Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/09/28
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]This is long, but I have an excuse. Today I became the proud owner of a new M6 TTL chrome 0.72 body to complement my ratty (but trusty) old M4-P. This is the first time I have bought a brand new camera since I got a Yashica FX-D when I was a teenager back in the early eighties, so this was a big step. I bought the camera from Dr. Joseph Yao in Hong Kong for a very nice price with full Leica international warranty (2 years, not Passport.). First a word about Dr. Yao. He is an amazingly helpful person - probably too helpful for his own good given all the trouble I put him to. For instance, I asked about getting a later serial number based on discussions here about battery usage, and he got me the latest he had. He also had a technician check the camera out before shipping without being asked and he was even polite with my impatience when USPS took their sweet time delivering it. Now that's service! By the way, someone asked about duty on imported cameras to the US. The customs service has a web site that lists all the duty categories, but cameras for the most part are 0%. That was the case here so while I will have to pay Virginia for 4.5% use tax, there wasn't any duty. My first impressions about the camera are very positive. I love the chrome finish, which is hugely ironic because once upon a time when I was young and (more) dumb I sold an M4 (which I had aquired wheeling and dealing for lenses) partly because I didn't like the chrome look. Tastes change I guess. Anyway, to me the chrome finish is handsome and the camera is all I would expect. One interesting thing is it makes a different noise to my recently-serviced (by Leica) M4-P. That one goes "chick" but the M6 goes "chock." Trivial, but strange to me. I can see already that it's going to take me a while to get used to having a built-in reflected meter. I have been using incident meters exclusively for 15 years or so and I have forgotten how to look for the right tone to meter off of and consequently in my tests I was about a stop off each time. It's not the meter, it's me. I did a careful check with another reflected meter of known accuracy using a plain wall as a target and I got the same reading with both meters, so I just have to learn to read with real scenes. Other than a meter, I also got the camera for the new flash capabilities, even though I know that's a crime with a Leica, but I hope that LUGGERS will forgive me because I get paid to take those kind of pictures at events. I took some with it tonight using my Quantum T2 with the TTL adaptor. While it's nice not to have to worry about the aperture, the biggest thing is the fact that it won't fire if the shutter speed is too high. That is probably worth the TTL alone to me as I have missed important shots with that error in the past and in fact it was a recent embarassing incident with a politician that got me thinking about the TTL in the first place. Another nice thing is the Quantum adaptor has a compensation dial on it. So assuming I can shoot at all with the slow synch, if I want to do fill flash I can simply dial in the amount I want in 1/3rd stop increments. Nice! There is one problem with TTL flash I will have to solve and that is the fact the adaptor uses up the accessory shoe. So where do I put the finder if I use my Heliar? Maybe I can find a plastic accessory shoe to glue on to the top of the adaptor, but that's a pretty ugly fix. Or I could just leave the Heliar to the M4-P, but that's also clumsy when I'm working. Any suggestions? Simon Stevens