Re: [Leica] Visoflex

["Henning J. Wulff" <henningw@archiphoto.com>]

At 10:57 AM +0000 12/31/99, Mike Johnston wrote:
>Just a brief comment--I wonder if some of the people "discussing" the
>Visoflex have in fact never owned, used, or perhaps even seen one. This
>fascinates me, because I perceive there to be a real difference between
>what intuitively appeals to people and what actually works well.
>Capitalist apologists are fond of saying that the market develops
>exactly the products consumers want, and therefore it's a perfect means
>for getting the ideal kinds of products; but I personally think that the
>market is good at giving up products we THINK we want, before we own or
>use them. IOW, products are perfectly designed to sell, but many
>products with great intuitive sales appeal turn out to be not so great,
>and some truly great products die because too many people make up their
>minds about it based on intuitive appeal before ever actually trying
>them.
>
>It seems odd to me, but American consumers at least tend to collude in
>this arrangement in a strange way; we tend to believe that we CAN make
>up our minds without firsthand experience, i.e., by "shopping the spec
>sheet."
>
>The Visoflex seems an example of something with limited "hands-off" or
>"mind's eye" appeal. However, I'm not aware of hearing much but quite
>admiring comments from people who actually own and use them. I
>personally try to be careful about making up my mind about things I
>haven't actually tried. Of course I still do rush to judgement,
>sometimes--it's tough not to--but it's worth trying to be careful about

I know of a number of people on this list who have used Visoflexes,
including myself. I had a Viso I ('57 vintage) on my Ig for many years,
with lenses up to the 400/5. I got pictures with it, but it wasn't easy at
times. Later I got a Viso III, and have used almost all lenses that were
made for that item. With the 400/6.8 on the front and the M4 body behind,
the Viso felt right, and worked as well as anything. The 6.8 lens was
virtually never stopped down, and the mirror return on the Viso III was
fine. Viewing through the Visoflex with long lenses was always better (in
my experience) than viewing through SLR's with the same lenses, the latter
also having to deal with shorter focal lengths. While the 400 was great,
the use of 200 and shorter lengths was more cumbersome, as they often had
to be stopped down. The 65, while optically magnificent, was the hardest to
use handheld. The lack of stop-down automation is what caused me to
eventually get rid of all Viso stuff. I have one 400 on an SLR now which is
optically way ahead of the 400/6.8, but I am using it less, as it doesn't
handle well. I now tend to use the 100-400IS Canon in this range, even
thought optically it is not as good. The fact that the handling is good,
the autofocus and manual focus work well, and especially the fact that it
has IS make it the lens that brings back the pictures.

Out of all the Viso combinations, the one with the 400/6.8 was the best
(the 560 was too long), but with the Canon IS I can do things that were
impossible with the Viso combinations.

   *            Henning J. Wulff
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