How to hold a Leica?

[Fabian]

Hello together

As the weather was relly bad today I took a few pics of how I hold my Leica and wanted to ask, how do you?

I never found a perfect solution to have a Leica ready to shoot, not having to fear to drop it any second, or to have pain in your hand.

So far this is the best combination for me. I use a sling, but with my index and middle finger and not as recommended with middle and ring finger.
And to give it more hold I use a Luigi case, but I think any Leica grip will do fine.

This way I have it ready for action, no worries about dropping and can carry it for hours without pain.


Looking forward to lots of ideas


Fabian

 

[tripod]

How to hold a Leica?

With your pinkie finger extended, of course. 🙂

 

[sepiareverb]

Well this circulated the last time this topic came up...:angel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzqqpy7_xPI&feature=related

 

[RdEoSg]

Nice canon....

How do the little finger strap thingies work there btw? I've always thought those looked like they'd be annoying as hell!

 

[Shac]

In my experience as a right-eyed shooter, pushing the camera against the bridge of the nose while viewing, increases stability greatly - don't press too hard or it can make you sound funny when you talk 🙂~)

 

[Ronald M]

Nikon wedmaster has it perfectly.

 

[hans voralberg]

I find the breathing to be personal, some do it better stop breathing, some prefer breathing out slowly. Just have to try.

 

[Scarpia]

Everyone seems to have forgotten wearing white gloves.:angel:
Kurt M.

 

[JoeV]

I guess I wasn't taught right. I can't even bend my left hand so that it's palm up without extracting some twinge of a reminder of my age, especially with my left elbow against my chest. I can almost do it with fingers forward, and the base of my palm toward my face, but not very comfortable, however, and certainly not with the hand positioned sideways relative to my face. It just feels like I'm hyper-extending my wrist backwards.

~Joe

 

[wontonny]

How to hold a Leica?

With your pinkie finger extended, of course. 🙂

Well I keep my right hand with all fingers on the front vulcanite thumb flat against the back and one finger on the button. The left hand... well I keep my middle finger on the focusing tab so I flip everyone off I take a picture of 😉

 

[furcafe]

I don't know, seems to work fine for my street shooting, just a matter of practice.

When using a lens w/a tab, I will hold the camera more w/the fingers of the left hand, as opposed to the lower part of the palm. Here are photos of me holding a Contax IIa & Nikon S3 2000, neither w/tabbed lenses, but I would use the same grip if I were using a Leica, etc. w/a tabbed lens:

For me, a lot depends on the weight distribution between the lens & body--when I use a long lens or a heavy old-school SLR, I tend to hold the camera in a manner more like that shown in Fred's picture.

Fred thanks for the explanation, though I can't really find it to be comfortable to hold a camera this way especially for street shooting.

The other thing that comes to mind is how inconvenient it could be to focus a lens that uses a tab for instance.... Nikon and contax/kiev RFs would be easier it seems.

 

[Chris101]

Most of these examples are for landscape format. Portrait format is trickier because it's too easy to get your hand over the viewfinder or rf windows. Here is my technique:

It's very stable.

 

[der.chris.tian]

When I take pictures upright, I also tend to hold like Chris in the last picture.... but with the exception, that I'm looking through the viewfinder with the left eye. Therefore, I still have a connection to the people I photograph, because my face isn't fully covered with a big black box. Okay... and the left hand on the lens, of course.

I came to that when I saw a documentation of a german photographer called Jim Rakete:

 

[Ara Ghajanian]

That's funny. When I should portrait mode, I rest the camera on my left hand, not right. It's much quicker than switching eyes and/or having your nose in the way.

I used to rest the camera on my palm before I bought an M. Now I just hold the lens with my left fingers. I find the Leica M too small to use that SLR technique.

 

[swoop]

I just hold it up to my face. Nothing special.

 

[Vincenzo Maielli]

Search in the web the classic user manual of the Leica M2 or M3: you can see the picture of the perfect "holding system" of the Leica M series.
Ciao.
Vincenzo

 

[jarski]

anybody compose a shot with both eyes open ? I've read its possible, but jest cannot do it, especially focusing closer is impossible. I don't know which eye triangulates which line in rangefinger area in the camera 🙂 or does it even matter ?

edit: ups.. went to OT. oh well.. 🙂

 

[drewbarb]

I often shoot with both eyes open using a 50mm or 90mm lens. I use M3's, and their high magnification helps. I've played with some old Nikon RF's, and the Bessa R3 camera, all of which have 1:1 finders; if Leica made one, I'd have it. I focus ignoring the info coming in through the eye not behind the camera, then compose using both eyes. It screws up my vision to close one eye and look through the camera too much, so I do it as little as possible.

To answer the OP, I generally hold the camera with both hands while shooting. My left hand supports the body and handles focus, and my right hand controls the advance lever, shutter speed and release. Pretty standard stuff. When shooting verticals, I usually hold my right hand up and left hand down.

When I'm out in a crowd, street shooting, at a wedding or other situation where I might want to be able to interact with people and generally look more like a person and less like a photographer, I carry the camera in my left hand, the body in my palm, fingers wrapped around the lens and the neck strap around my wrist. The camera is well protected, always ready, and much less conspicuous than a camera around my neck. Plus, it leaves right (dominant) hand is free to do other things when not shooting.

 

[Nh3]

when there is no film in the camera just do shadow photography and switch between horizontal and vertical positions and see which hold is the most natural to you and which grip allows you the fastest and yet steady switch from horizontal to vertical.

 

[fbf]

I often shoot with both eyes open using a 50mm or 90mm lens. I use M3's, and their high magnification helps.

I guess that depends on which eye you use to focus. I am left eye shooter and I cannot focus w/ my right eye for some reason...but I did try the instruction in leica manual which you hold the camera w/ both hands while both eyes are open. It feels awkward but it somehow makes sense...