Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/10/18
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I do declare, I've had the Leica tinted glasses welded to my eyeballs now! I can see the Glow! I really can! Breathe deep. I took the M6TTL out for a spin on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday was a hot dry day around the Peninsula. It was around 8am when I headed out for breakfast in Pleasanton and I was concentrating on photographing interesting "formal sculptures" like water pipes and such in B&W. Not too much of that, but enough to have some fun. Afterwards I stopped into the local photo shop and tried out an M-Grip ... well, I like the fact that it puts the tripod socket in the middle of the camera, but overall it's not for me. It gets in the way of my right hand, makes the camera bulky without giving me all that much more purchase. That's another $100 I don't need to spend... Buying this system has been an exercise in what NOT to buy rather than the other way around. "Keep it simple." Sunday I headed over to Santa Cruz and to my delight the fog on the wharf was being kind to me. Nice, soft light suffusing everywhere. I exercised all three lenses a bit, finished off the roll of B&W and loaded up some Reala 100 and ran all of that. The M6 is delightful. Loading is a breeze compared to the CL and on par with my old M4-P or any of my other cameras. The rangefinder is much better than the CL's: smoother action of the lenses, more visible image overlay. All the controls, the wind and shutter, operate with a seductive, silky smooth, positive feel that is so right. My choice of the 35/2 ASPH and 90/2.8 has worked out like I'd hoped: they are a very comfortable complementary pair for me, just wide enough and just long enough, just fast enough, not overweight. The Heliar 15 remains very extreme but I think I've finally gotten my first "good" photograph with it ... at some point, I'll want a 21mm lens, but it will have to wait. No reason to rush. The color print film was ready by 2pm and I processed the B&W a little later last night. Oh my. The meter must be darn good because every frame on both rolls is perfectly exposed. The quality of the Leica lenses is evident even in junk-one-hour photofinishing 4x6 prints ... I think I can spy the weak force at work at the subatomic level in there. This is the best photo gear I've bought in many an age: it's exactly what I wanted, it works just exactly the way I was hoping, the lenses are brilliant. My faith in Leica is justified: this equipment will further my photography. Godfrey