Is that a .... ?

H

HMFriedman

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Mar 10, 2009
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This may be a first, and a cause for pause for all those who worry about removing the red dot or obscuring the "Leica" name with tape:

While photographing a street chess tournament today, a spectator turned to me, looked at my M6 and said "Is that a ............... Minolta?". When I said no and apologized, he shrugged and walked away.
 
He was thinking of the minolta cle perhaps?

Several people have asked if my hasselblad was a movie camera. Nobody has ever identified it correctly. A guy once asked if my bessa r2m was an "old German camera". Most of the time people ask "does that still work?" or "does that thing take good pictures?" which always cracks me up.
 
Sometimes you just have to pretend to chimp to keep them guessing! :p

I had an old gent come up to me a couple years ago after spotting my M8 and tell me how refreshing it was to see someone using a film camera in this current age of technology. When I showed him the LCD screen and told him it was digital he was stunned ... I suspect he knew his Leicas but was quite unaware and somewhat shocked that they had made a digital camera! :D
 
I've had one person ask if my Bessa was a CL. My M3 frequently gets called out, usually when I have it up to my eye.:)
 
I went into a barbershop downtown and one of the barbers there noticed my leica. He gasped and said "I had one of those back in Bulgaria, an M4". I showed mine and he gasped again. "What! They made them in Canada? What! You can use Canon lenses?" Then he just shook his head and mutter something in what I assume was bulgarian.

He did make me promise to bring in pictures next time.
 
I was at a Rural King farm store with my M6 and an old employee said "that's a Leica 35mm single lens reflex! Don't see many of those anymore. I still have two from when I was a photographer in the war..."

I wasn't sure what to make of it. A leica owner who really didn't know the difference?
 
For about ten years from 1985, people would mistake my M3 for "a Russian camera". No one said that of the IIIc I had in 2006-07, which was assumed to have an LCD on the back and and over-size lens.
 
"Is that a Leisha?"
"Huh?"
"A Leisha M9?" *points to the silver ZI hanging over my shoulder*
"They sell those here? No, this one shoots film"

He walked away disappointedly. Later that day I ran into a university photographer on an assignment. He saw my camera and asked if Zeiss lenses were any good. He'd never heard of the company!
 
I know it's a RF forum, but I still remember when I just bought a Nikon D70, someone came up to me and said how rare it is to see someone still using film. He was so amazed when I showed him the LCD on the back. Now of course, it's commonplace to see a big black camera with a screen on the back.
 
7/8 year ago I and my wife spent few days in Venice with my grandfather Rolleiflex 2,8f Tlr & my contax g2 kit.The rollei was noticed 4/5 times from aged gentlemen as an old WAR camera.....
 
Oh boy, I'm going to a WWII remembrance meet today. You know, war veterans, old vehicles, that kind of stuff. A local war museum celebrates the liberation of the South of the Netherlands in September 1944.

All good and well, but I plan to bring a Yashica Mat 124 and the M2. Will be fun finding out what they make of it.

As a sidenote, the son of a colleague (about 7 or 8) doesn't even understand the concept of 'film' anymore. You make a picture and you can't see it right away? Such nonsense!
 
Richard G said:
Evening gathering with M2 35 f2 1/15s at f2: "Hey mate, the flash didn't go off - did you know that?"
Click to expand...

I've noticed on a lot of the old M2's that the little window for the flash (just beside the view-finder) often frosts over... There should be a sticky thread for it. ;-)

Regards, David
 
First time I took my M3 out, I got some guy saying he had "an old camera like that" and proceeded to tell me it was a Zenit. Bit of a difference between a German rangefinder and a huge heavy Russian SLR...
 
In Den Haag this spring, walking with my wife, son (in stroller) and father-in-law, a man comes up and asks (in english, which was a little strange since we hadn't been speaking english-my wife and her dad were speaking dutch, and I was busy photographing...) if my M3 was "a Russian Leica? or a German Leica?"
He seemed pretty excited about it all :)

(and yes, I've been asked "does that shoot FILM?" rather incredulously..."I didn't think people still did that!", and also "Wow, that's a nice single lens reflex!"... umm... no, not quite, thanks though)

-Brian
 
No red dot on my M3 and it was ID'd one day while I was out for a walk. First and only time that has happened. Local newspaper shooter saw me at a track meet and asked about the camera. Said something like, "so that's a Leica, cool".

So far no one has ID'd the MP, but I live in a rural area hence my surprise someone ID'd the M3.
 
hehe- just a week ago my bessa r3a was "upgraded" to "THE M8" by some dude with a big dslr.
True, there was a summicron lens on it...
 
I was walking into the Yonge subway station near Yorkville in Toronto (where a lot of the expensive boutiques are) and two very hot very well dressed young women (about 20?) walk past me and one nudges the other and says "oooh... a Leica"

It's been a while since I got a second look from a girl like that, even if it was only for my camera. :D
 
Once I was in Poland shooting some pictures with a Lomo LC-A. The Polish kids made fun of me: "why do you use that Russian garbage?" :)

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