[Leica] Off topic issues, the demise of film, and autofocus.

[Tom Bryant <tbryant@pars5.gsfc.nasa.gov>]

Hi Luggers,


     The discussions are getting interesting, and so I have to chime in with
my 2 cents.

     On Off Topic Topics.

     Generally, I love 'em.  From Porsches to single malt scotch (I'm
wondering what everyone else drinks [I have a small collection, myself]), to
neat bicycles, to industry rumors, in general I enjoy the discussion.  I've
even followed some of the autofocus ranting with humor.  The political rants,
fortunately few and far between, I can do without.

     On the demise of film.

     I don't think so.  You'll need to be able to download about 26MB per
second to pull the image off of a 24 x 36 color CCD that just gives 24 bit
color and 100 pixels per mm in a second.  To surpass 35mm fine grained color
film, you'll need to at least triple this figure.  Assuming that you can
build such a large chip in the first place.  This is pretty serious (read
expensive) technology that is most likely a couple of decades off.  

    Note that the motor drive fanciers in this group don't think much about a
1 frame per second frame rate.  It'll be a long time before 35mm film has gone
the way of vinyl records.  Digital just isn't there yet.  For newspaper work,
where images are about computer screen quality, it's there.  Not for the rest
of us, not yet.  It'll get there.

    Once it's been developed, some enterprising chipmaker will realize that
there are several billion 35mm cameras that need little modification to accept
a CCD back.  Obviously what Leitz had in mind when they designed the hinged
back on the M series cameras. :-)

    On Autofocus:

    I'm a manual sort of guy, and I have 30 years of trying to get it right
behind me.  I recently bought a "travel" camera, an Olympus Stylus, and it's
got a very sharp lens.  It's also as confusing to use as a VCR, if you want to
get into doing fancy flash modes.  

    Autofocus takes practice.  Just like manual.  My daughter tried to get a
shot of a dog jumping for food.  She clicked the camera at the peak of the
dog's jump, but by the time the shutter finally went off, all 4 legs were on
the ground and the moment was long gone.  You have to learn how to lock the
focus, and it's different on different cameras.

   We tried to get a shot of our horny lovebird trying to entice a cockatiel in
his cage, which was quite a sight.  The Autofocus got terribly confused, it
couldn't figure out whether to focus on the bird, the bars of the cage, or the
wall behind it.  We finally got a shot by locking the focus on something else,
and then shooting the birds.  

   My Leica M3 did much better, but following the quickly dancing birds was
difficult.  I finally caught on to just moving the camera back and forth.
This was much faster, but all throughout this exercise, I was thinking how
easily my eyes were locking on to the subject and correcting focus, almost
instantaneously and without much conscious effort on my part.  

   Autofocus might be neat, as are rangefinders, but our technology has a
long way to go before it beats the good old mark 1 eyeball.

   I suppose that for some sporting events, like soccer, autofocus and a good,
fast zoom would be the equipment of choice.  For a total grab shot, from
closed up camera to exposure in the shortest amount of time, the Stylus is
amazingly fast.  For the best overall images, I prefer my M3s (surprise,
surprise!)