Category Archives: Film photography

“Is the [insert older Leica camera model here] still a good camera?”

The M8. First sold by Leica in 2006. My favorite “obsolete” digital Leica. It’s still worth buying, ten years later.

If you spend any amount of time perusing camera enthusiast forums, you’re going to run across this question, posted at predictable intervals, asking whether a particular digital camera “is still good.” That’s always struck me as an incoherent question born of weak reasoning and ignorance. At base, what does the question mean? The key qualifying word seems to be “still,” as in “does it make sense to be using this camera now, given all the models that have come since?” Characterizing the question that way, it does make some sense. Why should I buy older model X when I can also buy newer model Y that is claimed to be “better” than model X?

Consider the Leica M8 and its present viability versus a current Leica offering, say, a Leica M262. Certainly, you might want to consider the price differential (unless you’re a person of means who isn’t constrained by financial necessities). The M262 is the successor to the Leica M-E, which itself is an M9 minus the frameline preview lever and USB port. The M262, however, is based on the M240 but shares the body shape and weight of the M9 series. It has a 24 Mxp full frame CMOS sensor. It costs about $5000. The M8 is a 10.3 Mpx CCD camera first offered by Leica in 2006. It has the same form factor as subsequent digital M’s (a slightly fatter M6), so if your main reason for wanting a Leica is to impress people, the average guy on the street wouldn’t know the difference. You can pick one up for $1200, used. So the M262 is 4X as expensive as a good, used M8.

By most socially accepted criteria, the M262 is the “better” camera. But is it really? That’s, of course, a question only you can answer. It’s got a larger, higher def sensor, no doubt, one that theoretically allows you the ability to take “better” photos depending on how you define the quality of a photo. It’s also going to set you back $5000 as opposed to the M8, which you can pick up these days for peanuts (relatively speaking from a Leica perspective).

It seems to me that, at this point in the evolution of digital technology, this is a question in search of an argument. Unless we’re talking of a camera from the early digital era, e.g. circa 2001-2005, most serious digital cameras of whatever age meet or exceed the quality produced by traditional 35mm film cameras in terms of resolution and dynamic range. In this sense, as of, let’s say, the Leica M8, they’ve become “good enough.” Does it make sense, then, to buy an M8 when I can buy an M262? More precisely, if I’m a guy who simply wants to say he owns a Leica, what reason would I have to buy the M262 for $5000 when I can purchase my Leica cred by buying a minimally used M8 that’s sat on some guy’s shelf for the last 10 years?

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The physicist Niels Bohr, apparently a wise man of few words, was fond of telling the story of a man who a bought a parrot, only to return it because the parrot wouldn’t talk. The seller of the parrot, upon being asked to take the parrot back, replied: “Oh, forgive me. You wanted a parrot that talks, and I mistakenly sold you a parrot that thinks.” The parrot seller was laboring under what logicians call the ‘false dilemma fallacy,’ where an argument presents a set of two possible categories and assumes the subject of the argument must fall into one or the other category. In Bohr’s parable, the line of reasoning suggests that someone is either silent and thoughtful or talkative and an imbecile, a specious line of reasoning that, interestingly enough, one could argue is amply supported by the denizens of most internet photography forums. [In reality, there exists a third option, that the talkative man might have something intelligent to say, or a fourth, that the quiet man might not]. You get the point.

As to the debate about the worth of a super-ceded camera model, the same realities apply. Framed one way (via the false dilemma fallacy), an M8 today is an unworkable anachronism, hopelessly outdated in the era of live view and 256,000 ISO. This, of course, is to uncritically accept the premise camera manufacturers espouse in their ceaseless efforts to keep you buying cameras – new is the standard below which anything else is “obsolete” and of no continuing value.

Which looks pretty suspect from a critical perspective. If we’re going to discuss “obsolescence” we’ll need to first distinguish between two types:

Planned obsolescence: Planned obsolescence is the designing and producing of products in order for them to be used up (obsolete) within a specific time period. Products may be designed for obsolescence either through function, like a paper coffee cup or a machine with breakable parts, or through “desirability,” like a consumer grade digicam made for this year’s fashion and then replaced by something totally different next year. Planned obsolescence is also known as “design for the dump.”

Perceived obsolescence: Perceived obsolescence is planned obsolescence that manipulates the “desirability” of a product. A superceded camera model, say, will continue to be functional, just like it was when new – no better, no worse – yet it is no longer perceived to be appropriate given new “advances” in technology or style, so it is now rendered obsolete by perception, rather than by function. Perceived obsolescence is all about what is fashionable, and what is fashionable in a consumerist economy must necessarily change from year to year. If capitalism has one driving reality, it’s that new widgets must constantly be produced to replace last year’s widgets and those new widgets must now be ceaselessly proclaimed to “better than ” last year’s widgets. Unspoken, but assumed in consumerist logic is the premise not only that the new widget is “better” but also that the old widget, the one we’ve owned and happily used without complaint, is now unworthy of further use. Of course, from a rational perspective, this is complete bullshit.

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Perceived obsolescence is now the number one “product” of the advertising that supports the camera industry. While what Nikon and Canon and Sony and Leica currently offer is technologically more advanced than what they were offering in 2006, its arguable whether new cameras are “better” in any practical sense from what’s been available to us in the past. To automatically infer they are is to confuse the allegedly useful with the necessary, the necessary being the pivot point on which Leica has historically derived its almost cult-like following. Up until the Last decade or so, Leicas had never been about technological superiority; they’ve been about functional and aesthetic simplicity. They’ve been about making the photographic act as streamlined and efficient and simple as possible and the instrument well-built to last, characteristics modern digital camera makers have ignored in their headlong sprint to see who can jam the most features into a camera you’ll use till the next iteration comes along. If you’ve ever stared at the menu options your digital camera offers while the scene you wanted to photograph disappears, or your camera won’t function because of an error code, you’ll understand the difference.

Josef Koudelka took this with an obsolete old film Leica and some Tri-X. He may not be able to print it much bigger than 11×14, but it’s still better than anything you’ll ever do with your M262.

Framed another way (a third option outside of the either/or dichotomy posited by the false dilemma), the M8 is still the great (but flawed) camera its always been. Being firmly rooted in the film era, I neither need (nor want) 12800 iso on demand. Long ago I learned how to shoot in low light pushing HP5 to 1600 iso using a fast lens. Ironically, the open-aperture bokeh look so prized by happy-snappers today has its genesis in the constraints of such traditional low light shooting. As for dynamic range, well, that went out the window under such conditions as well. It’s called “the film look”, and it’s an aesthetic now prized by shooters trying to avoid the clinical “perfection” of digital capture, and the M8, at least in b&w, does it to perfection. Run its files through Silver Efex and you”ve got something approaching scanned film with a fraction of the hassle. And when I’ve got ample light, the M8 delivers remarkable files easily printable to 20×30, not that I’d want to, mind you, as the modern fetish for large prints usually bears out the old adage “if you can’t make em good, make em big.”

in my mind, the argument should be about whether the camera you use gives you the results you want. As for what I want, it’s not sterile perfection, which, as best I can tell from a half-century of looking critically at great photography, is irrelevant to what makes a compelling photograph. What I do want, after a certain level of base technological competence, is that the camera I use get out of my way and allow me to get the picture. In that respect, just like my iiif, M4 or M5, my M8 succeeds briliantly, and I get the added Leica caché, all for the price of a middling consumer grade digicam.

The Leica Rep

By Derek McClure. Mr. McClure is a photographer who shoots weddings, corporate and other portrait type work as needed. To escape from the commercial digitalized product flow that overwhelms his life, he shoots 35mm film with his three Leica’s – an M7, an M3 and a Barnack iiib. He lives and works in Adelaide, South Australia. You can see his film images on his instagram feed, @backwater_beat .

The glass was millimetres thick, yet it might as well have been made from solid steel. I beheld the items before me, displayed like endangered zoo creatures surrounded by a force field of glass that were designed to tempt even the most stoic of shooters. My breath fogged up the glass as I glared at the elite system that was both within and without of my reach. To the bloated rich, they were just another camera system, to everyone else they represented a kidney or a lung on the black market. The Leica M system.

I sighed and turned away from the glass case, feeling like an intoxicated drunk who had been rebuffed at ordering his last pint. I cradled my own Leica like a new born as I began my usual mantra of why I would always be satisfied with just one Leica.. and the other two that had been shelved prior to my early morning departure.

As I was about to proceed out of the store I found myself face to face with a man in a suit sporting a murse and equipped with red dot on his lapel. The Leica Rep. His visage was that of a person who had been caught in a conversation with their grandmother about a fungal growth on her goitre. The cause of his countenance was an enthusiastic camera noob peppering him with questions about megapixels and Instagram filters.

As I went to step past his eyes widened at the sight of my M7, his demeanour changing suddenly from clammy to rhapsodic as he recognised a fellow luddite. “I love your camera strap!” Apparently I was to buy the drinks and say how often I come to this place. I tightened my grip on my Hardgraft leather and wool camera strap which comfortably grasped onto my chrome Leica M7 and Summicron 50, all of which was set off beautifully by my ebony Artisan Obscura soft release.

The conversation moved rapidly as though we were at Beach Club Café pretending to order a drinks. The mention of Leica’s, lenses and photographic intentions were numerous, and growing at a fantastic rate. The Visco app enthusiast stood awkwardly with a smile plastered on her face like a jilted bride on her wedding day. “I love lamp,” she may have mumbled.

The moment arrived when mutual admiration was trumped by insecurity. The global obstacle of two photographers wrestling to impress the other, but having no real foothold in their ability to astonish the other. The stalemate to which we had found ourselves lead to the situation I should have foreseen.The Leica Rep revealed his Holy Grail. The Noctilux 50mm f/0.95 ASPH.

All sound within a kilometre radius ceased, birds stopped in mid-air and a little bit of pee may have worked its way down my leg. “I love lamp..” I mumbled. He handed the lens to me with a knowing winners smile. I felt it slowly pulse in my hand like a beating heart newly ripped out from someone’s innards ala Indiana Jones. In my hand was the unattainable, legendary, real, and more than what I could sell one of my children for. I had never had a moment like this one where I wished I could run as fast as Usain Bolt. “How would you like to try it out for a month, we have..” His voice trailed off as I stared at the Noctilux. My heart was beating so loud in my ears that I thought it was about to implode. “Sure, I’d be keen.” I squeaked.

I gingerly handed the Noctilux back and gave him my card. A brief handshake later and I walked out of the store feeling alive. Colours seemed more vibrant, my senses alive like I had never seen daylight before. I skipped down the street as a trail of Disney creatures followed me. Their joy reflected my own as I broke into song. I twirled around like a giddy school reaching the crescendo of my canticle. I felt incredible. I slept fitfully that night dreaming of bokeh, thousands of Facebook followers and my new job at Magnum.

I never heard from the Leica Rep again.

How I Was Won Over to My Leica

by Hector Ramos

For the last year or so I’ve visited Leicaphilia almost daily‎ looking for interesting reads on analogue and Leica film cameras. I visit other sites, too like Eric Kim’s, Steve Huff’s and Japan Camera Hunter but I like Leicaphilia the best because it helps me discover and remember why I’ve chosen film and Leicas as my medium.

Growing up in the Philippines in the 1970s, one of my fond memories is my dad’s Kodak Instamatic camera and photo albums. Special occasions were recorded and revisited via photo albums. I grew up in a small town without electricity, TV, phone, refrigerator or cars. My dad’s camera was considered a sign of affluence. From 1992 to 2010, I lived and worked between India; the Bay Area in California; Europe; and Australia, and used photography to keep my sanity, doing it mostly as a hobby and part time to earn some money. I had a collection of Nikon bodies, an FM2 (which I still regret selling) , F801, F4s, F5, F3 and D1x, and several lenses. The F5 in particular was very impressive for its metering. But I remember one day asking myself: ‘This camera is better than me! I wonder how it gets ‘good’ pictures?’ Thus began my search for a more simplified camera that would allow me to make the pictures instead of having the camera do it for me.

I sold all my Nikon gear and ended up with a brand new black Leica MP and a pair of lenses: the 35mm and 75mm Summil‎ux aspherical lenses, bought from B&H. A friend who delivered them to me said ‘I can’t belive how expensive these are!’…. and I thought to myself ‘Is this all I get for selling so many cameras and lenses? What was I thinking?’ Yet, as I began to use the kit the build quality, simplicity, and concentration required to use the system gave me a photographic rebirth and the greatest satisfaction to date compared to any camera I’ve ever used. I noticed a change in my photos which were hard to explain. But the most important was the taking of a responsibility that when the picture was great it was because of me. And if it was not to my liking it was also because of my skills as a photographer.

Enter the M8. It was convenient and produced film like qualities. I stopped using the MP and my back-up M6. But interestingly the ‘quality’ of my work dipped and I stopped enjoying my photography so much. For important work, like weddings, I always went back to the MP and M6. And always they gave me greater satisfaction than the M8. I eventually sold the M6 and the M8 together with a 28 summicron and a 135 telyt for an M9 a few years back. I tried hard to love digital. But something never clicked. I couldn’t relate to the digital workflow and digital files. I tried to mimic film but in the end I thought,’why not just use film then?’ The M9 gets used by two of my sons when they visit.

I have since tried an M3 and an M4 and have learned to eye exposure. But my current workhorse is the MP and a 50 summilux. They always accompany me on my work travels to different countries, usually used to record moments for myself.

I am currently going through two big suitcases full of velvia slide boxes, and Tri-x and HP5 sleeves from the last 24 years of shooting, trying to organize for printing choice images just like what my dad did. Or maybe for a website. But the images which stand out because of a certain ‘feel’ are the ones unmistakably taken with the Leicas.

Gear Excess or Minimalism: What Makes You Happy?

Lately, in a conscious quest to simplify my life, I’ve found myself thinking:

Why exactly do I own what I own?
What could I sell and not miss, practically speaking?
Do I really need that?
What is it costing me to own that?

I have way too much stuff. Cameras and lenses to be exact. It’s a first-world problem, no doubt, a function of an affluence we often don’t recognize because it’s become so common. It starts with the best intentions, but usually ends up where I find myself – with a surfeit of beautiful, shiney, pleasing things I never use. Which is a shame, because the mechanical cameras and lenses I’ve collected – whether they be Leicas or Nikons or something else – deserve to be used.

When I hold onto camera I don’t use, even though just the possessing gives me pleasure, (and this is especially true for the mechanical cameras I tend to buy and collect), it does indeed cost me something, if only in the time spent organizing, contemplating, and/or servicing the camera I’ve accumulated. And it costs the larger gearhead community something too – a camera that could be being used by someone as opposed to sitting on a shelf.

So, I’ve decided to start selling off the things I can’t justify sitting on my shelf. It’s difficult, as I can always find a reason to hold onto something. But usually the reason I find is the same reason I bought it – it’s beautiful/cool/iconic/historic etc and I want it. Good enough reasons, I suppose, but not compelling enough to convince my wife, who is currently in desperate need of a shiney, new, large capacity refrigerator.

With this in mind, I’ve started a new page you can reach from my homepage entitled, simply enough, “For Sale.” Everything you’ll find there is mine. It all works. There’s nothing wrong with any of it. I’m not selling it for any other reason than I just don’t need it.

I’ll be listing further items as current items sell, so feel free to check back in for other items in the future.

Hollywood Gets the M3 All Wrong ( errrr…Possibly Right?)

The above is a still from the new Hollywood “Blockbuster” Kong: Skull Island, the premise of which, apparently, is that King Kong is found running around what appears to be Viet Nam in the 60s/70s wreaking havoc and the people above, among others, are tasked with capturing /wounding /incapacitating /killing him. The young woman is, apparently, a PJ. She’s shown using a Leica M3 with what looks like a 50mm Elmar (note the indented bevel on the front of the lens) and the close focus attachment for a DR Summicron, which makes absolutely no sense under any imagined scenario. Even were that a DR Summicron, I’d question what a 60’s era PJ in Viet Nam would be doing using macro focusing while on combat assignment in SE Asia.

[Editor’s Note: Within 30 minutes of posting this, I’ve been inundated with smarter, more knowledgeable readers noting that it’s clearly a Summaron 35 3.5 with goggles for the M3. Of course. One more example of why one shouldn’t drink whiskey and then write things on the internet. In this particular instance, the culprit was a 200ml bottle of Old Malt Cask Unfiltered Single Malt Scotch, bottled at the “preferred Golden Strength of 50% alc. vol” by Blair Athol Distillery, that my wife had just brought me back from Scotland.]

Camera Ergonomics

By Christopher Moss. Dr. Moss is a family physician in Canada. He has been using film cameras for over forty years as an amateur and still enjoys doing it.

Using a camera in a fluent and efficient fashion is vital if you’re going to get the photograph that suddenly presents itself to you. Camera manufacturers can either help or hinder this, by designing a camera’s controls to be as intuitive and accessible as possible. It would seem to be in their interest to help in this way, but the fact is that it isn’t. How can that be? Well, sadly, only a small subset of photographers are interested in a camera that works with them in this way; most want a camera that will do it all for them, and technology has not yet advanced to a state where this is compatible with taking the best possible photograph in any given situation.

Manufacturers follow the money and make cameras that help the average buyer achieve something most of the time. No camera maker wants a disappointed buyer, so they turn out designs that automate and simplify everything so that an inexperienced user can get something worth posting to their Facebook page. That is as it should be in a capitalist world, and the rest of us really can’t complain if we want camera manufacturers to stay in business and continue to feed our needs. It is true, however, that the automation and simplification has got to the point that a photographer who wants more than a minimal degree of control over a picture has to work against the ergonomics of many modern cameras. This isn’t a new problem, as a few examples will show!

The Pre-Electronic Era

Lots of old cameras tried to make life simpler for not just the amateur, but for the completely ignorant photographer. In the days before any kind of autofocus (beyond the depth of field of a small aperture) or auto-exposure (beyond the latitude inherent in negative films) this didn’t always work so well, but expectations were different too. Remember when a photograph was said have ‘come out well’? And if it didn’t satisfy it was said that ‘it didn’t come out’? There was a kind of black box that an exposed film entered, and it might come out or it might fail to come out, but the workings of the black box were inscrutable. Well, a very little thought tells us that this was a way of excusing a multitude of sins, from inept exposure, failing to hold the camera steady, getting the focus horribly wrong, not taking off the lens cap, all the way through the chain to some error in development and the film ‘being lost’. All happily under the umbrella of ‘it didn’t come out’ which answered any query and was never questioned. My first camera was a Univex AF-4 from the 1930’s that had only one control – the shutter could be set to instant or time. Nothing else at all, which was very convenient for the user, but likely to lead to disappointment when the film came back. Later a Number 2 Kodak Autographic Brownie came along from the mid-1920’s, and it allowed shutter speeds of 1/25 (“Clear”) and 1/50 (“Brilliant”) along with “B” and “T” for those who had confidence in what we now call risk- taking behaviour. Focusing was limited to Portrait, Near View, Average View, Distant View and Clouds/Marine. If you couldn’t quite figure out which to use, you had the ready fall back that the photo didn’t come out, which was probably just as well, all things considered.

The Univex AF-4: “AF” Does NOT stand for “Auto-Focus”

But not all was so obscure and not every photograph required all fingers and toes be crossed. Miniature photography in the form of the Leica and the Contax cameras during the same era as the models mentioned above had multiple exact shutter speeds, apertures and distances that could be set. The addition of a rangefinder allowed the focusing to be precise, but exposure values were still generally estimated, or at best measured with an extinction meter (my father had a dandy little device that had a wedge of opaque material inside, and he looked through it and tried to read off a scale of numbers. The last number that could be read was entered on a handy slide rule on the outside of the casing and apertures and times could be read off. All this allowed great precision, but wasn’t for the masses of people who wanted to take a snap without being expert in the dark arts of photography. The next stage of affairs for those folk was the invention of the C-22 colour negative film process, which had enough latitude to allow the widespread sale of Instamatic cameras using 126 film. Fifty million cameras were sold between 1963 and 1970, many with no controls beyond a shutter release and a wind-on thumb wheel, and the more sophisticated having two shutter speeds (sunny and cloudy), and two focusing distances (a head and shoulders outline and a mountain). Many of us will remember the dull grainy quality of the prints that came back from these mostly under-exposed films that we took on our holidays. Most of my memories of my early teens have taken on that veiled look as a result – I’m remembering photos of those times! Better latitude came with the C-41 process in 1972, but this was offset by the marketing decision to push 110 size film as a replacement for 126 film. Kodak must take some blame for selling us less film at higher prices and requiring new cameras to be bought. This was probably the lowest point of unskilled consumer photography in history.

Electronics

In the meantime the descendants of the Leicas and the Contaxes had continued to evolve, and the development of the single lens reflex from early Exacta and Kowa models had proceeded to the point where very good SLRs were challenging the dominance of the rangefinders. The addition of electronics was the catalyst that almost destroyed the rangefinders, as Japanese SLR manufacturers adopted these improvements and Leica did not. From the mid-1960’s onwards we saw closed-aperture metering, then open-aperture metering, then auto-exposure quickly develop. Powered film wind on came quickly as a development of motor-drives, until it was available in consumer point and shoot cameras. Despite Leica’s early interest in auto-focus, they let others introduce it into the market and from the late 1970’s to the early 1980’s it became the norm in SLRs and compact cameras. Notice how the term ‘point and shoot’ has crept in there? This was the first time a camera could be used the way my Univex AF-4 was used in the 1930’s, but with auto-focus and auto-exposure to save the day from the ‘it didn’t come out’ problem. Briefly, cameras of this era became easy, simple and reasonably reliable to use. There weren’t a dozen different exposure modes, and while auto-focus quickly diverged into single and continuous forms, there weren’t dozens of AF points to choose between or activate in groups etc. All that nonsense came along soon enough, but it was still mostly manageable until the next big thing.

A Contax G2, a High-Point of Electronic Film Camera Design

Digital

Once cameras produced digital images there was a huge change in the way cameras were used and controlled. Manufacturers seemed to feel that endless complexity could be introduced and hid it all in so very many menus that could be accessed through arcane combinations of button pushes that required one of those mythical teenagers who could program your VHS recorder in the days when no one else could. Most buyers of digital cameras don’t explore all the menu options and the thick small print manuals that used to be offered before it was decided that all this was more cheaply put on an optical disk or, better yet, available for download online, were hardly welcoming models of simplicity and clarity. The most byzantine set of menus and controls I have met with so far belong to the Olympus OM-D series. Nice, small, light cameras with decent picture quality – but those menus! Having set it up I shall hope I never have to do so again. In use, I have to try out various wheels and buttons to see what they do, or have been user-programmed to do. That’s neither quick nor efficient.

What Would Be Ideal?

There’s not much point in talking about mechanical only cameras here, as the only ones in production are the Leica M-A and large format cameras, which were probably designed in a world where ergonomics had never been invented. But a modern camera with a light-meter and autofocus? Lots of things that can help or hinder there! I believe the ideal camera could be set to allow all the usual controls to be easily accessed with physical dials and buttons if desired, with each allowing for an ‘Auto’ position if the user wanted the camera to take care of it for him. At a minimum, this means an aperture control, preferably as a ring on the lens, but at the very least as a thumb or finger wheel on the camera body. The same applies to shutter settings, but since more users prefer aperture priority over shutter priority, the setting for this can be a traditional dial on the top plate or a thumb or finger wheel as available.

ISO must also be able to be set outside any menu system, and can even be a dial in an awkward place or a menu setting for a film camera where it is set just once per film, or a wheel, dial on a digital camera that is reasonably easy to access, even if this means taking the camera from the eye. At the very least, a dedicated button and instant access menu on the LCD of a digital camera is needed. Things like the parameters used in setting up auto-ISO on digital cameras can be buried in menus, but switching from the lowest native ISO of a sensor (best quality) to the highest necessary for this particular photograph via Auto-ISO have to be available quickly and easily. Finally, exposure modes ought to be easily changed between spot, centre-weighted and matrix with a physical control.

When we consider focusing, a physical control to change between manual focus, single autofocus and continuous autofocus is by far the fastest way of changing between them. Niceties like how to choose which autofocus point to use, which group of autofocus sensors to use and so on can be relegated to the menus, as far as I’m concerned as I tend to set them once and stick with that setting. I suspect I am not alone in using autofocus in a way that would disappoint the clever engineers who made these devices. I want single autofocus on the centre of the viewfinder. I want to focus on the important part of the scene with a button press, hold that focus and recompose and fire.

Anything else at all is rarely used by me. If I were a sports photographer with fast-moving subjects I would have to get into all sorts of continuous tracking autofocus between various groups of focus sensors, but for goodness sake, keep that stuff out of the way of the majority of us who don’t need it! Talking of focus lock with a button press, it is pretty obvious that a half-press of the shutter button is the easiest way to do this. A separate button for exposure lock would be nice, as focusing on the part of the image desired isn’t always the same thing as getting the exposure right after you recompose.

Some Examples of What We Can Do if We Try

I’m not sure how many cameras I have owned or used over the years, and come to that, I’m not even sure how many I own right now. Some things are best left unsaid. But some stand out more than others and I’m going to describe in detail the cameras that I have found to be the easiest to use from the point of view of ergonomic efficiency. Firstly a purely mechanical camera without no electronics at all. All it needs is an aperture ring, a shutter speed dial, a shutter release and means of winding on the film. It doesn’t get much simpler than this, but even here design considerations can make all the difference. Compare my 1963 Leica M2 with my 1971 Hasselblad 500c. Apart from the slightly awkward film loading system (which I actually like more than that in modern Leicas as the take up spool grips the leader so tightly it is easy to rewind the film and leave the leader out), the Leica just works.

My left hand controls the aperture ring and focusing tab on the lens, while my right index finger turns the shutter dial, presses the shutter release at which point my right thumb can wind on the next frame. The only pause comes when I have to meter the light and reset the aperture and shutter controls. When I had an M7 and an MP even this obstacle was removed. The Hasselblad is also far easier to use than a present day compact if you want to do anything other than auto-everything. But, it has to be said, it’s not as simple as the Leica. While the controls are different, focusing, shooting and winding on are just as simple. It’s the lenses with their coupled aperture and shutter speed controls that complicate things.

Hasselblads are not designed for those who want to estimate an exposure, the use of the EV ring on the lens pretty much requires the use of a meter, and once it’s set, the coupled aperture/shutter rings can be turned together to allow some decisions about a suitable combination. Hasselblads have their quirks, and everyone sooner or later makes the mistake of changing the lens with the shutter uncocked (you cannot reattach that lens until the shutter has been cocked by careful use of a strong screwdriver), and who doesn’t forget to remove the darkslide at least once per session? Generally, though, they work pretty smoothly, and are simple enough, like the M2, that it’s hard to mess up from a control point of view.

Next, let’s look at something far more complex—a camera from that brief era when auto-exposure and autofocus had yet to be combined with the menus of a digital camera. I’m going to spend more time on this as there is far more to describe, and far more to get right or wrong! The Pentax 645n was a medium format film camera made between 1997 and 2001. It has no rear LCD and thus no menus, so everything that can be changed must be changed with a physical control. It is a large, rather heavy, boxy camera as might be expected from trying to have a medium format camera with a powered wind on and all the batteries needed to drive it (especially as this was made before lithium ion batteries were in common usage). Despite it’s weight and size, it stands out from the crowd in ease and speed of use, simply because the designers thought carefully, and also, I have to say, because they didn’t have the option of hiding settings deep in nested menus!) Let’s go through the available controls:

1. Focusing. The camera can be used with autofocus or manual focus. In a moment of inspiration, all the lenses for this camera (except for the small standard 75mm/f2.8) had their focusing rings made so they could be pushed forwards, revealing the words “Auto Focus” on the lens barrel, or pulled back, covering those words and switching into manual focus mode. So by simply grabbing the focusing ring, pulling back and twisting you have manual focus. Push forwards and a half-press of the shutter button gives you autofocus again. Very nice indeed! On the back of the camera body are two sliding switches, one that selects either ‘Servo’ (which you might call Continuous these days) or ‘Single’ autofocus, and the other which selects either a single or three AF sensors. Autofocusing is triggered with a half-press of the shutter release, and holding the shutter button in this position locks the focus. Easy!

2. Exposure. There are traditional aperture and shutter controls with a ring on the lens barrel for aperture and a dial on the top plate for shutter speed. Both have an ‘A’ position in which the setting becomes dependent on the setting of the other control. So if the Shutter speed dial is set to ‘A’ you can manually set the aperture and the shutter speed will be automatically set ie aperture priority exposure. Alternatively, the aperture ring can be set to ‘A’ and the shutter speed dial can be manually set, resulting in an automatic aperture selection ie shutter priority exposure. If both controls are set to ‘A’ the camera enters a Program mode, and uses combinations of aperture and shutter speed that it’s designers think best. This cannot be shifted to other combinations, but to be honest if you want to do that you ought to be using one of the priority auto-exposure modes anyway. There is a ‘Memory Lock’ button under the right thumb which can lock exposure for twenty seconds after a single press, or if the shutter button is half-pressed during those twenty seconds the locked exposure will remain in effect until the shutter is finally released. I simply hold it down as long as I want the exposure locked, and release it if I want to re-measure exposure as this is simpler and easier. Three metering modes are available, and a dial under the shutter dial has three positions for Spot, Centre-
weighted and Six-segment (these days: matrix) metering. The other control related to exposure is a dial on the top plate at the left which controls exposure compensation in 1/3 stops from -3 to +3 stops.

3. ISO. There is a small LCD on the top plate, and this is used in combination with a switch under the exposure compensation dial to set ISO. If the switch is held in the position marked ISO (it is spring loaded and will return to normal as soon as you release it), then ISO may be changed with the up and down buttons on the top plate, the ISO showing in the LCD as you do so. This is the least convenient of the controls, but for a film camera it doesn’t matter as this is set when a film is loaded and not changed until the next film, if a different speed.

4. Drive mode. Around the shutter release is a collar with settings for single, multiple and timer. Pretty obvious.

5. Other controls. Only three more – a power switch which has three positions: Off, On (with sound confirmation of focus) and On with no sound. Secondly there is a multiple exposure switch which lets the shutter cock without the film winding on, and finally a depth of field preview lever to close down the aperture. The only remaining button is the lens release.

For all the fact that this is a large and heavy camera, it is easier to use than most as the controls are easily visible and accessible. It’s a shame that it’s descendants, the Pentax 645D and 645Z have many of these functions accessible only via menus, as there really isn’t any reason other than expense not to have dedicated controls for the important and frequently changed items in addition to a menu system for selecting just whose face gets recognised and sepia toned to what degree! The digital Leica M cameras pretty much get this right, with physical controls for the important stuff, or at least a dedicated button to take you straight to the right menu (eg for ISO). And so far, it has only been Leica that has been eccentric enough to make a digital M with no menus, the M-D, which will appeal strongly to users of film cameras, given that it allows all the same controls that a film M has, and a lot fewer options that would normally be set on a digital camera. There will probably be little opportunity for other manufacturers to show their skills in designing cameras that can be used easily without relying on automatic functions, as the marketplace dictates cameras that can do more than their competitors, not less, and at the same time they have to be idiot-proof. Of the three modern cameras I have (Nikon D810, Nikon F6 and Olympus OM-D E-M5), all have been set up the way I like them and I never touch the menus any more as it took a very long time to get everything just so. It means I can use them as I want to, changing apertures and shutter speeds as I go (though I really don’t like control wheels over traditional controls) and not worrying about stuff I won’t miss. I guess I am trying to use them with the same basic controls that I can use on the M2 and the 500c, and even on the 645n I rarely change the autofocus or metering settings. So it’s possible to use a modern camera the way you used a film camera, but the lack of standardisation across brands still means that when you go back and forth between them there can be confusion about which control wheel does what. I think it’s worthwhile to try to do this, as it saves the confusion of too many choices, speeds up the use of the camera so that you can concentrate on getting the shot, and allows the satisfaction that comes from feeling that you made the photograph, not the camera.

Film Photography’s Alleged Comeback

By Temoor Iqbal, reprinted from EuropeanCEO, under the Byline “Film Photography Makes a Stunning Comeback”. [Editor’s Note: Not sure “stunning” is the correct word, although it’s gratifying to see the larger culture notice the continued relevance of analogue photography for many of the same reasons having been discussed at length on Leicaphilia.]

In the early 2000s, the world of photography changed forever. Though digital cameras had been widespread since the mid-1990s, the technology did not produce sufficiently high-quality results for professional and serious amateur photographers.

Around 2003, however, this changed, and vast swathes of professionals made the jump from analogue to digital, decimating an entire industry in the process. “Companies went from processing in the region of 5,000 rolls of film per day to 20 percent of that in a six-month period; as you can imagine, there were many casualties”, said Professor Steve Macleod, Director of Metro Imaging, a professional photography lab.

For a decade after this crash, sales of camera film steadily dropped as digital camera technology continued to improve. However, all was not lost for the analogue world. According to Kodak Alaris, a spinoff of legendary film manufacturer Kodak, sales of Kodak Professional film grew more than five percent worldwide between 2013 and 2015. Of course, this figure is not even close to reaching the dizzy heights of yesteryear, when film was the only tool available to photographers, but that might not even matter. Indeed, it seems the future role of analogue photography is not to challenge the dominance of digital, but to rest alongside it in a particular niche.

Legends of the past
Perhaps the best-known film producer in the world, Kodak is still operating in the aforementioned form of Kodak Alaris. What’s more, the company is continuing to innovate, with new films such as Kodak Portra designed specifically to be scanned, reflecting the preference of many modern film users to have scans rather than prints as an end product.

Kodak’s one-time rival, Fujifilm, is also still producing camera film, but focuses primarily on its Instax line of instant camera paper. This reflects one of the many unexpected trends in analogue photography; sales of Instax cameras have risen steadily since 2013, and are expected to hit five million units this year. This pattern is firmly being fuelled by a young demographic – typically those born and raised in the digital age, for whom a printed photograph is something of a novelty.

UK-based Ilford Photo, another of the few major players to survive the crash, confirmed this trend last year, after a survey found that 30 percent of film users were under 35 years old, and 60 percent had only started using film in the last five years. Such is the enthusiasm among this small but dedicated group that newer companies have even managed to find success in analogue photography – Lomography, born from a bizarre collective of photographers obsessed with low-fi Russian cameras, has also seen film sales rise steadily throughout this decade, with products such as Purple XR (a film that warps the colour spectrum) squarely aimed at the youth demographic.

Creative control
The question that these findings inevitably raises is – why? Why shoot film, when digital cameras are so advanced? In a sense, this line of enquiry is born of a misunderstanding. For many, there is an impression that film is an expensive medium compared to digital, which is ‘free’ in a sense, once the initial equipment has been purchased. “This is a myth. The cost of shooting analogue is immediate and physical: you have to buy film, you have to pay to have it processed and scanned. With these criteria, digital appears less expensive and many wonder why anyone would choose to shoot film. However, people fail to build into their costing how long it takes to edit digital photos. If they were to cost out how long it takes to edit and prepare digital files for production, it would be equivalent or near to the cost of shooting analogue; they balance out in the end”, said Macleod.

Similarly, there is often a lack of understanding of the experience of shooting film; the vast majority of digital camera users nowadays have never actually tried shooting with an analogue camera, just as most music listeners have never handled, played and fully listened to a vinyl record. There is a simplicity to the pared-down experience that can be of genuine creative benefit. “Necessity is the mother of invention; there is no point staring at the back of a film camera after taking a shot – that time and energy is already going into the next one. Not knowing immediately what has been captured is a creative advantage”, said Walter Rothwell, a professional photographer who regularly uses analogue cameras for his work.

Rothwell is not alone is this view, as more and more professional photographers are choosing film for similar reasons. This is particularly apparent in the world of fashion, as photographers seek to take back control of a creative process that is falling ever further into the hands of editors. “In the era of Avedon and Irving Penn, it was the photographers who were leading what the fashion should be. Today it is the fashion editor. It is the editor who is immersed in fashion, so it is the editor’s point of view that is valid…the photographer becomes just the tool to express that point of view”, said art director Fabien Baron, in an interview with Business of Fashion.

Je ne sais quoi
Of course, high-minded ideals about creative control and specific minutiae of costs are primarily professional issues. What inspires the everyday film photographer is something quite different, which is difficult to define, but easy to see.

“Film has a quality that is unique; a beauty and tonal warmth that digital cannot match. Like the vinyl versus MP3 debate, there is something inherently different about a physical process compared to a virtual one”, said Rothwell. While digital camera manufacturers have made photography a question of megapixels, a growing number of people understand that quality cannot be expressed in figures. Ken Rockwell, a prominent advocate of film photography, expressed this point well, writing: “Non-artists misguidedly waste their time comparing meaningless specs like resolution and bit depth, when they really should just stand back and look at the images.”

As well as the choice of medium, such considerations also influence the choice of camera for many photographers. Lomography’s Diana camera has extremely limited controls, uses a deliberately low-sharpness lens, and purposefully allows light to leak through the body and onto the film, and yet it is astonishingly popular, as the final images have a unique, dreamlike quality that simply cannot be recreated with any amount of computer processing.

For related reasons, the Hasselblad Xpan, a panoramic film camera, is one of Rothwell’s favourites for personal work. “The Xpan was a unique moment of madness from a large manufacturer; a comparatively small panoramic camera that shoots across two frames, producing very high quality negatives. Around 10 years ago, I noticed that I was ‘seeing’ panoramic photos, so I got the camera to answer a yen.” Rothwell’s panoramic street photography has earned him international acclaim, and while it would certainly be possible to use the panoramic mode on a digital camera or phone to replicate the effect, there is something about the lack of choice that lends his shots a unique feel. To stitch together a panorama from digital images with would not give the same results in terms of artistic impression, though the scene may be the same.

Self reliance
The most common process when shooting film is the same now as it was before the digital age. A roll of film is shot, rolled up, and taken or posted to a lab for development. The lab will then return prints and/or scans of the images, as well as the original negatives or slides for storage.

However, in this modern world of increased automation, there is a growing trend for manual processes. This has caused a minor boom in home developing, with many amateur photographers processing their own film and even attempting to make prints. Such has been the level of interest in recent years that, in 2014, Ilford launched Localdarkroom.com, a website designed to help photographers find a darkroom that they can work in, as most people lack the appropriate space or resources to do more than basic processing at home.

It is tempting to put this down to a desire to reduce costs, film photography being perceived as an expensive pursuit, but the reality is very different. “If you are developing and printing to save money, you’re barking up the wrong tree. There is no getting around it, film and paper are expensive, then there are the chemicals, negative and print storage costs, enlarging and processing equipment, the list goes on”, said Rothwell. People are keen to do things with their hands, not for reasons of quality or cost, but for the sake of it, and perhaps to satisfy a deeper instinct to produce physical work.

This desire for the physical extends to storage too. True, photographic prints have not seen their popularity rise in parallel with the rebirth of film, but having an exposed negative as a permanent record of a photo is something that speaks to people, especially as our understanding of the limitations of digital data storage increases. “I read an interesting quote recently: ‘nothing digital is truly archival, as it does not survive by accident’. We are taking unprecedented numbers of photos nowadays, but the vast majority are destined to remain as computer code, languishing on hard drives”, said Rothwell.

For the ages
Herein lies the problem – digital files do not last on their own. File types come and go – even the ubiquitous JPEG format may not be readable by standard hardware in 20 or 30 years – so constant, active conversion is required to ensure the survival of an archive. Properly stored negatives, however, can last almost indefinitely, with no particular action required. They are tangible records that can be passed down through generations.

In 2007, Chicago-based amateur historian John Maloof purchased a box of negatives from the 1960s for $400. They turned out to be the work of the now-revered documentary photographer Vivien Maier. Maloof now owns some 150,000 of Maier’s negatives, many of which have been successfully scanned, and he has been largely responsible for her posthumous fame. Could this have happened with a hard drive of JPEGs? The technology isn’t old enough to say for sure, but there’s cause for doubt.

Ultimately, this is not to say that everyone should immediately discard their digital cameras and switch to film, but rather that film still has a very real and serious place in the world of photography. As a specific tool in the photographer’s arsenal, alongside digital, film photography can continue to survive and thrive, offering something of an antidote to the mentality of snapping each and every passing moment. As Macleod noted: “The way people shoot has changed. Film has become a more considered approach; something people invest time in creating.”

The rebirth, however, is still just that – manufacturers need to continue to respond to the market and innovate as much as they can in order to make it a safe, reliably profitable industry once more. Whether that happens remains to be seen, but for now, film is most definitely alive and well.

Talking Leicas with Astrophysicists

Paris Observatory telescope. This 60-centimetre telescope, installed in 1890, was designed by French astronomer Maurice Loewy (1833-1907). Loewy was Director of the Paris Observatory from 1896 until his death.

In spite of my obvious critical stance toward many of the fruits of the digital age, it certainly has its benefits, one of which is the ability to connect people of like mind across distances. Prior to the internet, if you wanted to share your interests with others, you did so on a local basis. Now the world is open to you. Through this blog I’ve been lucky to meet interesting, intelligent people from around the world – the Far East, Africa, South America, Europe – and also around the corner where I live in Raleigh, North Carolina.

So I was pleasantly surprised, while travelling recently, to receive an invitation to visit from Dr. Henry Joy McCracken, an Astrophysicist at the Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris and a dedicated Leica film shooter. Dr. McCracken works in a contemporary building located on the campus of the Observatoire de Paris, the foremost astronomical observatory of France, and one of the largest astronomical centers in the world. Its historic building is located on Boulevard Arago in the 13th Arrondissement in Paris. Louis XIV started its construction in 1667, completed it in 1671. It thus predates the Royal Greenwich Observatory in England, founded in 1675.

While the Observatory is open to the public on a very limited basis, nobody gets up on the roof and in the cupola where the telescope is found. Dr. McCracken brought me up on the roof and into the cupola. The telescope there is very old, very big and very impressive.

On the Observatory Roof with Dr. McCracken. Behind him is the cupola where the Observatory telescope is housed. And yes, that’s a film Leica Dr. McCracken is sporting.Inside the CupolaGraffiti Scratched into the Stone Wall in a Space Under the Cupola

The irony of our meeting is that, while we connected through Leicaphilia, a site dedicated to the enjoyment of Leica film cameras and film photography as a viable ongoing means of photographic practice, only one of us was sporting a film camera – and it wasn’t me, which, I’m sure, gave Dr. McCracken pause even though he was a gracious enough host not to note the obvious to me. I had with me an M8 with a Amedeo adaptor and vintage Nikkor attached; he had with him a beautiful M6 with 50mm Summicron that someone had given him, loaded with Tri-X. Of course, there was a reason I wasn’t toting a film camera, as I claim I usually do, and it was because I just didn’t feel like dealing with the hassles of film on an international trip – the X-ray scanning and rescanning, the repeated explanations at security about what exactly the bag full of home-rolled film cassettes actually contained, the time spent developing and scanning the developed film once home etc; all of the reasons normal people embrace digital and see the continued use of film as quixotic in the extreme. If you were to accuse me of being a hypocrite, you’d be right. Consistency is not my strong point, although, in my defense, I am in agreement with Ralph Waldo Emerson that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, requiring one to be as ignorant today as one was yesterday.

These markers are found throughout the Observatory grounds. Something to do with the Meridian Line

So, did this trip help soften my antagonism toward digital Leicaphiles? Yes, it did, actually. I enjoyed the time spent with my M8 immensely. It’s a wonderful camera, offering the simplified Leica experience digitally. I borrowed a 35mm Summicron from a Parisian photographer friend and shot exclusively with the M8, the Ricoh GXR and the D3s staying in the bag. Along the way I lent it to a photographer who for years used both an M4 and M6 but never saw the use for a digital Leica – always saying “I just don’t see the point” when I’d enquire as to why he no longer used Leicas but now used professional Nikon DSLRs. Sitting on his Paris balcony, a few drinks in us both, I handed him my M8 with his Summicron attached. He picked it up, fired off the photo below and said “feels pretty much like a film Leica.” Yup. Pretty much.

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So, back to my thoroughly enjoyable day at the Paris Observatory, courtesy of Dr. McCracken, who, I should add, is an excellent photographer in addition to being a fine human being and a very intelligent guy dealing daily with issues that most of us simply aren’t smart enough to understand, let alone discuss. He publishes 52 Rolls: One Roll of Film for Fifty Two Weeks, where he shoots a roll a week and posts the photos on his blog.

As part of my tour, Dr. McCracken brought me into the bowels of a building on the Observatory campus where is located the darkroom that was once used to develop the Observatory’s photographs. Down a few flights of steps and behind a locked door stood a perfectly functional darkroom, still stocked with papers and chemicals with expiration dates from the 1990’s. Apparently, it had been locked away and forgotten, a sad commentary on the state of analogue photography. Fortunately, he has rescued it from disuse and it is now, again, being used for its intended purpose, although certainly now not in any official Observatory capacity. At the very least, it made me feel good that it has been resurrected and that maybe, just maybe, this blog might have had some little thing to do with it.

The Paris Observatory Darkroom

After my tour we settled in for a cup of coffee on the terrace of Dr. McCracken’s building, where we were joined by fellow Astrophysicists. We discussed, among other things, Dark Matter, String Theory, whether the Universe is expanding or contracting (its “bouncing” apparently), and, parenthetically, why we still all loved film cameras. We talked about the incredible vistas digitalization has opened to science, but we also discussed the problems that come along with our move from analogue to digital. Someone noted to me that there still existed, somewhere deep in the bowels of the Institute, negatives from more than a hundred years ago that charted the positions and conditions of the cosmos at that time, and that these offered a contemporary scientist the ability to go back and recreate those conditions in light of new theories or data, necessary work if you subscribe to Thomas Kuhn’s theory of how science changes. With digital data, so susceptible to degradation and loss, he noted, scientists 100 years from now might not have access to the same sort of data from our era, so eager are we to embrace new technology without thinking through the full consequences for the ongoing transmission of scientific culture. Who, I asked, is thinking about these issues? No one, he replied.

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The Observatory Stairwell

Having thoroughly enjoyed my visit with Dr. McCracken, off I went. Somewhere in the Marais, I lifted my M8 to take a photo of something, and as I did a gentleman walked past me with a curious look on his face, turned around and tapped me on the shoulder. “Are you the Leicaphilia guy?” he asked, to which I replied, yes. That’s me. A nice enough guy, we spoke some time, him being a reader of the blog. He, of course, had a beautiful Pentax MX film camera with him, although he assured me there was an M2 at home. I, of course, had my digital M8, another slightly uncomfortable situation which he was gracious enough to ignore.

And so now I’m home, having gone through my DNG files and processed the keepers. You’ll notice that they’ve all been processed to emulate the film look. I’m not sure what I should think about this. Is this “cheating,” inauthentic in some way? Even if it is, who cares? Isn’t it the end result that matters? In any event, I feel vaguely like a poseur, someone who advocates one position while acting in accordance with another. Regardless, I think I really like my M8. Will it become my tool of choice? Probably not, and probably for those same archival issues articulated by the Astrophysicist. But who knows.

An SLR Oskar Barnack Would Like

By Wayne P.

Upon return of my first Pentax AP (the first Pentax M42 screw-mount SLR marketed in US) from Scott Hendrickson’s outstanding CLA service, one of my first thoughts was that this might be very close to what Oskar Barnack would have designed, had he been compelled to design an SLR. This impression did not come from merely the obvious similarities in the way shutter speed is selected – not to mention the fact that maximum shutter speed is 500 – but comes from the feel of the advance lever, the sensation of the shutter release, the sound of the shutter, the solid feel; the overall gestalt of construction and mechanism. It is as if someone very knowledgeable and satisfied with the design of a rangefinder put it to themselves: “how can I best design a camera with the advantages of SLR focusing, but retain as much of the rangefinder camera convenience as possible?” And in doing so they rendering a masterpiece.

The chrome finish is very similar in appearance and feel to my Leica IIIc and IIIg. The tension and overall smooth feel of the film advance lever is very similar to the M2…but not nearly as long in stroke. The shutter, although a bit louder – and I mean “a bit“ – has the same general sound as an M camera. Nothing rattles; whether cocked or not, it feels and behaves as though chiseled out of a solid block of metal; furthermore, exclusive of the prism hump, the overall size and weight of the camera is about the same as an M2.

The view through the finder is enough to make any nostalgia buff smile: the central region is a large ground glass area surrounded by fresnel rings…that’s it; reminding very much of the focusing screen of a Hasselblad 500C.…. No lines, needles, LED light; no numbers, lettering or anything else to distract you from the various parts of the scene that magically fades in and out of focus as you compose. Again, to stick with the main comparison, it is as close to the simple magic of a rangefinder patch as is possible with an SLR prism arrangement. The camera is doing nothing for you; you experiment, moving your eye toward and away from finder window, finding what works best for you….making the experience entirely your own. Any improvement in result will come purely from improvement in your skill and effort.

If I may …. an exposition on an aspect of OVF (optical viewfinder) not often expounded upon in the great OVF vs. EVF debate: that being, the EVF robs you of some cherished moments with the unique characteristics of fine old glass – or even, fine new glass. With EVF, you never do actually get an opportunity to view the world through the lens. With Pentax AP, you do get this opportunity, and in the most raw interpretation of the act. Even if the photograph does not turn out exactly as you envisioned, and you walk away without the prized, perfect image, you still have the view, the joy, of that vision in your head. You were there. You saw it through that magical Zeiss 50mm 1.4 Planar….. With an EVF, well, you watched the video.

On the subject of lenses, this is another aspect of the AP that will sit well with those used to rangefinder photography. While not as small as the delightfully tiny and lightweight lenses used on a Barnack Leica, they are small. The AP, packed with Pentax M42 55mm f2, 35mm f4, and and 105mm f2.8 does take up more room than my IIIC with comparable lens set, but can be packed- with IIIC, including comparable lenses- in my Domke F-5XB……a shoulder bag not much larger than my shaving kit. Oh, and there is still room for the superb, and cheap, M42 Takumar 50mm 1.4 – if you feel the need for a fast lens.

At this point, given the length and breadth of modern comprehensive camera reviews I have read over the past few years, I begin to feel somewhat inadequate to this task. There is not really much, beyond the sensation, i.e. “haptics,” of use to expound upon. it is, quite literally, in substance, nothing more than a metal box to facilitate: storage and advancement of film; manual focus of lens; selection of shutter speed, and activation of shutter. But for a mechanism of that type, it is superb.

There you have it: spartan in feature; elegant and solid in design; able to stand up to the test of time; convenient in size and weight; unobtrusive and fulfilling in operation. I am pretty sure Oskar would have liked it.

OBTW, I own two. One came with a Takumar 58mm f2.4 lens attached, the second came with the Takumar 58mm f2.0. In both cases, camera and lens, together, resulted in a raid on the family treasure of about half the value that either of the lenses, alone, would normally demand.

If you see one for sale, pick it up and give it a fondle.

Digital Technology and Its Discontents

Photo A: A Man With a Leica, Circa 1950. Photo B: A Man With a Leica, Circa 2015. What Does The One Have to Do With The Other?

I love Leica film cameras. And as much as I love Leica film cameras, I remain profoundly ambivalent about Leica digital cameras. God knows I’ve tried to like them. I own an M8, my second, bought shortly after I sold my first and regretted not having it around. It’s an interesting digital camera, unlike the bloated plastic and magnesium monsters offered by Nikon and Canon. But the economy of means possessed by the film cameras somehow feels absent in the Digital M’s, the traditional M’s restrained simplicity having crossed over in the digital models to an ostentatious austerity, attention to necessary details having evolved into the excessively fussy.

The digital M’s even look inauthentic in some undefined way, maybe in the way a self-consciously “retro” edition looks in relation to the real thing. If it were just the aesthetics of the cameras themselves, I could overlook it, but it’s the experience the digital versions provide that’s unsettling for me. Every time I use my M8 it feels odd in some way, like a simulation of the “real” experience I enjoy when using a film M. The cameras themselves might share a similarity of form, but that’s where the similarities end. The respective experiences themselves bear almost no relation to each other. You might as well be engaged in different activities. And isn’t that traditionally why photographers have loved and used Leicas; why they’ve always paid a premium for them, the simplified elegance of the photographic act they allow?

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The tools you use to create structure what you create. In Shop Class as Soulcraft, Matthew Crawford argues that genuine agency arises in the context of submission to the tools we use, tools that have their own intractable ways. The important thing to remember, if you agree with Crawford, is that the experience we can have is dependant on the tool we chose to use. The design of a tool conditions the kind of involvement we will have in the activity. Some tools are better adapted to the requirements of skillful, unimpeded action, while other tools can prevent skillful self-assertion and can compromise the experience of seeing a direct effect of your actions in the world.

I would argue that this is especially true for photography. You can choose digital technology for its quickness and ease of use, but at the certain cost to your own creative autonomy and of your experience of the craft you are engaged in. Or you can use traditional analogue processes and more fully engage your own skillful involvement to create something.

Valentina, Red’s Java House, San Francisco, Arista.edu 400 @800 iso in Diafine.

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While the digital/analogue argument will seem a tired exercise in nostalgia for most photographers, there remain deep biological factors at play that militate against it ever being completely resolved for some of us. Historically, creating something required a tactile interaction with materials and substances, the result of a deep intelligence that could not be learned without material manipulation and embodied experiences and an understanding of the cause and effect relationship that exists between actions and their consequences.

The hand and handiwork is a major thing that sets humans apart as a species. The earliest divergence of the species that evolved into modern humans began with an evolutionary reconfiguration of the hand allowing sophisticated tool use. You can make the case that this is, literally, what defines us as human animals, and argue that rationality, what is commonly understood to be the uniquely human, came along as a byproduct of the use of tools, as sort of a evolutionary development of the neural software necessary for tool use.

Digital virtuality is propelling us further and further away from physical, tangible experience. What is lacking in the new digital photographic paradigm is the physical experience of photography, the activity that has traditionally constituted photography, the physical making as part of the creative process. The singular final print, the end result of a chosen process of varieties of film, the mechanics of the camera, the physical activities of developing and printing.

We are in danger of losing the sense of the photograph as a physical thing. A photograph is not only seen—it is touched, read, received and manipulated. It is fully appreciated only as a product of this physical relationship, and in that relationship it will always remain elusive, a handmade object irreducible to any single dimension. The most detailed digital rendering, what you might view on your computer screen, preserves only a vestige of the physical photograph’s real, dynamic nature. Yes, you can print a digitally produced photograph, but how many people do?

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Contemporary photography has a certain look, a function of its technology. It’s the reason many of us still shoot film. Some of us still see certain creative possibilities in ‘The Film Look’ that aren’t given us with digital capture. So, if and when digital technology advances to the point that it can reproduce the appearance of films and formats precisely, will the process of analogue alone be enough to keep some of us using it? For hand made processes, where their idiosyncrasies are intrinsic to the print, undoubtedly. But what of industrial films, which were designed to react with light in a consistent way without variation?

To paraphrase Elliott Erwitt, photography should be taken seriously and treated as an avocation. We should love the doing of it and do it for that reason. And I think a big part of this is engagement in the process, and in that respect I find traditional photographic processes much more rewarding, partly because they embody a certain set of skills that reward detailed attention and experience. The analogy to cooking comes to mind: Taking photos digitally and editing them on a computer is like cooking a TV diner in a microwave. The film process is a gourmet meal cooked with attention to every step in the process. Film process – how demanding it is to use as a craft — is its enduring strength, but it’s also why film is now a niche with no aspirations to popular appeal, aimed squarely at discerning users, while the convenience of digital has made it the tool of choice for the average guy who just wants to photograph something.

Analogue users belong to the future because they are guardians of the past. Let’s hope we film aficionados, the people who occupy that niche, are able through our efforts to keep film alive for future generations. Technological change is too often a “Faustian bargain” in which something is sacrificed in order for something new to be gained. Will we sacrifice what is of real value in the photographic experience for the new we’ve gained?

The Five Best 35mm Rangefinder Values (That Aren’t Leicas)

Occasionally, I’ll have someone contact me to ask about what rangefinder camera I would recommend they buy. Usually it’s someone new to film and or rangefinder use, and they’re looking to dip their toes in the water without spending the kind of money a Leica is going to cost.

Having had lived through the original rangefinder renaissance in the late 80’s, early 90’s, and being an incorrigable gearhead, I’ve probably owned or tried every variation of non-Leica rangefinder along the way, other than most of the 60’s and 70’s era fixed lens rangefnders from Japan, pedestrian cameras like the Canon Canonet or the Minolta Hi-Matic, which really weren’t meant to appeal to people who might consider a Leica, but rather were that era’s glorified point and shoots. So, with the criteria that it not be a Leica but a reasonable alternative to one; and that it be “affordable” (an admittedly subjection criterion), here are my (admittedly idiosyncratic) choices if you’re looking for the rangefinder experience without all the humbug, and costs, that comes along with owning a Leica. By “rangefinder experience” I mean this: 1) its got the be a rangefinder, obviously; 2) it’s small and compact; 3) it allows manual use i.e. you control shutter speed and aperture if you prefer; 4) it allows you to change lenses.

So, moving from better to best, here’s my favorite five best non-Leica values:

5) The Konica Hexar AF ($400 with lens): yes, I know, its got a fixed lens, which should immediately disqualify it, as it doesn’t meet the criteria I myself set. But….the 35mm f2 Hexanon that comes with it is an excellent lens, the equal of that $2000 Summicron you’re lusting over, and the camera itself such a perfect little jewel, incredibly inexpensive for what it is, that its made the list anyway. And yes, its AF, but the AF is pretty much bullet-proof, maybe even to this day the fastest, most accurate AF you’ll find. As for those who claim a camera with AF “really isn’t” a classic rangefinder because, well, it just makes things too easy – just remember, you get no points for difficulty. The point is to get the shot, and for that, the Hexar AF is brilliant, especially when working indoors. Plus, it’s got a stealth mode that’s super quiet, quieter than any Leica. Really, the only downside of the camera, other than the fixed lens, is that its highest shutter speed is 1/250th, which makes shooting pictures of fence rails at f2 in bright sunlight for the amazing bokeh problematic. Then again, you can’t always have everything.

4) The Nikon S3 Millenium w/ 50mm f1.4 Nikkor ($1500-1800 LINB on Ebay): yes, I know it’s pushing the affordability criterion, but hear me out. Imagine if in 2000, celebrating some corporate milestone, Leica had made the decision to remake the iconic M3 from the ground up, the exact same camera offered in 1954, hand made to the same exact specifications as the original – no cost-cutting- and coupled it with a new, modern coated Summilux 50mm f1.4. Imagine as well that these were eagerly snapped-up by collectors and speculators for about $6000 a kit, and were usually put aside, still in the box, to await the massive value appreciation you assumed they’d someday command. Suppose as well that now, 15 years later, for some bizarre reason, collectors and speculators, usually from Japan, would now sell you the full kit, basically new, for somewhere between $1500-$1800. Would you want one? Of course you would. You’d sell your children into slavery to get a kit like that at that price.

Well, that’s what Nippon Kogaku (Nikon) did in 2000 when they decided to re-offer a brand new Nikon S3 rangefinder coupled with a modern version of the venerable 50mm f1.4 Nikkor. And you can easily find one now, like new in box, between $1500-$1800, which is crazy, given that the lens itself is every bit the equal of the best 50 Leica is offering now. And the S3 itself is an amazing camera, possessing a solidity and quality feel equal, but different in its own way, to the best Leica M’s. Those who are familiar with the Nikon F will feel at home with the S3, given the F shares the same body architecture – essentially, Nikon created the F by taking an S3 and putting a mirror box in it – the detachable back, the wind on, the funky position of the shutter button. Like the M3, it’s unmetered, and like the M3 the viewfinder best accommodates a 50mm FOV, although there is a native frame for 35mm. At $1500 for body and lens, it’s a killer deal.

3) The Konica Hexar RF ($500 body only): The best AE M-mount camera ever made, including the M7. I prefer it to the M7 if you’re looking for an AE rangefinder because 1) it’s a 1/4th of the price of an M7; 2) it has a built in motor (an expensive add-on the M7; 3) it’s got a viewfinder magnification that allows use of a 28mm without external viewfinder, 4) it’s got a normal, swing-out back that allows trouble-free loading; and 5) it’s built like a tank. It takes any M-mount Leica lens you want to put on it. It’s the first camera I put in my bag when I’m shooting film, usually with the excellent 28mm M-Hexanon, or the equally superb 50mm M-Hexanon.

2) The Contax G1 w/ 45mm f2 Planar ($450 body and lens): You either love this camera, or you hate it. I love it, as in love it. You can buy a G1 body for $125. It’s got a titanium outer shell (you’ll pay $25,000 for a titanium M7), a built in motor (expensive add-on on an M7), AE, and AF. It’s the AF that seems to drive some people crazy, although the folks it drives crazy tend to be, in 2016 US presidential political terminology, “low information” photographers. Any “defects” of the AF system have more to do with the photographer than the camera; if you treat it like a point and shoot, you’ll have problems. To properly focus it, do this: point that little rectangular box in the middle the viewfinder at what you want to focus on; half cock the shutter; hold the shutter half-cocked while you recompose any which way you like. Voila, a perfectly focused photo. It really isn’t rocket science. Plus, you get to use the best trio of 35mm lenses ever made for a rangefinder system – the Zeiss 45mm Planar, the 28mm Biogon, and the 90mm Sonnar (the 35mm Planar, while the least awesome of the bunch, is no slouch either). Four incredible optics, the 45mm as good or better than anything you’ll ever find elsewhere, which you can pick up used for $300-$400, the 28mm Biogon easily procured for $300. A titanium body to support them, $125. Seriously?

1) The Leica M5 ($800-$1200 body only): Yes, I know it’s a Leica…but it really isn’t, at least if you listen to the internet hive mind, most denizens of which have never seen one, let alone used one. The M5 is, in my mind, Leitz’s great, misunderstood masterpiece, the high-water mark of Leitz’s hand-assembled, cost is no object rangefinders. The M5 made its debut in 1971, the first M with an exposure meter – in this case, a TTL spot meter still the best meter ever put in a film Leica. Big, bright .72 viewfinder, .68 base rangefinder, well-thought through ergonomics unbeholden to the “iconic” M design.

Unfortunately, it flopped in the marketplace, no fault of its own, rather a function of broader industry trends (the move of professionals to SLR systems), boneheaded decisions by Leitz ( introducing the CL simultaneously at 1/5th the price), and, most importantly, rejection by Leicaphiles because it didn’t conform to the iconic M2/3/4 design. Which isn’t to say it wasn’t a brilliant camera – it was, and still is, even today, a better camera than the M6 that proceeded it. However, all but the most discriminating Leicaphiles continue to simply ignore the M5, as if it didn’t exist, usually because they’ve bought into the common view that it’s too big and too ugly, “not a real Leica M.” Bullshit. It’s the best metered Leica M ever made.

Leica Announces New Digital M3D: “Back to Our Roots”

Mike Evans tries out the new M3D on a crisp April morning in Bad Wolkenkuckucksheim (Photo: George James, Leica M-P and 50mm Apo-Summicron)

An M3 with a digital back: This has been the holy grail of Leica M photographers ever since the relatively bulky M8 was announced in September 2006. Why can’t we keep the size and weight of the film camera but have the advantage of digital, they wondered. Now they can have the best of both worlds.

Leica has today met this demand from a vocal majority with the announcement of the Leica M3D, a camera that has identical appearance, dimensions and weight to the first M, the M3, but with a digital sensor replacing the film plane. It was shown to the press this morning in the popular spa resort of Bad Wolkenkuckucksheim near Wetzlar.

Advance lever

The M3D offers the very essence of digital photography combined with the simplicity of film shooting. The only adjustments possible on the M3D are aperture, shutter speed and ISO. Even the ISO is not automatic, it has to be selected manually by means of a central dial on the back of the camera where other digitals would have a screen.

In a nod to tradition, the M3D even sports a film advance lever, just like the original M3. You have to advance this after every shot to re-cock the shutter and remind yourself that you are shooting digital film.

The M3D is similar to the M7 film camera in operation. It will accept any M lens and will be welcomed by rangefinder enthusiasts who have become frustrated by digital bloat and the emphasis on in-camera processing that epitomises most cameras on the market these days. Surprisingly, in view of the retro feature set, the M3D offers an auto shutter speed setting similar to that found on newer digital M cameras and on the still-current M7 film camera. This enables aperture priority shooting which is what most rangefinder photographers prefer.

RAW only

The Leica M3D is one handsome camera and serves to consolidate Leica’s new-found willingness to return to the purity of the rangefinder. The first step in this direction was the stripped-feature M262 but even that did not go as far as to dispense with the screen, nor with many of the processing options and buttons that go with jpg shooting. From now on it’s RAW only and that is how most rangefinder fans like it.

Speaking at this morning’s press conference, Leica CEO Hektor Barnack said that the M3D represents the epitome of the rangefinder experience. “This is das indubitable Wesentliche”, he told journalists: “This is the camera rangefinder enthusiasts have been waiting for. No screen to chimp on, no buttons to press in error while handling the camera, no menus to distract or confuse. It’s a pure, film experience but without the cost of developing and scanning. It is, not to overemphasise the point, back to our roots.”

Stripped down

“Now we have catered for the techno modernist market with the outstanding Leica SL, we feel confident in stripping down the M even further. No longer does the M have to address every facet of the market. For all those photographers who still carry around our film cameras, including the M3, the M3D is likely to be a very compelling alternative.”

I have to say that ever since I tried the all-steel M60 edition, which turns out to be a rather heavyweight progenitor of the M3D, I have been convinced there is a need for a stripped down digital. By offering the film experience but without the film, the M3D is an economical alternative to an older film camera. I for one will not miss the high cost of processing and scanning.

The Leica M3D will be with dealers by the end of May and will cost £3,600 in Britain (including VAT) the same price as the film M7 or the MP.

*This is a reprint of the original scoop, first reported on Macfilos.com by Mike Evans on April 1, 2016. Editor’s Note: Macfilos is a great blog with a lot of interesting content. Check it out.

The Difference Between Black and White Digital and Film Explained

For those of us practiced in traditional silver halide photography, it’s obvious that b&w images (are there really any other kind?) made with film are different than digital b&w. Run your RAW files through any b&w film emulation program you desire and, at bottom, they come out looking different than a native black and white negative. It’s true: silver halide film is capable of certain aesthetic qualities that digital capture simply cannot match. It may be subtle at times, but it’s there, and unlike what some think, It’s not just film grain or lack thereof that constitutes the difference.

It has to do with the differing ways film and digital sensors react to the same given amount of light. Digital sensors are linear. The actual output voltage from each cell of a digital sensor is directly proportional to the amount of light that strikes it during the exposure. As such, you can use three light sources and what you get will be the exact sum of the three. You can then subtract one of them and be left with the exact sum of the remaining two. Etc Etc.

This isn’t possible when using film because film’s response to light isn’t linear. Black and white film records light as degrees of tone. The more light that hits the film, the more grains of silver chloride are converted to darkened silver. However, unlike digital sensors, film does not transform light into tone in a linear 1= 1 fashion. All silver halide films capture tones in a characteristic S curve, the S representing the relationship between a given amount of light and the tone actually produced by a film. Film’s unique qualities have as much or more to do with film’s characteristic tonal response curve — the “toe” at the dark end, and the “shoulder” at the light end. The toe of a film’s curve represents the decreasing proportional differences in negative densities when exposed to lower amounts of light; the shoulder represents the decreasing proportional differences when exposed to higher amounts of light. Digital, being linear, does not produce decreasing proportional differences either in the lowest or highest light.

Ricoh GXR M Module, RAW conversion in Lightroom and Silver Efex

The practical result of the differences in the light sensitivity of digital versus film is this: Negative film is less tolerant to under-exposure in the shadows while digital sensors are less tolerant to over-exposure in the highlights. A film negative will give you deeper, less defined blacks at the bottom end. Conversely, film will give richer, more nuanced highlights at the top end than will a digital file of the same scene.

Digiphiles will claim that given a good enough digital original, you should be able replicate film qualities by adjusting the tonal curve of a RAW file, applying a fairly steep S curve to its exposure histogram in Lightroom or Photoshop. What this misses is the fact that the RAW digital file you’ll be applying the curve to, unlike the spectral response of film, captured its exposure values linearly i.e. It didn’t compress brightness values at the light end and darkness values at the dark end. This means that you’ll be applying a post-process S curve to a digital file that has much different native information than does a film negative of the same scene – particularly with respect to highlight detail (or the lack thereof). Where film, with its shoulder, compresses and thus saves highlights, digital’s linear response to highlights is more apt to record bright highlights as pure white, devoid of detail, what we call “clipping” of the highlights, while at the same time giving more shadow detail and thus less deep blacks. For highlight detail, this means that you’re often starting with a RAW file with lots of native shadow detail but whose highlights have been rendered as pure white i.e no detail. Applying a film-like S curve to such a file will mimic film’s deep blacks (by simply compressing out existing details) but cannot mimic film’s highlight detail because the emulation software, no matter how clever, can’t turn pure white into highlight detail.

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RAW converters, both as post-processing software and in camera as jpgs, will apply some form of tone curve to the image to give it a more “natural” film-like output. Once your RAW file has been converted, you can then use a dedicated b&w emulation software like Silver Efex to apply appropriate tonal curves and grain characteristics to mimic specific film stocks. What’s interesting here is that you’ll be applying two different curves digitally – the initial curve from RAW to TIFF or Jpg by your RAW converter, and then a secondary curve applied to the (already curved) file by the emulation software. When using film, there’s only one embedded curve – a function of the film and developer combination.

HP5 in D76

This is why film gives better, more pleasing b&w highlights and more detail than does a digital file run through film emulation software. Details in highlights require native information to work with; they can’t be reconstituted after the fact by software when the capturing medium has clipped them altogether. A RAW file, being the result of linear capture, will contain less native information in the highlights, and no amount of RAW conversion or secondary film emulation will reconstitute highlight detail that isn’t there to begin with. Another way to put it is this: the information needed for nuanced highlights is either there to begin with (film), or it isn’t (digital), and no amount of post-process tweaking can add highlight details when highlights have been “blown” or “clipped” i.e. are recorded as pure white.

Leica: Please Make a Decent High Speed Film Scanner

Muhammad Ali on my TV, 1974. This is the stuff you find when you scan your old negatives

Patek Philippe, maker of exquisite hand-made mechanical watches for the one-percenters, justifies their stratospherically priced goods with following advertising slogan -” You never actually own a Patek Philippe, you merely take care of it for the next generation.”

I think of this when I think of my film Leicas, which, to my mind, embody the same mechanical timelessness as does a vintage Patek, albeit at a much more forgiving price point. A Leica M3, or a Iiif, one dad bought 60 years ago, still works just fine, no obvious end in sight. Your grandkids, were they of a mind (seriously doubtful, though, in an age of instant digital communication), might easily be loading it with Tri-X (probably now manufactured by some niche film concern) and photographing their grandkids with it come 2056.

There’s something comforting about that thought, a certain continuity of tradition that’s been almost wholly swallowed up by digital technologies. Traditional silver halide photography – film photography and wet printing – has become a niche within a niche, having been, within the last 15 years, completely bludgeoned on two major fronts: Communication is now digital, and the immediacy of the internet, WiFi and iPhones have caused a complete consumer embrace of digital.

Call me completely clueless, but I’m happy to chug along enjoying the pleasures of what I think of as “photography,” loading film into cameras, controlling what my camera does (as opposed to my camera controlling what I do) via shutter speed, aperture, metering and choice of film. And choice of development. It seems to me that I’m practicing a wholly different craft than the one most “photographers” practice today.

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I’ve recently embarked on an epic quest to digitize every negative I’ve ever shot since 1970. It’s my one concession to the digital age; like many of us otherwise tried and true film photographers, I’ve succumbed to the inevitability and ease of digital printing as an acceptable hybrid solution to the continued use of film.

To do so, however, requires serious dedication, because the process of scanning negatives with a consumer grade scanner is incredibly time-consuming and monotonous. My Plustek scanner, a nice little piece of equipment, takes about 3 minutes to scan a 35mm negative to approximately 30 mpx. Given I’ve accumulated over 300,000 negatives since 1970, all nicely sleeved and sitting in orderly binders, I figure that if I dedicate 8 hours a day, every day of the week going forward, I should be finished when I’m past 120 (not theoretically impossible as I’m a remarkably youthful 57 as we speak).

Me, a very long time ago

Of course, such unfortunate realities push many of us over to digital capture, where we can shoot to our heart’s content and fill hard drives full of 36 mpx RAW files at the mere push of a button. What’s not to like, right?

I’m sorry, but the whole digital process simply doesn’t do it for me. Somewhere, deep in the recesses of my being, probably encoded in some archaic section of my lizard brain, is the idea of photography as a craft that produces tangible things via tangible processes. Photography needs to smell like fixer. It needs to afford you the opportunity of choosing a film and developer, of hanging a roll of film to dry, of contact sheets.

But it’s not just the process, but the result as well. Currently working now with reams of negatives from the 70’s, I’m constantly struck by the difference in the aesthetic quality of my film photos when viewed with an eye now acclimated by the digital aesthetic. Film looks different. It has an unmistakable fullness and perfect imperfection that’s been swallowed whole by the sterile perfections of digital. Run your Monochrom files all you want through Silver Efex 2, tweak those sliders all you want, add an overlay of faux Tri-X grain, and it still looks, well…like digital. It will never look like a well-exposed film negative, no matter how many S curves and grain emulations you apply. Might it be a sufficient substitute for an unsophisticated digiphile? Probably, but anyone who has spent any time shooting and developing film can notice the difference immediately, and it’s not a marginal difference, but a subtle yet profound aesthetic difference that really matters to how your photos transcribe a subject.

So, some of us, the hard-core holdouts, have been experimenting with ways to make scanning faster and more efficient so that we can continue to use film cameras as viable working instruments and not merely objects to fondle. To that end, I’ve employed an unusual scanning solution that’s completely transformed my ability to shoot lots of film without becoming back-logged and overrun with undeveloped, unprinted film photos.

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A year or so ago I purchased a Pakon scanner on Ebay. In the early 2000’s Pakon made film scanners for retailers who developed film. The scanners themselves were professional grade, able to quickly analyze, correctly expose and scan uncut rolls of film in 2-3 minutes and give you 6mpx tiffs. In the last few years they’ve been showing up on Ebay in good numbers, the result, as I understand it, of a national chain that got out of the film processing business and sold off their scanners. I grabbed one before they became well-known, really cheaply.

Somewhere in New Jersey, 1976

The Pakon F135 Plus is a really well put together machine. It gives better scans out of the box than any other non-drum scanner I’ve used. It’s fast, efficient and makes scanning almost effortless. I say almost, because, as always, the devil is in the details. These Pakons are orphaned, no longer supported or serviced. They operate with proprietary software that runs on Windows XP computers, XP being outdated now by at least a decade. In order to run one, then, you’ve got to find an old computer with XP on it and use it as a dedicated scanning computer, and then you’ve got to jimmy-rig the software to run on a PC; either that, or figure out some way to run XP as a virtual machine on a current computer, which, I’m told, is a complete pain-in-the-ass.

So I’ve bought the best XP laptop I could find and use it to power my Pakon. The next problem is constantly transferring the reams of resulting tiff files from the laptop to my editing computer for editing and storage. To deal with that issue, I had a software guy design a ‘push’ program that automatically pushes the resulting tiffs from my laptop to my editing computer via a network cable. Now scanning in bulk is super-easy: develop rolls of film in batches of eight in a large Patterson tank, let dry, run the uncut rolls through the Pakon, load em into Lightroom, and voila, you now have 8 36 exposure rolls of film, fully scanned and loaded into your editing software, 30 minutes max. As for archived negatives that are cut and sleeved, remove em from their sleeves, hand feed them into the Pakon in strips of 5 or 6 and the Pakon processes them quick and easy and sends them over to Lightroom, no fuss.

Needless to say, this has re-invigorated the use of my film cameras, not just as objects to fondle, but as photographic tools. Unless it’s something quick and easy – and throwaway – I almost never reach for a digital camera anymore.

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Which is really cool, because it allows me to actually get my film photography out there, in people’s hands, or more usually, in front of people’s eyeballs via digital media. Usually these ‘people’ are born and bred digiphiles, having known nothing else, who consider my attachment to film cameras as evidence of incipient senility. You know, the old clueless guy who thinks he’s hip but is really just embarrassing himself. (It doesn’t help that I’m still rocking a ponytail, wearing camouflage shorts and expounding the brilliance of Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited to kids in their 20’s). Tsk. Tsk. But, the problem in convincing them otherwise is this: they rarely get to see my film photos, given the labor intensive means of producing them. There’s been a running joke in my circle of friends for years: don’t worry about him and his ever-present camera taking pictures of you at the most inopportune times; you’ll never see em – “he’s shooting film!” Laughter all around.

Not anymore.

Christina in Paris

I recently had the honor of transporting my niece Christina, a fine young lady who lives in the nether regions of USA flyover country, to the UK for a semester abroad. Being 20 y/o, and never having been out of the States, a chaperone was needed, at least to get her there in one piece. I was nominated. We first went to Paris to visit friends. I took only a film camera – a Hexar RF and a bag of HP5 – which I used to chronicle her trip for posterity. [As an aside, this put to bed any notion that x-ray machines will fog your film. Between a connecting flight in the States, then to Iceland, Iceland to Paris, Eurostar from Paris to London, then everything back again, my bag full of HP5 must have gone through at least 8 full scans during the trip. No fog.] Upon return home, I developed about 20 rolls, scanned them quick and sent out some shots via an extended email to update family and friends about her trip. The responses were interesting. Almost to a person, they noted how ‘cool’ these simple b&w photos looked. Nothing like what they got with their iPhones. “How do you do that?” was a typical reply. Easy. Learn how to be a real photographer and shoot film.

Somewhere in the UK, 2016. HP5@800 in Diafine.

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Film is not dead. It doesn’t need to die unless we let it, and that, to my mind, would be tragic in a very real sense. An entire expressive medium and unique aesthetic gone the way of the mechanical watch in the interests of the quick and easy. It’s our choice as people dedicated to the craft – Leica M6 or iPhone, Patek Philippe or Apple watch?

The problem going forward,as I see it, is the failure of the market to offer us film users a viable means of efficiently digitizing our negatives. Progress on this front was never paid attention to as all R&D efforts went to the emerging competitive digital camera market. Film technology available to the consumer simply stopped developing around 2004. No one solved the film to image, or film to digital post processing issue. Granted, some revel in the old post-processing ways as a “slow boat to China” method of enjoying photography … which makes it a shrinking market unsupportive of any manufacturing advancements that would attract new users in great enough numbers.

What we film users need is a good scanner, a scanner that can efficiently scan negatives in bulk, and quickly. Something like the Pakon (see, it can be done), but updated with software and features to run it on today’s computers and to couple it quickly and easily to post-processing software. It seems to me that this is right in Leica’s wheelhouse. It would offer us film users a practical solution for using our film cameras as viable tools instead of as sentimental throwbacks. It would compliment the sale of new Leica film cameras. It would be incredibly seductive to the hipster crowd in Austin and Brooklyn, Paris and Beijing, not to mention us old dudes. It might just save film photography as a viable photographic option going forward. If Leica can find the time to build something as funky as an M262 digital camera without LCD, surely they can build us film Leicaphiles a decent bulk scanner. Are you listening, Leica?

The Duality of Leicaphilia

When I speak of “leicaphilia” in what follows I’m referring to the love of all things Leica that animates many of us partisans of the iconic Leica brand. If you don’t suffer from it you probably won’t understand it. If you just read about it, without having suffered from it yourself, with all the semi-mystical attributes often ascribed to Leicas by folks who should know better, you’d be within your rights to dismiss the whole phenomenon as simply another irrational mania that afflicts humans in a myriad of ways, whether it be in the form of the religious or political, psychological or philosophical. Even for us long-time Leicaphiles, suffering the most from the malady, it’s difficult to justify many of our enthusiasms in our more rational moments.

I understand, and I’ve often used this blog to try and deflate some of the more pernicious claims seriously addled Leicaphiles sometimes make – you know, your Leica makes you a better photographer, or you’re not really serious about photography unless you use a Leica, or there’s an identifiable ‘Leica Glow’ one gets when using Leitz optics, or one can easily identify negatives and files produced by Leica cameras and Leitz lenses, or your M8, with its obsolete sensor and abysmal DXO score, somehow still produces files rivaling what you can get with a Nikon D5.

And then there’s all the ancillary crap attempting to hitch its wagon to the exclusivity that association with Leica can provide – bags, grips, leather cases, thumbs-up contraptions, lens hoods, soft release shutters, red dots, black dots to cover up the red dots, replacement leather skins of various textures and hues, and my personal favorite for ridicule, Frankensteinian dual hot-shoe brackets that allow you to mount both an external finder and meter on the top of your diminutive little IIIf, akin to putting a lowering kit and spinning neon wheels on your beautiful vintage BMW 2002.

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I don’t pretend to be a ‘fine-art photographer’. Photography for me is a process of documenting things, of keeping records. As a documentarian, I try not to romanticize the tools I use. And, while, emotionally, I’m still stuck in the film era, from a practical perspective the ease of digital wins out when I need something with a minimum of fuss or on a deadline. (When I need something absolutely permanent, however, film always wins out). My philosophy, when it comes to choosing a camera to use for a given need, is this: grab whatever works best. Lately, that usually means a Nikon D3s or, if quick and easy, a digital Ricoh, or, for what’s really dear to me, a film camera, preferably a rangefinder – an M4 or M5, a Hexar RF, a Voigtlander Bessa R2S or a Contax G, all great cameras – or a Nikon F5 loaded with HP5.

Amsterdam, 2015, Hexar RF and 28mm M-Hexanon, HP5 @ 800 in D76

It’s really only peripherally about the camera you use. It’s ultimately about the photographs you create, and the photos you create are a function of your technical mastery of your tools coupled with your aesthetic and reportorial sense. It’s about understanding shutter speed, aperture and depth of field, mastery of exposure; using the correct lens for a given task; understanding how perspective changes with distance and focal length; understanding the physics of the color of light; and last, and most importantly, knowing what’s important to point your camera at.

Having said all that, I’m just as susceptible to all the nonsense than are the unapologetic fanboys who give Leica a bad name in more serious circles. I obsess over the particulars of thoughtfully made photographic tools — the tiny details done just right, the haptics of a knurled knob or the aesthetic balance of chrome and vulcanite, the muffled ‘thlunk’ of a mechanical shutter.

Damn if I don’t spend a lot of my time fondling my film Leicas, ‘exercising’ the shutter while waiting for the decisive moment, or just simply carrying them around with me, admiring them for their mechanical beauty. Right now my enthusiasms seem to be centered on a Leica IIIg with cool vintage 5 cm lenses attached. Of course, tomorrow it might be different; I could very well pick up an M2 and switch emotional gears, now proclaiming it the coolest camera ever, or a black M4 mounting a Summicron that feels sublime in use. It need not even be a Leica. It could be a Nikon S2 or SP or F or even an F5, a Hexar RF or my current obsession, a Bessa R2S. Consistency, I must admit, is not my strong suite when it comes to my irrational attachment to film cameras. In this I am in agreement with Salvador Dali, who advised that it’s best to frequently contradict oneself so as not to be predictable, because the worst, the most boring one can be is predictable, consistency being, as Oscar Wilde once noted, the last refuge of the unimaginative.

The sorts of fondler’s interactions many of us enjoy speak to a need that is embedded in our relationships with traditional film photography, a tactile enjoyment of the process of photography and the pleasures given by the finely crafted tools we’ve used in that process. A fascination with, and admiration of, the tools themselves is part of what drew us to photography in the first place, and us fondlers have no need to apologize for this.

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Our often irrational attachment to our old cameras, I think, is ultimately about a desire for permanence in an endeavor whose technologies now evolve at warp speed. The charms of really nice film camera are many: the look and feel of tools well-crafted for long use, the familiarity created by using them for decades. It feels nice to use a camera for a long time. Do you remember the digital camera you were using 15 years ago? Mine was a Nikon d100. And there were those funky experiments that wrote their files to 3.5-inch floppies. Remember those? See where this is going? In 15 years, at our current pace, you won’t even recognize your ‘capture device’. In any event, I have no interest in having to learn the nuances of a new technical device every other year.

Its why I love my iiif and iiig, my M4 and M5, my Nikon F and S3. Mechanical cameras, and the technology they embody, can be passed down from fathers to sons and daughters without the need of technical manuals. Learn the traditional skills of photographic capture: aperture, shutter speed, film speeds, and you’re able to figure out the marginal differences of any mechanical camera in a matter of a minute or two. In learning to master it, it becomes an habitual extension of your way of seeing, rather than a device that stands between you and what you see. I can pick up an M4 after not having touched one for years, and can still immediately operate it almost unconsciously. If I let my digital camera sit for too long, invariably I’m scrolling through menus and submenus trying to figure out some basic operation, usually standing flat-footed while what I grabbed the camera for plays itself out unphotographed.

The advance in digital technologies is stunning, but it has vitiated quaint notions of any practical longevity for a camera, even those, like Leica’s, that still pay lip-service to the idea that you might purchase a camera with longevity in mind. Camera product cycles now track the cycles for computers, because your digital camera is a computer. Manufacturers fight to see who can cram the most buttons on the back of their latest image capture device, and ‘camera nuts’ dutifully hand over their money for the latest best new thing. Hard-core consumers, longing for the next thing even as we’ve just laid hands on the current version, are where the money is, so as we queue to buy the latest ‘must have’ camera we reinforce and reward manufacturers and help perpetuate the very process by which we remain dissatisfied, perpetually craving the next update. I suppose, given the realities of consumerist capitalism, these cycles are inevitable and will remain with us as Nikon and Canon, and to a lesser extent Leica, cram more “new and improved” digital cameras down our throats well into the immediate future.

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When it was new, a Leica M4 camera cost a lot of money. Fast forward to 2016, and a simple online calculator using the Consumer Price Index (CPI) indicates that the relative purchase price of an M4 today would be $7,080.00. This answer is obtained by multiplying $1500 (approximately what a black M4 would cost new in 1974) by the percentage increase in the CPI from 1974 to 2015. So, a new Leica M4 in 1974 cost about the same, in real dollars, as a new Leica MM costs today. But the difference is this: when you bought the M4 you expected to use it for decades. I have an M4 made in 1974. It still works exactly as intended and I use it often. It’s not just a collector’s piece that sits on my shelf. I will eat my hat, however, if that MM you buy today will still be in your bag in 15 years, let alone working. And forget 40 year-old Monochroms. In a relatively short time you’ll have to sell it at a loss, or its electronics will fail and you’ll be out-of-pocket for its replacement with something else. This is the current reality now that cameras have gone from being something like a durable good, as was the M4, to a consumer electronic commodity that you replace every two years or so.

Maybe, leicaphilia isn’t simply about fondling and exclusivity; maybe it’s also the most prominent manifestation of a fading photo-cultural memory that many of us value highly and don’t want to see disappear. I’m convinced there remains a market for modern cameras (even with electronics) that are intuitively simple and built, cameras that eschew the technological dead end in favor of efficiency and directness of function, yet we often sneer when someone like Leica gives them to us. Some of us still like the notion of over-built even if there is less intent to keep something forever. It speaks to a psychologic longing for some sense of permanence in a temporary world.

Part of what makes us leicaphiles, more than just the fetishization of a particular camera, is the appreciation of the tools we’ve traditionally employed as photographers, when a Leica or a Nikon, Canon or Hasselblad film camera was the simplest, best means to do what was important. Our camera was our tool, and we built a relationship with it that lasted for decades. It’s this that’s been lost in photography’s evolution, a sense of rootedness and tradition that spanned product cycles. A simplicity and directness, a tactile pleasure in the use of our photographic tools, seen in the continued appeal of slow-boat analogue techniques and of old Leicas.

Paris Photo 1976

Jacques Revon, 1976, Paris Photo

The first time I ever went to the Paris Salon de la Photo was in 1976. At the time I worked as a technician and photographer for the Société Lumière / Ilford in St Priest where I’d been employed for five years.

This was the golden age of the beautiful black-and-white silver gelatin print, the kind your eye lingers over, although the power of color photography was already on the rise, most notably attracting professional photographers with the famous Cibachrome process. – Jacques Revon

Leica Monochrom vs. a Leica M2 and Tri-X

Above are two pictures I shot in the autumn of 2014 in Glasgow. Both with a 28mm Summicron ASPH and a B+W red filter. The top picture was shot on my M Monochrom mk1, the lower picture on my M2, loaded with Kodak Tri-X film.

The M Monochrom is an incredible camera, and it’s as close to shooting black and white film as I’ve yet come across. It’s also versatile since the ISO can be altered from frame to frame, and convenient, because the images are instantly available.

The M Monochrom is also very sharp. In the M Mono shot attached here, you can zoom in and count the ridges and veins on some of the leaves. With the film image from my M2, there is less detail, but a more beautiful veiling grain, especially in the sky.

Crucially that’s the difference. I’ve made both of these images into prints, and everyone who has seen them, including me, instantly prefers the image shot on film. It just looks nicer. In the M Monochrom shot, the tree trunk has a kind of plastic look to it.

Film requires more dedication than digital. But when you get a shot that you’re happy with, you’re always glad you shot it on film. It looks nicer, and you have a negative, a permanent record of the event, whereas with digital, you’re always worrying that the file will become unreadable one day.

Colin Templeton is a newspaper photographer for the Herald/Times/Sunday Herald/The National in Glasgow, Scotland. You can see his personal work here

The Ultimate Camera

The Role of Chance

Imagine that you set out on a walk at a certain time, having intended to do it at that time and not another. Two blocks from your home you meet a stranger with a weapon. He assaults you. Neither the fact that he is where he is, at that time, and you were where you were, at that time, are accidents. But the convergence of both acts is.

Of such cases, Jacques Monod, the Nobel winning scientist and author of Chance and Necessity concludes: “Chance is obviously the essential thing inherent in the complete independence of two causal chains of events whose convergence produces the cause of the accident.” These chance accidents, Monod concludes, are essential for reality to exist, for they create the possibility of “absolute newness.”

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The English art historian Horace Walpole was entranced by a Persian fairy tale about three princes from the Isle of Serendip who possess super powers of observation. In a letter penned in 1754, Walpole suggested that this tale contained a crucial idea about human creativity: “As their highnesses travelled, they were always making discoveries, by accident and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of.” And he proposed a new word — “serendipity” — to describe this talent, which was a creative skill rather than merely a result of luck.

Monod and Walpole were onto something that most creatives understand and nurture. Serendipity and chance breed the creative. It’s an idea of the artistic process that has a deep pedigree. Leonardo Da Vinci suggested that art students observe the random spots and stains on walls, for in those creations of happenstance the artist would find an unrefined beauty, untainted by the complications of the rational ego.

In my experience, the most interesting photos aren’t summoned; they just happen, at times and in a manner of their own choosing. It’s less down to your skill than to your preparation. The best you can do is be open to it, ready and able to recognize and receive it when the chance manifests itself. Hence, the old adage “f11 and be there.” But it’s anathema to current photographic trends, with the fetishization of the super-sharp and hyper-real that’s accompanied the digital age. And that’s partly why I value it so much. The most enjoyable photographs, for me, are random. They are the happenstance convergence of optics and light. And in this sense they are always unique, singular, uncontaminated with cliched compositional considerations, more in line with a reality with too many possibilities to be reduced by the false values of clarity and precision.

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I find that being outside of the mainstream of photographic practices has liberated me in creative ways, differentiating what I do and how I do it from the general photographic culture. Given that I’ve gotten off the technological hamster wheel, I feel free to allow the serendipitous into my practice. Stick a lens on a body – any lens, any body – and shoot. Point at stuff and shoot – out car windows, walking down the street. Just shoot. Don’t worry about how sharp your lens is, or what film you’re shooting, or the tonal range of the scene. Don’t bother metering, just guess. But shoot.

I like to take my camera with me while driving – an old meterless Leica with a 35mm lens, loaded with HP5 pushed 2 or 3 stops, exposure guessed at, focus approximated – and point it out the window occasionally and depress the shutter. Sometimes I get an image I like and I keep it.

Street Photography on the Way to Work

By Frederic Strauss for Leicaphilia. All photos by Mr. Strauss (Leica IIIg, 35mm Summaron, Tri-X @ 800)

In the early 1990’s I was using a bunch of different cameras. I like small, stealthy cameras for a variety of reasons. I was using a couple of auto cameras, a Contax T, a neat little Canon pocket camera and my ‘big’ camera was a Minolta SRT 101.

A business partner’s father had recently passed away, a doctor, and he had told me he would lend me one of his dad’s Leica cameras. I waited, with great anticipation, but after a few weeks he told me he could not find them and that one of his brothers may have taken them. Disappointed and tired of waiting, interest now stirred, I rented an M6 with a 35 Summicron for a weekend. The feel of the camera, the manual control, the simple interaction with the Leica were wonderful. I shot a few rolls, returned the camera on Monday and dropped off the film for development and contacts. The next evening I looked at the contacts and that was it – I was hooked on the shooting experience and results. Totally. That Friday I bought an M6 and a 35 Summicron. I gave away the Minolta and lenses to a friend who could not afford a new camera system.

I still use the M6 today with my favorite 35 Summicron. I’ve added lenses over the years but still mostly use the 35 Summicron. Eventually I did get the promised Leica cameras from my business partner, bodies only, an M3, IIIc, a IIIg, all as gifts. I purchased screw-mount lenses for the IIIc and IIIg. I use the cameras on an impromptu basis. The screw-mounts really connect you to the process of capturing the image you are after.

I carry one of the cameras with me almost constantly. When I go to work I walk less than one block from the train station to my office in Manhattan, certainly a photo rich environment. Since the year end light is much less in the morning I push Tri-x to 800 to give me more latitude to shoot at a higher speed, particularly with the 35 Summaron F3,5 on the IIIG.

Frederic Strauss is an architect in New York City. He uses a Leica M6, an MP and IIIg with a 35mm.