[Leica] Re: Why do we do it ?

[bdcolen at earthlink.net (B. D. Colen)]

Michael E. Berube (Hi, Michael, long time no hear from!:-) ) wrote...

 Well that is true, but are you really stupid enough 
to think that will make any real world difference? During the 50's the
likes of 
Eugene Smith, Cartier-Bresson, David Douglas Duncan, Capa, and
Eisenstadt  set 
the standard for candid Leica photography with lenses often seen today
as old 
and substandard.  Yet, today's photography certainly is no better, and
is very 
seldom as good. "

You are far too smart a guy and far too good a photographer not to know
that the fact that today's photography is "certainly no better, and is
very seldom as good" has absolutely nothing to do with lenses or cameras
used - it has to do with photographers. And, btw, most photography in
the era to which you refer was seldom as good as that of produced by the
people you cite. Today, Salgado, Nachtwey and a handful of others are
doing work just as good as that produced by Smith, Duncan and Capa.

But even more to the point, those people did not set a standard for
"Leica photography," they set the standard for candid photography -
period. And let's remember that Eugene Smith shot with just about
anything that would hold film, Duncan shot with Nikons -RF and SLR - as
well as Leica, and Capa did allot, if not most of his 35 work with
Contax cameras. 

Finally, yes, there were incredible images produced 'when giants walked
the earth,' but I would contend that some of those images might have
been even better if free of the defects (fingerprints?) of the older
lenses. We look at them now and say, 'ah, that Leica glow.' Yet I can
just hear the howls of derision coming from this list if, for example,
the Cosina lenses produced the kind of flare, ghosting, and soft images
produced by the Leica lenses of yore. ;-) Today's Leica lenses are
stunners - particularly in comparison to the older Leica lenses.

Best,

B. D.