[Leica] A digital camera without.....

[don.dory at gmail.com (Don Dory)]

Dave,
The LCD is there to save the manufacturer money.  Without the LCD you could
not make any number of settings that you do now with the multiple press of
some button or twirl some knob.  All digital, all very inexpensive to do
because all the controls are electronic, you are sending pulses to the chip
set that then sets up the various motors or controls.  Without the LCD there
would have to be more knobs connected to gear sets or pots which cost a lot
more money to manufacture, and calibrate.  We get the ability to chimp for
free and we are allowed to pay extra for the priveledge.  Pretty smart
marketing.

One of the reasons that Leica's cost so much is that real men and women even
in low wage countries like Porturgal (Don't flame me, it is in comparison to
Germany) fit gears, bearings, shutter tape, cams together into one
harmonious whole.  But even in the day of the AE-1 or the Olympus OM-1 the
cameras coming out of Japan were largely subassemblies being put together in
an automated factory with little hand assembly.  In many respects better
quality if the designers got the specifications into line with the
capabilities of the assembly robots.  I suspect that the profit per M8 will
be higher than for an M7 in spite of the relatively expensive sensor and
LCD.  The lens flange/shutter is a subcontracted assembly and if Leica does
the fitment of the sensor with the shutter crate there will be a thermal
glue that the sensor is put in and when the assembler gets the exact film
plane to flange distance the glue is heated and sets at the precise location
it needs to be.  Really much better than shimming and screwing.

Don
don.dory@gmail.com


On 9/26/06, David Rodgers <drodgers@casefarms.com> wrote:
>
> Digital cameras have many features. I'm wondering if some wouldn't be
> better off with fewer. For instance, what if there was a digital camera
> without an LCD preview screen? It'll probably never happen. And maybe
> it's not realistic to think it ever would. But if anyone could have
> bucked the trend it would have been Leica. What if Leica hadn't put an
> LCD on the M8? We'd have screamed, for sure. But might not the M8 have
> been a better camera for it? Here's why.
>
> 1) no chimping. My first reaction after snapping the shutter on any
> digital camera is to look at the screen to see if I "got it"! The irony
> of that is that if I didn't get it I probably just wasted a second
> opportunity because I was too busy looking at the LCD. And so what if I
> didn't get it? What are my options? Unless I can fly around the world at
> the speed of light and turn back time, it's too late. What time I might
> have had I just wasted...chimping.
>
> Consider the case of someone having closed eyes in a shot. It takes
> longer to verify that there were no closed eyes than to shoot 5 frames,
> which was the old cure for closed eyes. With the M8 we shoot 5 frames in
> 2.5 seconds. That's less time that it takes to analyze the LCD. Not to
> mention, "Sorry but Uncle Bob had his left eye half shut. Everyone line
> up again!" or "Sir could I please get you to walk back under that bird.
> I see in my preview window that you didn't have quite the expression I'd
> hoped for when it crapped on your shoulder."
>
> Perhaps we need to see images so we can delete the bad ones and save
> card space. Yet isn't that one big benefit of digital cameras over film?
> Each frame is essentially free, and I'm less constrained by the roll of
> 36. Why not just delete bad images later, after they are downloaded?
>
> 2) save space inside the camera. I don't know how much room the LCD
> takes up, but I'm sure it takes up some. Do away with the LCD and you
> can make a smaller camera body. Or better yet, allocate that space to
> sensor electronics. (Apart for the M8 place more emphasis on a good
> viewfinder. Heck, on many a P&P the LCD has replaced the viewfinder). On
> the M8 I'm sure having an LCD meant having a fatter camera.
>
> 3) Longer battery life. That's not a big issue, but it could be in
> certain circumstances. Sure I can turn off the LCD. But it's still
> there.
>
> 4) Longer camera life. Might the LCD be the first thing to go? OK, so I
> might be reaching here. I guess we don't really look at cameras long
> term today.
>
> 5) Less fear of pressing nose up to back of camera. No explanation
> needed.
>
> OK, I'm sure by now everyone is saying that we still need access to the
> menu. After all we've got options to deal with. A simple shutter speed
> dial and aperture ring may have been satisfactory way back when, but now
> we need to toggle through a thousand and one configuration choices.
> Today a simple situation calls for
> "Shades-Down-Red-22-Right-Bleed-Dive-Trips-All-Go" when yester-year the
> most complex situation we had to deal with called for
> "Sunny-16-and-Hail-Mary"?
>
> The ability to immediately see results has detracted from the discipline
> it takes to make sure we get it right in the first place.
> "Polaroid-like-instant-view-ability" is very
> un-"Leica-M-and-the-decisive-moment"-like.
>
> For those who absolutely must have a preview device here's the solution.
> Leica could have offered an LCD as an accessory. Not on the camera, but
> a small monitor you could put in your pocket. It would have its own
> battery pack, control buttons, and it would easily plug into the M8.
> Best of all, just like bright-line finders it could easily be misplaced
> allowing Leica yet another source of ongoing revenue. Someone on the
> selling side obviously didn't think through all the advantages.
>
> daveR
>
>
>
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