RE: RE: [Leica] pointless debate about cheap lenses

[Paul Chefurka <Paul_Chefurka@pmc-sierra.com>]

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Bmceowen@aol.com [mailto:Bmceowen@aol.com]
>
>Suffice it to say I reject this analogy.

[snip]

>We are talking the final inth degree of 
>difference here -- 
>not the kind of dramatic differences that separate a cheap 
>zoom lens and a 
>top quality prime lens (or good speakers and cheap speakers). 
>
>Bob (would rather buy 35 CDs than $500 worth of cable) McEowen
>

Count me in that merry band who can hear differences between speaker cables
clear as night through a Noctilux.

On the other hand, I have real trouble discerning differences between
lenses.  On Saturday I was in a used camera shop looking at 'blads, and the
owner was conducting a challenge.  Two sets of three 4x6 B&W prints - one
set shot on a G2 with the 45/2.0, one from an M4P with a 50/2.0 Elcan.  I
was forced to participate because everyone there knew I was a Leica user.
On all three prints I unerringly picked out ... the Contax :-/  The prints
looked identical in all respects except the Contax shots had noticebly
better shadow detail.  Oh the shame...

I must admit I got a bit defensive after that, and engaged in a heated
lecture on how the G2 wasn't really a manual focus camera, and anyway it
didn't have any fast lenses...

For me, subject matter always seems to triumph over lens quality when I look
at pictures, much as performance triumphs over fidelity when a musician
listens to a recording on a hi-fi.  Now, when it comes to the process of
photography I'll take Leica every time, just as when it comes to hi-fi I
prefer SimAudio to Sony.  Whether my choices make any objective difference
to the output in either case is up to objective observers to decide (and I
suspect I already know the answer to that question).

My underlying point in the comment about the Tamron zoom was that in any
pursuit involving connaisseurship fine distinctions get magnified to the
point of becoming blatantly, incontrovertibly obvious to the initiated.
Those same fine distinctions remain unimportant and even imperceptible to
those outside the circle.  Even if most of my friends could tell the
difference in pix taken with an Elph and my 35/2.0 ASPH, it just wouldn't
make enough difference to their lives to be worth the expenditure.  Same
goes for music played through my speaker cables.

Paul (I'll take speaker cables for $1000, Alex) Chefurka