[Leica] One history of Leica Obsession

[Mike Dembinski <mdembin@it.com.pl>]

Date: Tue, 20 Oct 1998 22:08:21 +0200
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
From: Mike Dembinski <mdembin@it.com.pl>
Subject: Anatomy of Leica obsession
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Having been introduced to LUG and the like-minded fellowship of Leica
obsessives, I'd like if I may to share with you the feelings of Leicosity.

My introduction to photography began with the purchase in 1979 of a Zenit
TTL in Olsztyn, Poland. I recall the (mal)odour of its (n)ever ready case
and its ham-fisted construction. I sold it in England for a vast profit,
which helped me buy a Nikon EM, huge improvement over the Zenit.
Black-and-white interested me from the beginning; a Zenit UPA-5 enlarger
turned out reasonable prints for a beginner. And colour slides. I did those
too.

I would have been happy with this black plastic SLR, it took reasonable
snaps with its Nikon E-series lens, good enough to enlarge to 10x8 or to
project onto a screen. I bought a 28mm lens, a 135mm lens and for a while
was blissfully satisfied in the innocence that was Early Photography.

Until, that is, my friend Stan showed me his father's Zorki I (Leica II
copy). I was thrilled with its density - it was so heavy for its size, its
little windows, knurled knobs, the lens that you popped out, the very idea
of it was just so much more *pure* than my modern Japanese auto-exposure
only camera...

At around this time I began looking into camera shop windows. I began
lusting after *cameras* for their own sake. In the window of City Camera
Exchange (Waterloo) I saw a camera called a 'Leeka' (had no idea how to
pronounce it then) which cost like 200 pounds... second hand... and it
didn't even have an auto exposure mode... or even a light meter... and it
was not an SLR. In those days, a Canon A1 body cost about the same and had
three auto exposure modes, took damn good optics and was Respected be
Anyone Who Knew as a Top Class Camera.

In October 1980 I started a journalism course at London's City University,
a nearby library had good photography books. There I found a copy of Gianni
Rogliatti's 'Leica The First Fifty Years'. Now I was hooked. Weeks later I
bought my first Leica, a IIIb with a rather ropy Summar, which I soon
traded in for a 3.5cm Elmar.

I had reached a threshold on my mystic path. Pictures were harder to take,
but required more thought. I had but one lens; I learned to get closer to
the subject; "Two rules in photography: One. Get Close. Two: Get closer
still." (who's quote?) The little Leica's small size and unobtrusiveness
allowed to me to take it everywhere and learn about street shooting using
depth of field. One day at Paddington Station, an old gent came up to me.
'Leica, eh? the best.' I was still a student and this meant loads to me.
"I'll tell you how to get correct exposures without a meter. Say you have
100 asa film. Set shutter to 1/100. Bright day use f16. Slightly cloudy f8.
Overcast: f4. Just remember to set the shutter to the reciprocal of the
film speed and adjust accordingly..." So the Weston Master IV had to be
relied on less and less.

One day I found an old 1960s copy of Leica Fotografie, in German. There
inside was a picture of "Leicamann". A guy with an M-2, demonstrating how
to hold the camera vertically. That had me sold. I wanted to be Leicamann.
Urbane, cosmopolitan, several notches above the photoproletarians with
their Chinons and Cosinas with add-on motordrives, zooms and cheap
hammerhead flashguns. I then realised I had become a camera snob. Not for
me was impressing the unsophisticated.  I wanted to impress the cognoscenti.

A year past, into my first job. I found an M2, battered, brassy but usable
for 125 pounds in North London.  Months elapsed before I could afford a
lens for it. A 35mm Summicron M-from-screw conversion.  150 pounds at City
Camera Exchange (Waterloo) New Year sale.

Now I was in business. I took some of my best stuff with that camera and
lens, b&w of people out and about, documentary pics of elderly Poles living
in Britain, landscapes, transport themes, all developed and printed at home
in my darkroom (Gamer enlarger, EL-Nikkor 50mm f2.8 lens). Right up to
20x16.

As income became more and more disposable, so the Leica obsession got a
grip. Lenses, yeah, you can justify. But I started buying stuff I didn't
*need* (just *craved*). Like a second body (near-mint M3 S/S) and a third
body (used but useable M4). And last year an M6. One day, in Fox Talbot,
Tottenham Court Road,  I was looking at a used M6. 'Too much'. That very
moment, a guy walked in of the street wanting to sell *his* M6 to Fox
Talbot. The shop assistant offered him 500 pounds less than the price their
M6 was displayed at. I 'pssst'd' the guy, we went outside and I offered him
the chance to split the difference. Next day we did the deal (after I'd
checked his M6 - perfect then, perfect now).

Since then, the M6 is with me on all shoots (my new Minolta TC-1 being with
me EVERY day). The light meter has added a new ease to Leica photography. I
still miss shots through lack of autofocus and autoexposure. But 17 years
with Leica M and much of the process becomes instinctive.

And I have a cheap way to satisfy the equipment craving; I collect old
Soviet rangefinders. Each Sunday, Warsaw plays host to one of Europe's
largest regular camera fairs, the Gielda Fotograficzna at the Stodola.
30,000 sq ft of stands. Upstairs you get the Russians, bringing in all
maner of FEDs, Zorkis, Kievs, all at bargain-basement prices. The going
rate for a Kiev 4 (Contax II copy) is 70 zloties - less than 20 bucks.
Lenses, viewfinders, all there. Incidentally, a mecca for Leica fakes and
forgeries - gold Leicas, Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe Leicas, all mint fakes
made from Zorkis and FEDs.

Good to have got that off my chest and shared it with people who *understand*