[Leica] RE: The priest the professor and the engineer

["Jonathan Borden" <jborden@mediaone.net>]

Kotsinadelis, Peter (Peter) wrote:
>
>
> I would think one would buy the equipment that allows one to
> create the art
> of a photograph.
> A sharp lens will not produce a great image, only a photographer
> can do this
> regardless of what toll they use.  Personally, I would rather see an HCB,
> Avedon, or other image taken by a Brownie that one by a artistic
> illiterate
> taken with a very expensive Leica.
>
> Peter K
>
But that is not at all the point, who you would rather view a photograph
taken by. If it were then the modern Leica would be hardly relevent, perhaps
the M would be unique as a rangefinder, though it certainly wasn't even this
in its day. The R series would be totally irrelevent, never at all unique.

Indeed I imagine many great and artistic photographs have been taken by the
worst of lenses. I believe the "pictoral school" of photography, popular in
the earlier part of the 20th century had no great need for technical
capabilities of lenses.

Much of the rise of the 35mm camera in contrast to large format has been due
to the very fact that the high lens quality allowed much smaller film area
to be used in certain circumstances.

E. Leitz never ran an "art school", it was a fine optics/engineering firm as
was Wild-Heerbrug. Zeiss et al. then same. Much of Leitz' early business was
in the area of microscopy, indeed closely tied to scientific not artistic
endeavors. This is not to minimise the artistic contributions of
photographers (nor scientists for that matter), but if one does in fact wish
to "evaluate" camera systems or lenses prior to plunking down several
thousand (or several hundred) dollars, there are several ways of doing so:

***1) Choose a religion and ask the applicable priest which camera/lens to
use.
****2) Measure the lens in a scientific fashion and compare the results.

Jonathan Borden

*** If you haven't yet guessed, HCB and AA are high priests.
**** The famous Leitz/Zeiss designers are also high priests.