[Leica] Digital Capture - Full Circle Back To Film

["Leonard J. Kapner" <ljkapner@cox.net>]

For those contemplating the migration from film to digital capture, it
may be helpful to learn of one long-time Leica owner's experience (me)
descending into the digital capture domain. Forgive me in advance if I'm
tredding old ground, but I've only been a LUG member for several months,
and I haven't seen much written on this subject.

Last year, I succumbed to the hype and purchased a Coolpix 995 for
"casual" snapshot use. I used it seldom and found it to be "strange" to
use compared to my Leica Ms and Rs. I didn't make many images with it
and when the Coolpix 5K arrived, gave the 995 to son #2 and went to
Yosemite with Coolpix 5K and Leica R for five days to do some a:b
comparisons.

My conclusion? After a serious interval in the field trying to use the
5K (and a few hours with my wife's D1x, a power-hungry brick of a
camera... I'd rather haul a Hasselblad!) I am full-circle back to film
capture, for the following four reasons:

1. Look-through viewfinders on the non-SLR digital cameras are uniformly
terrible - where were the photographer-testers when camera designs were
being thought through? Did the packaging engineers win?
2. LCD viewfinders are a joke - I'd rather use a Rollei TLR, it's
brighter in daylight and much less granular. And they require far less
battery power...  ;-)
3. Image acquisition average latency (elapsed time to AF "ready" light
on) is excessive, in the range of 2-3 seconds, making the digital
capture solution almost unworkable for anything other than landscape,
posed portraiture or still life applications
4. Human interface to the onboard camera operating system software is
cumbersome and non-intuitive - no way to conveniently work non-preset
choices by "feel" alone; it's like buying a new "improved" computer
keyboard and discovering that you're not able to touch-type on it!!

BTW I had an opportunity to "handle" a Leica Digilux 1 production
prototype about 4 weeks ago when the new rep in our area happened by the
local dealer while I was picking up something. Impressions are that the
camera is poorly finished, "bricky" feeling, LCD is bigger, brighter,
perhaps better, human interface to the on-board OS is a bit easier than
the Coolpix, but latency and look-through viewfinder is still woefully
poor and cannot compare to the immediacy and quality of M and R film
alternatives.

My takeaway? Unless one is willing to spend well north of US$5K for
premium-level non-Leica digital SLR rig, this technology is not ready
for prime time just yet. That's why I've come full-circle back to film
capture with my Leicas, for virtually every photographic application
that interests me.

Anyone out there have a different set of experiences from which we all
might learn? Does anyone think that these technology shortcomings are
likely to change in the near future?

/Len/ 
Leonard J. Kapner 
Tel: (310) 377-5060 
E-mail: ljkapner@cox.net


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