Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/02/12
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Hate to break this to y'all, but there is _no chance_ that any M7 that Leica will build will be a camera that will appeal to the Leica M faithful. No chance whatsoever. The current market forces and the imperatives of salability militate against it too strongly. _Any_ camera they build will be a disappointment, at least to any of you who truly appreciate the virtues of the M. I guarantee this--remember where you heard it, so I don't have to say "I told you so" later on. Meanwhile, keep your M6s and be grateful they exist. Here's what is needed: a camera that retains the traditional operating parameters of the M6, only with modernized implementation that would speed up most set-up (non-shooting) operations and reduce purchase cost, but not complicate or alter shooting operations. I.e., the new camera would be a manual focus rangefinder with a well-built metal body. The modern implementation would include: --swing-open back --built-in motorized film advance --autoloading --auto-rewind on demand --a modern shutter with speeds to 1/4000th and 1/250 flash sync --TTL flash metering --better dust sealing And POSSIBLY aperture-priority exposure automation IN ADDITION to manual exposure, and a self-timer. (I think those of you who are asking for total mechanical operation are simply not taking into account how cameras actually work--besides, we already HAVE a manual Leica M!) But it should ABSOLUTELY retain the traditional virtues of traditonal size and weight, solid construction, SIMPLE control parameters, rangefinder manual focus, floating viewfinder framelines, and quiet operation; and any new camera should be designed for much-improved manufacturability such that it would cost half as much as an M6. We will absolutely not see such a camera. Any new camera will be: more complicated, less direct, with more controls; it will not be as quiet, and it will be more or less just as expensive as the current manual camera, if not more so. Most people who buy cameras don't use them (or don't use them seriously), and these non-, casual, and occasional users constitute the buyers who must be satisfied by a new product. It's not that Leica will get it wrong through ignorance; it's that they _must_ get it wrong (in user's terms) in order to market a salable product that will appeal to today's market. Mark my words. --Mike (Editor, _PHOTO Techniques_ magazine, Chicago) P.S. >>>I am curious? What three lenses and body did HCB use for his landmark work?<<< Cartier usually used whatever was the latest Leica camera body, up to the M6. He usually carried three lenses, a 35mm, a 50mm, and a 90mm. Peope who have studied his contact sheet books (archived at Magnum in Paris and New York) say there is occasionally a shot that looks like it could have been taken with a 90mm, almost never one from the 35mm (Magnum's Erich Hartmann says never even a single 35mm shot). From its introduction, the 50mm lens HCB prefers and uses is the collapsible-mount 50mm Summicron. Virtually all of his work has been done with the 50mm focal length.