tested and happy

[Godfrey DiGiorgi <ramarren@apple.com>]

I spent the last week and a half using up the 36 shot roll in the M4-P.
Funny how as I've gotten older, I take few and fewer exposures with my
cameras yet have more and more decent pictures. I'll have to buy some
bulk film and wind up a batch of 10 shot rolls as I tend nowadays to shoot
only 6-8 pictures on an outing.

Anyway, I remembered in the course of the last day's shooting that I dropped
and broke two of my filters (and Heliopan filters at that... sigh). Just
clumsy. So I packed up the camera and lenses and trundled down to K&S to
see if they had any filters in stock.

I was shocked when I walked in the door at the huge crowd there. Anniversary
sale or summat. Hmm, 20% off on Domke bags ... and there's the one I've wanted,
think I'll nip that one up. They only had one of the filters I wanted, oh
well, so I ended up with a nice new bag and one of the three filters I wanted
to buy and it only cost me $100 or so. Yeah, there are cheaper filters but I
can't see the point of spending all that money on nice Leica optics and then
putting a crap piece of glass on the front of them.

The Leica rep was there with his testing rig so I figured now's the time to
test the shutter and rangefinder, aperture mechanisms for any problems.
The test apparatus was really neat, nice small and compact, and he ran
all the equipment with it. Shutter variance from the marked speeds was a
maximum of .2 stop, only at two speeds, the rest were dead on. So was the
rangefinder -- dead on the money. All the lenses checked out perfect on
optical alignment and aperture operation. I was smilin'.

Dear Fred, I kinda agree with you (all my equipment was bought used and while
it cost me what I think is a bundle, the whole kit was less than half what
I hear some folks talking about for one zoom lens!) -- these are cameras
to take pictures with, not to coo and coddle and trade as collectibles for me.
However, I also bought it because I like it more than I needed it, I think
a lot of other folks do the same. Whatever turns you on, and whatever you
can afford. I do believe I can see a difference, even in cheap 4x6 machine
prints, but I notice the difference when I do a rare 16x20 print.

Let's all just follow Bill and Ted's advice: "Party on and be excellent
to one another." ]'-)

Godfrey
  'Oh Lord won't you buy me
   a SuperWide C
   My friends all shoot Leicas
   and Rolleis, poor me ... '
       with apologies to Janis