.

It is good, but the Nikon SW shows Histograms, and allows white point

selection. Vuescan has an excellent proofsheet function.

 

<p>

 

I have only used Photoshop. It is the industry standard for a reason.

Obviously the celeron grunts a bit, especially when stitching up a

100mb panarama. Any 1Ghz Athlon or PIII with a half Gig of Ram should

chomp through 35mm photos fast enough for a hobbiest. You can't have

too much ram. An IDE raid 0 set up would speed up the loading a fair

bit, and can be done in software with WIN2000.

 

<p>

 

I have a HP CD burner which seems a good way to archive, allowing me

to keep the drive mostly empty (Photoshop uses a scratch disk a lot,

especially with only 200mb so I need to defrag regularly). DVD ram

will be even better but first they need to decide on one of the

current four formats, and drop the price.

 

<p>

 

The Epson 8** and 12** printers are good. In comparision with the B&W

darkroom I had before, a printer has a certain resolution limit

(about 360ppi of input at the 1440dpi printing resolution on the

870). Small photos don't have that bite that a good small

conventional print have (the ultimate being a contact print). The

bigger you print on the inkjet, the better they look up to the limit

of your photos resolution. I use Epson inks and Papers, and it is all

bloody expensive, but these photo printers are design with a system

approach to ink hardware and paper.

 

<p>

 

My overall feeling is that the control this system allows exceeds the

limitations of the low end scanner and inkjet printer. A good custom

print from the neg could be better, but the control is lost and is

even more expensive. Machine prints from the neg have worst clipped

dynamic range and screwy colors (no control) although the resolution

is better if you look closely. 8x10 was always enough for me in the

Darkroom also. To do justice to the resolution and color rendition of

your Leica you will need to invest more than I did, especially in the

scanner.

 

<p>

 

It has taken me a year (about 85 rolls of 36), 5 different films, and

4 1/2 filled photo albums to get a work flow which gives me my

current results. I feel I still have a ways to go to get consistant

color correction.

 

<p>

 

Unless you are willing to climb a steep and long learning curve (you

basically need to learn a big portion of the graphic artists job),

you may be better off getting your favourite slides custom printed on

a Fuji frontier machine, working with the operator to get the look

you want, expensive per print, but so is doing it yourself if you

ever accurately added it up (scary concept).

 

<p>

 

For the web, 600x400 50kb jpgs (bigger is going to be a pain for

others), almost anything including the slide adaptor equiped flatbed

will do a decent job. When you resample a 1800x1200+dpi scan down to

600x400 and add a little USM it doesn't even need to be a sharp

original to look really sharp on screen.

 

<p>

 

As soon as I can afford a Canon 4mp+ digital camera with a near full

frame sensor and decent AF (~2004) I will stop this scanning

nonsense. If you want a digital image anywhere in the workflow, it

makes a lot more sense to let the camera generate them in real time.

 

<p>

 

 

My 62 M2 was bought in very ugly condition in 96.

 

<p>

 

It stank of cigar smoke for about the first year I had it.

It has the following faults I have been meaning to get fixed:

Rotating RH strap lug (both are nearly worn through)

Vulcanite is chipping off.

Light leaks from baseplate (that was fixed with a little matt black

paint)

RF frames are weak on the LH side.

Erratic slow shutter speeds.

All speeds at least 1/2 stops slow.

Big dent (outwards) in top case from being dropped on the rewind knob)

Medium dent above RH strap lug.

Medium dent in bottom plate edge. Otherwise the bottom plate has too

little wear to have been original on this camera.

Untold smaller scratchs and dents all over.

Paint on back door frame mostly gone.

Low contrast, dusty RF.

Frame line selecting cam worn (but all three still select properly -

just)

RF Cam follower was not rotating when I got it - a touch of light

machine fixed that.

 

<p>

 

The Seventies 50/2 Black:

Worn focus cam.

Focus ring fees like it slips if turned rapidly.

Aperture ring rotates too freely for my taste.

The red dot is missing.

 

<p>

 

I am torn between getting it CLA / Repaired, and thinking that it

isn't worth investing in. Except the Lens produces that look....

http://www.2pics.de/2pics/drf/gbf2_e.htm

 

<p>

 

I ran a search on Photo.net, and it turned up a link to this guys

site.

Jeff you don't say if your summilux was bought new (being the latest

model I guess so). If it was well used, the focus cam in the back of

the lens may be worn. This is the case on my 70's black summicron, a

ridge can be seen at the the end of the cam. It can be corrected

during a CLA.

The M body could be the ultimate digital camera. It's strengths are

the rangefinder, the build quality and the glass. The quiet shutter

would be quieter if there was no shutter. If no batteries is

important you can still have a film body as a backup.

 

<p>

 

The rangefinder is almost completely self-contained in the top plate,

leaving all the rest of the body volume for the sensor, battery,

drive bay, circuit cards, and back LCD. Here is a camera which solves

one limitation of digital SLR's, that the LCD only displays the image

after the shot. This would also offer two options, rangefinder

viewing with its inherent focussing accuracy, or LCD viewing with

accurate framing.

 

<p>

 

Film is only a different kind of sensor. Good lenses perform better

than poor lenses in front of any sensor. You need a very good sensor

to challenge the sharpness of a summicron, but there are plenty of

poeple using T-MAX 3200 handheld with Leica, because sharpness isn't

everything. They still benefit from low distortion, contrast, low

light fall off, and that look (bokeh). If you bolt your M to a heavy

tripod and shoot Tech pan, you will have to wait a little longer for

your digital sensor.

 

<p>

 

You don't have to use the LCD if you dont want to.

 

<p>

 

The number of images on a CF card is a much smaller limitation than

film. Today 1 GB microdrives will store a couple of hundred 6mp

images. Remember what a 1 Gb hardrive for your PC cost 10 years ago.

Project what a 40Gb CF card will cost in 2011! Film comes in 24 or

36 exposure rolls last I looked, bulk load it and you might squeeze

forty images on the roll.

 

<p>

 

If your preferred work flow is shoot Velvia or Techpan and pour over

images on a light table through a 10x loupe to the tiny hard core of

like minded "Photographers" then you will be able to boast of "better

quality" images until CMOS, and CCD sensors of maybe 10mp become

available. Replacing a slide show is not so easy.

 

<p>

 

If you final product is a color print which normal people will

appreciate, todays 6mp sensors are already competitive on quality.

Film has improved continually, but look at the rate of improvement in

sensors and regardless how high your standards are, the curves will

cross somewhere this decade.

 

<p>

 

I agree that a full frame sensor is desirable. More so on the Leica

M, as wide angles are the heart of the system.

 

<p>

 

The non-retrofocus design of the M lens line up could give sensor

manufacturers differculties due to the angle of light falling on the

sensor.

 

<p>

 

The cost question can be answered by taking a look at your film

processing costs. If you shoot a couple of hundred rolls of Velvia a

year, a $7000 digital body is pretty easy to justify. But look at the

price curve for pro digital cameras. The M shutter has to be an

expensive item to produce. Full frame sensors will just keep getting

better and cheaper.

 

<p>

 

If you bulk load Tri-x, and love your darkroom, enjoy the glut of

cheap top quality darkroom gear flooding the second hand market.

 

<p>

 

If you prefer the workflow of film/darkroom, this will always remain

a valid process, capable of images of breathtaking beauty, but a cost

effective light jet printer which can expose conventional B&W papers

will be a final nail which will close all talk of "quality"

and "better".

 

<p>

 

I hope Leica doesn't rush in and built some half-arsed M body based

on the first full format sensor on the market. Having sat out AF and

various other advances, they should wait until someone builds a

really killer quality, low energy sensor, and then stun the world

with a great M7. If Cosina doesn't beat them to it.

I have an M2 with this style lever, and before fitting one to a mint

camera, be farwarned that it will beat dents into the shutter speed

dial.

Five years ago I paid $680 for my really mongrel M2 with a good black

70's summicron, so the M3 deal you have been offered is a really

winner. The lens is great.

Expat Kiwi living in Vienna.

Airline propulsion engineer.

Is this the set of three lens (I thought they were called rolleinar - mine are)

 

There are two identical close up lenses, one for taking, one for viewing. The third lens is a prism which you mount on the viewing lens, this looks down slightly to correct for paralax close in.

I have a really mongrel M2 with a 70's black summicron. To give you

an idea what to look for ,here are the faults mine has:

Lens...

Lens focus cam worn, does not align at infinity.

Missing red dot.

Friction change if you focus fast (feels like it slips but doesn't)

Kind of loose aperture ring.

Oil on aperture blades.

A couple of flecks of paint inside are loose.

Body....

Multiple drop wounds (top dented out where it has been dropped on

rewind knob is the worst of 5 different decent dents).

Dents in shutter speed dial from the wind lever.

Wind lever a little wobbly.

Leatherette falling off.

One strap lug rotates.

Worn lens length cam follower (a 35mm lens only just brings up it's

frame line - lucky I don't have one :)

Weak LH frame line.

Dirty RF.

Cloudy RF.

All shutter speeds slow (at least 1/2 stop)

Slow shutter speeds rather random.

 

<p>

 

As the lens glass is still clean, it takes the sharpest photo's of

any camera I have ever owned. I keep meaning to have it CLA's, but

the body probably isn't worth it. The M2 you are looking at sounds

like it will last forever.

I'm in Austria, and at present we europeans can really benefit from

the weak erup to get great prices on ebay. I sold my 28-80L that way,

I did what you are thinking of. I got a beat up M2 and 50 summicron.

They are wonderful, but I ended up buying an EOS 50 with 28/85 and 28-

105 lenses plus flash. The Leica is great, especially the lens, but

rather inflexible.

 

<p>

 

Do you like your current nikon glass? If you are happy with it, buy a

used FM.

Canon T50. My own fault, I was 16 and traded a perfectly good Pentax S1a for it. A point and shoot that takes FD lenses. I hear they became popular with skydivers. Figures :)

You are a professional photographer. If things work out, you might

get famous, in which case the very rare Black M4 becomes a very very

rare, black M4 once owned by Eric Laurence.

 

<p>

 

Think of how much poorer the camera collecting world would be if

David Douglas Duncan hadn't got Leica to engrave his black M4's.

 

<p>

 

It is your duty to do this, to give future generations of camera

collectors something to lust after. (After they have retrieved Neil

Armstrong's Hasselblad :)

I have only the 50/2 for my M2 an feel the same. Just having one lens

cut the whole descion making process of and forces you to just do the

best (it is supprising whole little this limits you).

I use a crappy, uncoated, no name, close up filter on my Canon 28-105/3.5-4.5 for the occasions I need close ups at work. This is certainly a light convenient way of getting close. My results are far better than than the really crappy Mavica pictures the technicians normally supply.

 

Usings a better two element, coated close up lens like the 6T, and stopping well down (which you do anyway) should give pretty good results. Obviously a compromise, but only you can say whether this is acceptable for this job.

 

I was suprised how well the 550EX (roughly the equivelent of your SB-28) lit this. Front on flash with the head at the -5° down setting. Manual 1/125@f11, flash on ETTL.<div></div>

I use an EOS 50 and M2. I use the M as a carry everywhere, iso 400

B&W machine with just the summicron 50. I don't see much point in

weighing down the Leica with a bunch of lenses and accessories. For

that I have the Canon (or Rolleiflex, or Horizon, or 4x5)

 

I use the Canon with 100iso color film and use the flash a lot (maybe

80% of shots). For this I have a 28-105, 85/1.8 and 28/1.8. I

disagree with the comment on the quality of the 28-105, I think is is

a great snap shot lens, but certainly nothing like the summicron. My

wife likes the convenience of the zoom.

Either - The functionality of the nikon FM3 (hybrid

electronic/mechanical shutter) aperture priority AE + manual, TTL

flash, 1/250 sync, back loading. Canon has had a hybrid shutter since

the F-1n so it is long overdue. This will probably not happen.

 

<p>

 

Or- Digital M! same rangefinder, full frame 6 megapixel sensor, back

LCD, CF II, similar energy consumption as Canon D30, Av AE + metered

manual, TTL Flash, sync at all speeds, same size as leica III. As

there are no linkage constraints here, except the rangefinder, and no

shutter required, you have the whole body to put the electronics. The

battery could easily fit in the space left by the film canister (this

could be bottom loading :)

I Also have the 550ex on an EOS 50. The flash is probably the best

accessory I have ever bought. The best thing I did was to make a

bouncer out of white card which I attach to the flash with a rubber

band. Looks stupid, but fills in the neanderthal brow look that

straight ceiling bounce gives.