Re: [Leica] battery dependance

[Byron Rakitzis <leica@rakitzis.com>]

> Several of you keep mentioning battery dependance as a kiss of death 
> for a camera. Cameras are film dependent too, but you bring extra, 
> don't you?

[...]

> What's the big deal?

Sorry to chip in to such a tired old topic, but I want to have my say.
You may, however, wish to check the archives since this has been discussed
MANY times here and on other photography forums.

Here's my reason:

Mechanical cameras tend to fail gracefully. If the meter on my M6 goes,
I can use it a guess-to-matic only camera, or with a handheld meter. This
isn't only if the battery goes, but if there is a short anywhere else
in the circuitry.

This isn't just a theoretical concern for me. This has bitten me twice so
far: with a Nikon F3 and an Olympus OM4.  Both have had their metering
circuits fail, and both were therefore usable only on the mechanical
backup shutter speed.

The best you can say about this situation is that both these cameras
have manual film transport and one emergency shutter speed (the sync
speed plus B) so they are still usable in this half-broken fashion.

Nevertheless in the intervening years I've gone away from Olympus and
the Nikon I use now is an old F2 with a plain prism. And guess what,
it just keeps on going. It's an ugly thing, to be sure, and by today's
standards the shutter is laughably crude and slow and loud. But it keeps
working and working.

Why do you think Nikon still puts rewind cranks on their pro bodies?
It's because they recognize that at some level there has to be a way to
fish out the film which isn't dependent on electricity.

Byron.