[Leica] Back from Yellowstone

[pklein at 2alpha.net (Peter Klein)]

All: Last night I returned from a vacation at Yellowstone National Park. I 
used the M8 exclusively. It performed beautifully. I'll be posting some 
pictures soon, but I like what I looked at quickly as I downloaded the 
cards.  The M8's detail still astounds me sometimes.

The only major problems I had were spots on the sensor, and dynamic range. 
Most of the spots succumbed to a combination of a rubber bulb powered air 
blower, Arctic Butterfly brush and sensor swabs. I'm at around shot 
#2,000, so I'm probably getting to the end of the shutter lubricant 
shedding cycle. No fun cleaning your sensor in a hotel room at night when 
the other occupant of the room would really rather sleep!

Dynamic range: Yellowstone is often like beach or snow scenes, with a lot 
of bright gray silica deposits shining in the high-altitude sun. I used a 
spot meter sometimes, and found a basic exposure that worked most of the 
day.  The quickest thing to do was to take a shot, chimp the histogram, 
and shoot again if need be.  Sometimes, when there were shiny clouds and a 
dark, shadowed subject in the same picture, I had to choose whether to 
blow the clouds or lose the subject.  Seven full stops is a lot to ask, 
even of the M8.

I used the 35/1.4 Asph and 50/2 Leica lenses, plus VC 28/3.5 and 90/3.5. I 
debated bringing the 50, but decided to try it, and found that it was my 
second-most used lens, after the 35/1.4.  The 35's equivalent 
magnification of 47mm actually lets it stand in for both a 50 and a 35 at 
times, and the 50 is actually a bit of a telephoto, not quite a 75, but 
almost.  The discontinued VC 28/3.5 is a wonderful lens.

I hand-coded my 35/1.4, used a Milich adapter on the 28/3.5, and did not 
code the 50 or 90.  All's well.

The One That Got Away:

Here's one way that the film is superior to digital. If you use a soft 
release, the consequences of forgetting to shut the M8 off before storing 
it in the bag are far worse than with film.

With film, you lose one frame if the shutter gets tripped in the bag. 
With the M8, If you don't you can end up shooting blank frames and filling 
up your SD card. I lost a really nice eye-to-eye shot of a buffalo (bison) 
walking right past my car window at Yellowstone National Park last week.

It was the first photo of the day.  I had Mr. Buffalo's eye in focus, I 
pressed the shutter, nothing happened.  Looked at my "frames left" 
indicator.  It read zero.  Odd, it read 14 last night.  Muttered a few 
choice phrases of Anglo-Saxon origin, changed card,  When I got home, I 
discovered 14 black frames at the end of the card's file list.

Some people have fish stories.  I have a buffalo story.  :D

--Peter