So on and Sofort

It might seem strange as a photographic enthusiast, but I’m over cameras. There was a time, when I was working in photographic retail, that I visited DPReview a dozen times a day and was forever pressing F5 on nikonrumors.com, waiting for the rumoured release of a brand new 12 megapixel full frame DSLR.

Not any more.

After selling these products for years and seeing the same people come into the store and purchase mark I, II, III and IV of the same cameras, I realised we had reached the point of diminishing return with digital cameras. Incremental increases in autofocus speed and image quality had not improved the photography of these chumps. All they were getting were larger photos of the same unimaginative crap. For almost all photographers today, the limiting factor is not the camera, but the idiot behind it.

This is why it’s so nice to find a camera which makes me excited to go out and take photos again: the Leica Sofort.

The Leica Sofort is an instant camera that uses Fujifilm’s popular Instax Mini instant film. It is essentially a slightly more brutalist — and more expensive — version of a Fujifilm Instax Mini 90. Why would you go the Leica over the much cheaper Instax? For the same reasons anyone buys a Leica product: because it’s a Leica.

Operation of the camera is straight forward, with a power button, flash and exposure settings on the back, and a lens that offers close range (1–3m) and distance (3m+) settings.

This simplicity makes the Sofort a blast to use.

Travelling overseas recently, I shot around 60 exposures with the Sofort, and part of me thought, in the event of a mugging, I’d much rather lose one of the “real” cameras in my bag than my irreplaceable Sofort frames — don't take that as an invitation!

Instant film allows photographers a different way of seeing. As someone who came into photography at the tail-end of the last instant film era, I can appreciate why the new films and cameras are so popular.

For me, instant film is a sort of visual notebook far more tangible than what can be done with a smartphone and its in-built camera.

The importance of physicality can’t be overstated. My 2 year-old son knows exactly what the Sofort is for. I’ll get the camera out, and before I’ve even turned it on, he’ll be saying “CHEESE!” with the toothiest grin I’ve seen. I’ll never forget his first gasps as the picture developed right before his eyes — a picture of himself. Then I was able to leave a couple of frames on his grandfather’s fridge before we jetted back to Australia. Cue the old man voice saying "you can't do that with digital".

The only slight letdown is the quality of the lens. Yes, I know this is instant photography, but the Sofort isn't cheap and the Leica name is synonymous with extreme glass, so it's sad they sully their good name with cheap plastic. Instax film is very capable when shot with real glass. I can only assume it must have been cheaper for Leica to repurpose the Fuji Instax lens, rather than designing their own. No doubt the inevitable Leica Sofort Super Elmar starting at $599 (plus $299 for the Limited Edition Ostrich Skin Edition) will address some of these issues...

So is the fun of instant photography exclusive to the Leica Sofort? No, of course not. Any Instax camera provides a similar experience — and the larger format Instax Wide looks very enticing — but none does it with the same bold presence as the Leica Sofort. Anyone who truly loves images owes it to themselves to give one of the Instax lineup a try.

A Skeptical Approach to Cameras or: An Ode to the Leica M4-2

Leica M4-2 by Andrew J. Cosgriff via Flickr

Originally published at richardmckenzie.com.au/words

If you've gone hunting for a decent hi-fi setup anytime over the past two decades, chances are you have come across publications such as What Hi-Fi or Stereophile and cooed over their adjective-laden reviews of high-end equipment you've never heard of, "must-have" accessories you'll never have and remastered audiophile albums you don't want to repurchase. These reviewers use the abstract and subjective as if they are measurable and quantifiable values; SI units of auditory measurement if you will. You've already settled for the $899 Panasonic job from JB Hi-Fi, but in the world of high-end hi-fi, dCS, Bryston, Continuum and Audioquest are the names to look out for.

"Audiophile" reviewers wax lyrical about an amplifier's "warmth" and "depth", or the improved "image focus" and increased "coherence" of a $750 USB cable, or a CD player's "righteous sense of musical flow". In this rarified world, it is self-evident that a $1190 RCA interconnect (or audio cable to us mere mortals) will produce "superior detail, clarity, timing precision, and image focus" and that such an exotic product – made from "tellurium-copper alloy" no less – is necessary for the best audio experience.

With seeming full sincerity, a $200,000 turntable is rated as possessing a greater "emotional majesty" that "sings" to the reviewer's heart: "When you hear the music [the turntable] lets escape from the grooves," the reviewer claims, "you, too, will be astounded and swept off your feet".

Except for the tiny problem that the vast majority of these reviews are guff. Non-scientific, non-measurable, emotional guff. While most consumer reviews have embraced the quantifiable and objective to test the efficacy of products (Video Card A runs Game B at 64 FPS; Computer X takes 56 sec to render Video Y), audiophile hi-fi regressed to a pre-scientific world view, preferring untestable subjectivity to measurable objectivity.

In the real world, this is simply not acceptable. A rational person, for instance, wouldn't take a drug because a doctor said it had "a more defined sense of certainty" than another. You would demand evidence of the drug's efficacy in comparison to others before swallowing it. Now, hi-fi might not be a matter of life or death, but many otherwise rational people are all-too willing to swallow the homeopathic audiophile hi-fi pill without thinking.

It was easy for me to laugh at the absurdity of high-end hi-fi's claims. I am a skeptic, and fiercely proud of it...but then I realised I had swallowed similar claims when purchasing my camera...

Leica Virgin

My Leica M4 and Voigtländer VCII Meter

It was 2009 and I was about to purchase my first Leica. Few brands are steeped in the as much myth and legend as Leica. Born in Germany, Leicas are regarded by many as the pinnacle of 35mm photography. As with audiophiles, Leica adherents are renowned for their devotion to the brand despite the many shortcomings of the products. Leica cameras and lenses, so the story goes, possess very special qualities not seen in other cameras. This is not entirely guff; objective measures of image quality often give Leica products close to full marks, but there are other less measurable qualities ascribed to Leica products we should be skeptical of.

When it came time to decide on which Leica M body to purchase, opinions were a dime a dozen, but the consensus from the "experts" was that the German-built Leica M4 was superior to the later Canadian-built M4-2 and M4-P models. Why? Do they hate Canadians? No, because according the experts, the Canadian models were constructed to "looser tolerances". What these tolerances were and how they affect one's photography or the operation of the camera is rarely quantified, but I trusted the "expert" opinion, so I avoided the Canadian models and bought a German-built M4.

With the benefit of experience and hindsight, I can now see the whole pro-German M4 thing as little more than a smear on the good name of the Ernst Leitz Canada (ELCAN) factory and its unbelievably talented staff. The amazing inventions and innovations of the ELCAN staff sadly do not receive their due credit in the history of Leica. ELCAN was pushing the technological boundaries of optics at a time when Leitz Wetzlar was focused on merely financial survival. The ELCAN team, led by legendary optical designer Walter Mandler, designed the very first Noctilux lens, envelope-pushing military lenses, IMAX projection lenses and groundbreaking Panavision optics. This was not some second-rate factory, it was the true innovation centre for Leica in the second half of the 20th century, right up until the early 1990s.

The ELCAN M4-2 and M4-P actually saved the Leica M as a product and possibly Leitz (now Leica) as a company. A bit of history: after the successful M4, Leica released the unloved Leica M5. Although it was the most technically advanced Leica M to date, the M5 was a sales flop that caused Leitz to discontinue the M line and focus on SLRs. That's right, the now iconic Leica M product line was discontinued. After the discontinuation, the folks at ELCAN suggested to German management that they could produce a more economical version of the M4 in Canada. Leitz approved a limited number, but demand was greater than expected, thus the M4-2 was born.

So were there actual problems with the M4-2's more "economical" construction? Well, kind of. Like many new products, there were problems with first batches. The viewfinder was more prone to flare than previous models owing to the removal of a condenser, and some metal and brass parts were replaced with plastic parts. In most cases this substitution made no difference, however some parts were demonstrably less robust than their metallic predecessors. Many of the other cost-saving changes were cosmetic or had little effect on the usability of the camera, such as the stamped Leitz name on the top plate (replacing the engraving of previous models) or the removal of the self-timer (I've used mine once).

What of "looser tolerances"? Production methods did actually change. The time consuming "adjust and fit" method of bespoke production was substituted for a more modern and economical production line mode of manufacture. Thus the tolerance claims are true to a certain extent, although the effect on the final product was minimal. This was a new workforce building a new camera on a new production line and what mistakes they made were quickly rectified. And don't forget that all the tooling to build the M4 was transferred from Wetzlar to Canada – that's no small task so it would be more of a shock if there weren't issues. These cost-cutting measures, practical though they were, add up in some minds to the Leica M4-2 being somehow a "lesser" Leica than the German-built models that preceded it, even though today, a well-kept Canadian M4-2 or M4-P operates just as reliably as any other Leica.

I asked a photographer friend of mine, Andrew Cosgriff for his thoughts on using the Leica M4-2 and the German-built Leica M6: "The truth (for me) was that it still felt like everything a Leica was meant to feel like. You could sit there and wind it all day, because it felt so good. I loved how the M4-2 had absolutely no extraneous features, compared to other cameras I owned, most of which seemed to have a few extra knobs and dials that I never found myself using."

And of the obviously superior German-built M6? Did it feel better because Germany?

"Nope. Winding it on felt just as good, and the meter was a convenience (now, 4 years later, a crutch) rather than a necessity. Both of them are still Leicas, and for me they both exude the qualities we’ve come to expect from that name."

And this is where we should take a moment to step back from inherited opinions that are told and retold enough for them to become fact. A photograph is not only the product of a camera, it's the lens, the chosen medium and most importantly, the person behind the camera. It is highly-unlikely that the camera body will be the weakest link in the process that is photography. Sure, you may be affected by the "cost-cutting" roots of the Leica M4-2, that somehow it's not a "real" Leica, but I would suggest that's more in your head than in the product.

Similarly with hi-fi equipment, the biggest change you can make to improve your audio experience is to fix up your listening environment, not demagnitise your discs and replace all of your audio cables with unobtanium-plated interconnects. Alas, there's no $1400 product to sell to support the moving of speakers a few feet one way or another (although I'm sure there are a few less-scrupulous companies out there willing to give it a try...have you heard of the BS Technology Pro Grip Finger Protectors FAP-1020 that discharge dangerous static before coming into contact with your precious hi-fi equipment?).

Above the din of their scorn, many Leicaphiles forget that without the M4-2 and M4-P, Leica might not exist today. ELCAN designed and produced the finest rangefinder lenses and kept the Leica M line alive at a time when its German parent company wanted little to do with such outmoded technology. Yes, there were differences with the construction of the M4-2 compared to previous models and, yes, some of the changes were designed to cut costs, but a good M4-2 is no less usable than a good M4. Leica's focus on SLRs would eventually falter, with their R SLR cameras never achieving the same prominence (or sales) as the Leica M lineup. Leica finally discontinued the R series in 2009; the M series continues strongly to this day. Had Leica given up entirely on the M, the company probably wouldn't be around today.

The more economic methods of production perfected in Canada informed the creation of the Leica M6 and helped allow production to finally move back to Germany in the 1980s. Today, the Leica M forms the core of a resurgent Leica Camera AG, thanks in large part to the foresight and passion of Leitz workers at the ELCAN factory who kept the iconic rangefinder alive.

I've learned my lesson. Next time, I'll be a bit more skeptical of the received wisdom of the internets, of forum users with 10,000+ posts and of claims without assertions. Had I followed this course of action in 2009, I might have saved myself quite a bit of money. Should I need to replace my M4 for whatever reason, I'll be more than happy to "take the risk" with a Leica M4-2 and ELCAN's wares...just like the US Navy did, just like the US Army did, just like Panavision did, just like IMAX did and just like Leitz did.

--

Thanks to Andrew for his musings on the Leica M4-2 and M6 cameras. You can see more of his awesome photography on Flickr.

The inspiration for this article came, in part, from Peter Johansen's post A Brief Guide to Audio for the Skeptical Consumer on his blog Numeral Nine Music and Audio.

For an overview on the amazing accomplishments of the ELCAN operation, take a look at Ernst Leitz Canada Limited on the LEICA Barnack Berek Blog.

Notes: It is incredibly difficult to find advertising materials for the Leica M4-2. I have a few brochures in my collection for the M4-P, but none for the Leica M4-2. The internet wasn't much help either, I could not find a single digitised ad for the M4-2. Sad face.

A Walk in the (Leitz) Park

Late last year, I was lucky enough to undertake a pilgrimage to one of the holy sites of photography: Leitz Park in Wetzlar. The recently-opened complex is home to state-of-the-art production facilities for Leica Camera, in addition to three other related companies: Leica's cine-focused sister company CW Sonderoptic, parts manufacturers (and Leica suppliers) Weller Feinwerktechnik and Viaoptic. 


Wetzlar is a city imbued with history, but its last 150 years is of most interest to photographers. Along with Oberkochen and Jena, Wetzlar is one Germany's centres of optical engineering. Over the past century, the city was home to names such as Minox, Leidolf, Hensoldt and, of course, Leitz, manufacturer of Leica (a contraction of Leitz Camera).

It was in Wetzlar's Eisenmarkt that Oskar Barnack captured the very first image with his prototype camera, now known as the Ur-Leica. This nondescript single frame captured with the experimental device signalled a new era for photography. The very first Leica brought both portability and quality to photography that had been hitherto lacking.

Leitz was a dominant force in photographics for the first half of the twentieth century, synonymous with ruggedness, quality and the intrepid photojournalist. But in the face of declining sales and financial difficulties, Leitz left Wetzlar in 1988, relocating to the nearby town of Solms.

Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, Leica survived several restructures and near-death experiences to produce a slew of successful products, starting with the Leica M9. The Solms factory was bursting at the seams. A reinvigorated Leica Camera AG returned to its home town with a purpose-built state-of-the-art factory precinct.

I visited Leica's factory in Solms in 2009. That facility looked like a temporary music festival toilet block compared to the cutting-edge facility at Leitz Park. A striking piece of architecture, it is part-showroom, part-gallery, part-factory, all class.

Upon entry, visitors are greeted by a sleek, open space with exhibitions and displays, the mother of all Leica Shops and, naturally, a café. International sales manager Falk Friedrich was kind enough to show me around the facility, providing context to Leica's impressive history.

2014 was an important year for Leica, celebrating 100 years of Leica photography and 60 years of Leica M. Two exhibitions in the wonderful new space highlighted Leica's incomparable contribution as unofficial photographic record-keeper of the twentieth century.

 
Magic Moments - 60 Years Leica M dominated the largest wall. Hung in a lively salon fashion, the exhibition celebrated top-tier Leica M photographs and photographers from the past six decades.

The other, 36 aus 100, shows 36 iconic photographs captured with Leica cameras over the last century. From some of the earliest frames of the Ur-Leica to Eisenstaedt's famous V-J Day, it is a collection of images both iconic and lesser known, all of which convey the Leica gestalt.

One of the key attractions for Leicaphiles is the collection of rare and unusual cameras. Some are owned by Leica themselves, others are on loan from collectors. Although I'd consider myself pretty well-informed in the Leica world, Falk surprised me with some interesting tidbits, such as how sport optics (spotting scopes and binoculars) helped keep the company financially viable during the dark years of the mid-1990s to 2000s.

Amid the rarities, a showcase highlights Leica's milestone products, from the Ur-Leica (a replica is on display, the original reportedly remains locked away in a vault) to the S2. While some milestone products, like the Leica S1, were not big sellers, they helped the company overcome technical hurdles and lay the groundwork for today's successes.


The factory area is where the magic happens. Visitors get a window (literally) into each stage of production, from glass polishing to lens and camera assembly, with an interactive digital interface informing visitors of the various processes. At the time of my visit, the Leica M Edition "Leica 60" camera was on the production line. Very nice!

In this area sits the Leica family tree. Greatly expanded from its Solms rendition, the new family tree features one of almost every camera and lens Leica has ever made. Beginning with the Ur-Leica, the Null-Serie, all the way through to the latest M, X, T & S series cameras, there is a formidable logic and thought to the progression of each Leica model.

While little has changed cosmetically with the M series, new product lines like the sleek Leica T take the best of technology and rethink what is possible. Leica is sometimes criticised for being outmoded, but the T and S series cameras in particular show this is not the case. In fact, these cameras demonstrate a modern design sense completely lacking in many other camera manufacturers.

There is a care and precision evident at Leica that simply doesn't exist in other companies. While it's easy to mock Leica for being "too expensive" or "irrelevant", their products are sublimely designed and built. Their optics are second to none and their cameras and user interfaces actually put the photographer at the centre of the experience. Where mainstream camera manufacturers layer their cameras with a zillion buttons, touch-screens and sub-sub-sub menus, Leica eschews this idiocy with simple and practical design.


I also noticed a distinct pride on the part of Leica's employees, many of whom have been at the company for decades. Some, like product manager Stefan Daniel, have reached the pinnacle of the company after beginning their careers there as teenage apprentices. Leica is a shining example of German Mittelstand enterprises, small-to-medium businesses that account for 70% of employment in the entire country. These small, innovative companies are the heart of the German economy, something other countries could well learn from.

As with all tours, I finished up exiting through the gift shop; however this shop was unlike any other I had visited. The Leica Store Wetzlar offers lenses, Vespas, T-Shirts, books and, naturally, the entire Leica camera range. There is simply nothing else like it anywhere in the world. 


And with that, I bade farewell to Falk, who gifted me a Leica T body shell, the same type that is polished by hand for 45 minutes in the world's most boring ad. I left the warm, glowing warming glow of Leitz Park and stepped out into a grey Hessian day - a little more inspired than when I arrived.

A big thank you to Falk Friedrich for taking the time out to show me around and to Leica Australia for helping organise the tour.  

Travelling with Film, Part II: The Airport

Originally published at richardmckenzie.com.au

[A]irports are sites where identity is confirmed or questioned; they are spaces of public display; they are contested zones where privacy and national security vie for priority; they are complex factories for the production of patriotism and the privilege of mobility. At the same time, airports can be considered as generic spaces, forgettable and often uncomfortable. They are designed to be passed through, and in rapid fashion... 

Christopher Schaberg, The Textual Life of Airports

Travelling with film is not that difficult. However, the airport represents one of the great challenges to a travelling film photographer. If precautions are not taken, standard security screening processes can irreversibly damage unprocessed film. It is in the transition from landside to airside that the performance of modern security theatre can harm our film.

These are the terms of our entry to airports. An acknowledgement that airports offer both incomparable freedom and stringent security. One such security measure is the screening of passenger luggage. While it is intended to keep air travel safe by preventing dangerous items from getting on planes, common screening methods, such as X-ray machines may damage unexposed film. This damage takes the form of "fogging" our film, a bit like opening the back of a camera half way through a roll. Film is sensitive to radiation, of which visible light and X-rays are but two wavelengths.

Fortunately, there is plenty we can do to prevent this from occurring. Here are a few golden rules you can follow to make the film photographer airport experience run as smoothly as possible:

1: NEVER EVER PLACED UNPROCESSED FILM IN CHECKED LUGGAGE

Checked luggage is subject to very intense explosive detecting, space-time warping X-ray screening that will SEVERELY DAMAGE YOUR UNPROCESSED FILM. GUARANTEED. Never, ever leave your unprocessed film in there. 

Processed film is fine to place in check luggage. That said, processed film may be immune to the effects of X-rays, however it is not immune from being sent to Melbourne, FL, instead of Melbourne, Australia. It is highly recommended you keep all processed film on you at all times.

2: ALWAYS place unprocessed film in your hand luggage

Keep your film with you at all times. No, this is not a canned security announcement, it's for the sake your film and irreplaceable images. Hand luggage screening uses a less-intense form of X-rays, meaning your film should be relatively safe. 

Any exposure to X-rays will affect your film, but it won't be visible from only a few passes. According to a 2003 Kodak technical publication, 400 ISO film will start to see some degradation after 6 X-ray scans, but results can vary. Some of my film (up to 800 ISO) went through up to 8 scans over my two months of travel and I've not noticed any degradation.

The higher the speed of your film, the more sensitive it is to all forms of radiation, including X-rays! It's important to note you can request a hand inspection of your film in order to avoid the X-ray machine entirely, but your mileage may vary (see below).

3: ALWAYS place your film in a clear and accessible container/bag

Keep your film accessible at all times. Better yet, don't place it in your carry-on bag, keep it in your hand. A general rule every air traveller should follow is to be prepared for the processes of security before reaching the queue. Don't hold the queue up by fiddling around with a dozen different rolls of film stuck somewhere between your copy of the Robert Ludlum's The Bourne Repetition by Eric Van Lustbader and your boarding passes. Keep your film together and place it separately on the X-ray conveyer.

A few sandwich bags never go astray when travelling

Even after your film gets x-rayed, inquisitive security-types may wish to take a closer look, so keep it accessible. I cheated a bit here and used an opaque Japan Camera Hunter 120 case, but at least it's easy to open for inspection and keeps all the film together. 

I often get asked about my cameras by security staff, although they've usually impressed by the gear. One security guard at Munich Airport took such a liking to my Leica, I was getting a bit concerned. He was a bit confused by an Australian owning a German camera, but he was happy nonetheless. That said, I'm told a Hasselblad and Leica look pretty awesome on X-ray.

4: ASK for a hand inspection of your film, but be prepared to be rebuffed

At most screening points, you can ask for a hand inspection of you film. In theory. In practice, this may not occur. The security staff will usually state that the X-ray machine is "safe" up to 1600 ISO. Alas this doesn't take into account any cumulative X-ray exposure your film may have incurred from prior screenings. 

Be polite, you might get lucky, but will the staff will more likely counter that the machine is "safe" for film. Don't get angry. That won't be good for anyone. Some photographers recommend placing a "dummy" 3200 speed roll in their bag, just so they can justify a hand inspection. Again, not something I've ever done, but has been known to work.

Be aware that asking for a hand inspection of goods may single you out for further forms of "enhanced" screening, such as explosives testing and hand inspection of all your carry-on luggage.

5: UNLOAD your camera before screening

Although this isn't always critical, it is best to travel without loaded cameras. It's never happened to me, but have heard of security staff wishing to inspect the innards of cameras. Best case, you waste part of a roll by having to rewind it to open the camera. Worst case, some clumsy security fool opens your camera for you (rare, but it has reportedly occurred).

6: NEVER use "X-Ray Safe" lead-lined bags for film storage

These foil and lead-lined bags were popular items back in the day, however these days they're, at best, useless. At worst, they will lead to the irreversible damage of your film. These bags theoretically render items contained within opaque to X-ray screeners.

If you were an X-ray operator, would you allow a giant grey blob of mystery through to the gate? Probably not. Best case, the operator asks you to open the bag and inspects the contents, worst case the operator increases the power of the X-ray radiation in order to penetrate the bag. Whoops. Film. Fogged. Pictures. Gone.

7: BE POLITE and do not rage against the (X-ray) machine

Getting angry with security staff will not get you anywhere. Whatever your personal opinions may be on the "security theatre" of the airport, it's a shit job and the security staff are there for the protection of the air-travelling public.

Yes, it's not hard to find evidence of over-zealous officials, but in Australia, the experience seems to be a fairly benign one. Unless you're not white and have Channel 7 camera crews in your face.

It is much better to grin a bear a few minutes of security screening than risk missing your flight.  

I'll have a lot more to write on airports at another time, thanks to the inspiration of The Textual Life of Airports. I'm sure you can't wait.

Continued in Part III - Buying Film and Developing

Travelling with Film, Part I: The Gear

Every roll of film was recorded, along with the camera used, location, date started and date finished (Panasonic Lumix GX7, Leica DG Summilux 15mm, VSCOCam)

First published at richardmckenzie.com.au

61 days, 21 cities, 9 countries, 76 rolls of film.

These were an amazing two months on the road (well, rails more often than not) with all the sights, sounds and intellectual stimulation that only Europe can provide. But when I tell people I shot 76 rolls of film, they give me a puzzled look before saying, "Don't you work in a place that sells digital cameras?"

Why?
Photographing with film this trip was one of the most rewarding experiences I've had. We film photographers often have to justify our continued use of the medium, but the simplicity and pleasure of using my Hasselblad, Leica M4 and Olympus µ[mju:]-II - and the results I achieved - speak for themselves.

First off - and this is a rule most photographers can learn from - the less gear, the better. Photographers often think that more gear=better shots. Maybe, but for most, it's a recipe for empty wallets and vacuous photography. Although three cameras may seem a little bit over the top, they were three very individual cameras, each with a different purpose.

What

Hasselblad 503CX with Zeiss 80mm C T* f/2.8

Hasselblad at the Birkenkopf, Stuttgart (Panasonic Lumix GX7, Leica DG Summilux 15mm, VSCOCam)

I'd never shot 6x6 in Europe, so this was a must-do for me. Paired with the 80mm lens, it allowed me to capture the straight-on architecutral, street and landscape shots I'd so admired in many other photographers, but not been able to make myself.

I only carried one 120 back with me, swapping largely between Kodak Portra 400 and Kodak Tri-X 400.

Leica M4 with Summicron-M 35mm

Leica M4 (and your incidental photographer) at the Birkenkopf, Stuttgart (Panasonic Lumix GX7, Leica DG Summilux 15mm)

My workhorse and my unabashed favourite camera. It's the all-rounder for all situations with the perfect focal-length to match. Many, many words have been written about Leica M rangefinders, but they are discrete, incredibly rugged and very German. This is a good thing.

Like the Hasselblad, I shot primarily Kodak Portra 400 and Kodak Tri-X 400 (with Leitz yellow filter).

Olympus µ[mju:]-II

The MJU is easy to use in all situations, even while smoking with eyes shut (Panasonic Lumix GX7, Leica DG Summilux 15mm)

Another 35mm focal length camera? Yes and don't let its compact size fool you, the results from this camera were stunning. The MJU's purpose was to go in my pocket when I was weighed down by my wife's my luggage in transit and unable to reach the other cameras. It performed this purpose admirably, with its 35mm f/2.8 lens suitable for almost any situation. Its small size and unobtrusiveness makes it the ideal camera to use when you don't want to use a camera.

A Different Point of View

A photo posted by Richard McKenzie (@purplecamel) on Dec 26, 2014 at 4:58am PST

Two focal lengths and three cameras. The paradox is that by limiting choice of equipment, I was freer than ever to concentrate on my photographic vision. I saw the world through the framelines of my leica or the ground glass of my Hasselblad without grabbing either out of my bag. I didn't look at a scene and feel the urge to capture it with a 12-24mm, 24-70mm, 70-200mm and 105mm macro "just in case". It's a trite turn of phrase, but less really is more.

To be continued in PART II - The Airport...

"Das wesentliche"

"The essential" is how Dr. Andreas Kaufmann, chairman of the supervisory board of Leica Camera AG describes the new Leica T Typ 701. After the marketing disaster of the Leica X Vario (which I wrote about last year), Leica made sure not to raise expectations of a "Mini M" or in fact anything like an M rangefinder with their new mirrorless camera.

And that is the right move to make. While the minimalist design of the Leica T fits the German company's historic gestalt, this new camera is arguably the first all-new minimal design the company has made. With the M-series bound strictly to its roots, the X-series to a standard digital camera design and the S-series to a non-mass market, the Leica T has the potential to transform digital camera design in the same way the M3 did to 35mm camera design.

First is its manufacturing process, as detailed here. It is "unibody" just like a MacBook Pro - perhaps this is the camera Apple would make if it were to ressurrect its QuickTake line under Jony Ive - milled from a single block of aluminium, then hand-polished for 45 minutes. You can see the polishing in real-time here.

Now, it may be a while before we see an Olympus or Sony mirrorless camera constructed in the same way, but it does put the possibility out there for a Jony Ive-spired design from Japan at some point in the future.

The Leica T's sleek lines and minimal controls renounce entirely the retrofied designs of mirrorless competitors such as Fujifilm and Olympus (not without irony as it had been noted that Fujifilm's X100 out-Leica'd Leica). This is a great decision, after all if Leica (with Audi Design) had produced a camera that looked like a shrunken M, what would be the point? Leica would be accused of aping Fuji (who in turned had aped Leica) at three times the price. No, Leica's new design breathes life not only into Leica but into the camera design world more generally.

But bigger than the looks is the thing that's on the back of the Leica T Typ 701: a 3.7" LCD Touch Screen. Yes, this is the least shit LCD ever put on a Leica camera. In fact, you might even call it the best, although I hesitate to use such a word when describing Leica's choices in LCDs. Leica is the company that co-invented the 35mm film format, perfected the rangefinder and engineered lenses of perfection. They have now turned their sights to a touch LCD interface - this is either going to be the best thing ever, or terrible and fail miserably. I have a strong feeling it won't be the latter, at least not according to initial reviews.

No Asian camera manufacturer has engineered a touch interface that makes any sense. No Asian camera manufacturer has designed a digital camera interface that makes any sense. The Japanese camera giants have been making the same, terrible cameras for years and hoping their extremely good sensors and electronics would tide them over. Not any more. This is Leica's chance to influence the world of camera design again, by creating a usable touch interface that isn't too far removed from an iOS home screen. Clean, sensible and lots of gradients German. I can't wait to have a play.

The Leica T seems to be all about quality, style and usability. It's also the first new Leica camera in almost 30 years to proudly display "Leica Camera Wetzlar". As with other Leica products, this camera is built and finished superbly, but does not break new ground in its specifications. A 16 megapixel APS-C mirrorless camera can be had for less than $500, but that's not the point. If you were worried about price, you wouldn't have been waiting for Leica's foray into the compact system camera world.

That said, I do find the price the most disappointing feature: AUD$2,300 for the body only, $2,300 for the 18-56mm zoom lens and $2,500 for the 23mm Summicron-T. No, I'm not going to delve into DPReview-style luxury loathing, but to me this is the camera that says Leica has their eyes on joining Cartier and Rolex.

Although Leica's products have always been expensive, the quality of the products coming from the major camera manufacturers is at such a high level now that, given a blind test, you would be struggling to tell whether an image was made with $1000 DSLR kit or a $50,000 medium format kit. Camera businesses are no longer concerned about image quality, but about survival in the smartphone era. Leica has identified one way to survive as making "premium" products and selling them to the wealthy in the west and the burgeoning super elite in China.

Perhaps, as a Leica user, it is sacrilege to say that there is little for an aspiring photographer to see in a Leica that they can't see in a Fujifilm X or a Sony A7. Where, for instance, a Leica M4 offered a size advantage at a price premium over a Nikon F3 in its day, today's mirrorless cameras offer amazing quality at a fraction of the Leica price. Where generations of aspiring photographers were rightly inspired by the workhorse Leica M and its famous users, today's Leica is much more a glitzy piece of extraordinarily well-engineered shoulder candy than photo workhorse.

In an interesting hypothetical, the Online Photographer asked what camera famous photographers of the 20th century would be using if they were alive today. Henri Cartier-Bresson, the post reasoned, would be shooting a Nikon V1 with the 18.5mm lens; Garry Winogrand, a reader argued, a Ricoh GR. Yep, it's hard to see a rarefied photojournalist these days using a Leica for anything but a bit of fun - "personal" work, they usually call it. It's even harder to imagine Robert Capa swimming ashore at Normandy with a Leica T Typ 701 with T-Snap and co-ordinated T-Flap. At least the resulting images, assuming the camera survived, wouldn't have been irreparably damaged in processing.

But I am bashing a straw man. This isn't your granddaddy's Leica. The T Typ 701 is a very latter-day Leica product - outside the box and somewhat contrarian. It'll no doubt be the first in a line of T bodies, perhaps one a bit more like a Leica M will be released at some point, built-in EVF etc. There will inevitably be many critics, but who cares about them? Leica certainly doesn't. And when you're Leica, why should you?

Leica Summicron 50mm Flare Test Review Unboxing Video

Have you ever wondered what would happen if you pointed your 55 year-old lens at the sun? Well, wonder no more. The Leitz Summicron 50mm with near-focusing range is incredibly resistant to flare.

Its resistance to flare is even more obvious when coupled with high-contrast, high-saturation reversal film such as Fujifilm Velvia 50 (RVP50), as demonstrated in the attached photographs. If you can hear yourself over the screams of Walter Mandler, then I highly recommend giving it a shot.

Preferably you should go back in time to steal Steve McCurry's Nikon F6 loaded with the last ever roll of Kodachrome, place the drive mode in C, point the camera at the sun and hold down the shutter button. If this is not possible, just use the most expensive slide film you can find.

It is truly a thing of beauty. Now I know how JJ Abrams felt when he invented the lens flare AND the television serial. There should be no need ever to want anything less than total flarage. In fact, it is possible a number of improvements* could be made to existing photographs.


*Sincere apologies to Dorothea Lange, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Steve McCurry.

"X"-pectations

Leica Camera AG, Solms – © 2009

After two weeks of rumours and leaks, Leica Camera AG has announced the latest addition to their photographic family: the Leica X Vario. The camera builds on Leica's previous X models by taking an APS-C sensor and pairing it with a zoom lens. As Leica's marketing guff is quick to highlight, this makes the X Vario the "world’s only compact camera of its kind", combining a large sensor with a zoom lens. Will semantic wonders never cease?