insidertravels
Newbie
Hi there,
At the moment, I'm a bit overwhelmed. I've never used a rangefinder camera before, either film or digital, unless it was when I was very young and just don't remember, but I suspect I've never even seen a rangefinder except in online photos. This post is very long and I've probably provided much more information than you need, but I'm hoping to get some useful advice from R-D1 users and/or converts from Canon EOS DSLRs.
I currently use a Canon EOS 20D, mostly with an EF 50mm f/1.4 USM. I have bought and sold numerous other EF lenses over the past two years, but I never kept any of them for longer than about six months, but I could never quite put my finger on any good reason why I sold them - except for the fact that I HATE carrying around so much weight on my back/hips. I'm 5'8" and 130lbs., but I don't consider myself all that strong. Even if I were, my own personal "style", if you will, for everything in my life is "less is more." I just hate having so much stuff to get in the way of experiencing life. I'm also a big fan of being as unobtrusive as possible; that's the way I do web design as well. I guess it's like a universal personal aesthetic I have. I hope this makes at least a little bit of sense.
I've just finished the final project for my interdisciplinary master's degree and am about to get my business started. I can't say I'd be too excited about doing corporate photography like advertising and such. It's just not my style and it doesn't arouse my passion really. I'm more interested in photojournalistic and fine art travel and culture photography. I might do some weddings and such, but only for clients who appreciate a photojournalistic style. The one catch is that I LOVE animal photography as well, though I'm not into birds so much. Of course, a lot of it can be done without those back-breaking telephoto lenses as long as the animals are domesticated or in a controlled environment, but the pundits lead us to believe that we MUST HAVE 600mm+ if we want to be competitive - I can barely handle carrying around a 200mm+TC around for a few hours, and I'm not happy with the picture quality once I get home to my computer. I also prefer NOT to use flash. Every once in a while I'll use fill flash, but I've had two different Canon speedlites in the past but sold them both after only using each a few times. I usually expose manually using an in-camera meter because I think it's helping me to learn photography better than if I were to let the camera pick my exposures all the time.
OK, so here's my dilemma. I've started selling off my remaining EF lenses, except for the 50mm prime. As soon as I know how much money that will bring in, I was planning to sell my 20D and 50mm as well so I could buy an R-D1. I weighed the pros and cons for a fairly long time and thought I'd come to a definitive decision. But I'm having a few last reservations that I was hoping you rangefinder users could help me with.
I've never used a manual focus camera, but all my EOS lenses have had full-time manual focus capabilities, which I've had to use more often than I originally anticipated due to "hunting" issues and the like. To me, it's almost like it defeats the purpose of having auto focus if it doesn't even work properly half the time. Of course, I'm not nearly as experienced yet as most of you probably are, so this could be partially due to operator error, but I don't think I should have to compromise what I want to create simply because the machine overrules me according to its own will. I'm also a bit weary about switching to ONLY manual focus because I'm not currently familiar with how to use a rangefinder, so I'm afraid the learning curve will put me farther behind and I'm afraid I might stink at it and end up with remorse for ditching SLR.
Another problem is that if I do this, I have no choice but to sell my DSLR in order to finance the R-D1 and a Leica 35mm Summilux f/1.4 because I cannot afford to have two cameras or even two lenses for that matter - at least not until I get my business running smoothly. On forums all over the place I keep reading that professional photographers have to have Nikon or Canon or similar in order to get clients (I'm not sure if the same is true outside the U.S.). They say that customers won't take you seriously if you have such a tiny camera, even if it is of better quality, because they can't see past its physical size. They also say you need all the additional features that SLR provides, including burst rates, that fancy new Canon flash metering, autofocus, etc. What I can't figure out is if they're just saying that to scare potential competition into opting for another career path or if they really know photographers who have trouble getting work without the latest, greatest DSLR.
I thought maybe I'd get a Powershot S2 IS or a Lumix FZ20 for doing extra-long telephoto shots, since most of those would be for myself or for books, magazines, online, stock, etc. anyway and wouldn't necessarily need a full-frame sensor for quality. But maybe after getting the hang of a rangefinder I'll find that I really don't need a super-long lens like I thought I would.
If I do opt for an R-D1 and love it, I'll probably save up my pennies to get an M-Digital if and when they are released. But Leica's financial situation is a bit scary, especially since the lens I'm planning to buy costs $2500 U.S. from B&H. I need it to last me literally FOREVER, and since I take such good care of my equipment I have no doubts that it would last me my whole life barring some freak accident.
The last final reservation is the different between the 20D's 8mp sensor and the R-D1s 6mp sensor. On the samples I've looked at from this site and others, I can't tell much of a difference. Can I make just as big of prints from the R-D1 as the 20D? Will Genuine Fractals take care of quality upsizing to 20x30 and bigger because I already have a copy of that I've never used if you think it would alleviate my concerns.
Before you ask, going to film is not an option for me. I've invested way too much time, money, and energy becoming proficient at RAW processing and Photoshop, and I've got the astronomical student loans to prove it. Had I known I'd decide to become a full-time photographer when I started graduate school, I'd probably have quit then and saved myself 20 years of payback misery. Alas, the whole hindsight cliché.
Anyway, as you can see I'm really up in the air about this. Something deep inside me tells me that my personality and style would feel more at home with the simplicity and unobtrusiveness of a rangefinder. But that nagging propaganda voice is telling me that I'll starve, or end up working a desk job (something that would send a person like me to the looney bin sooner rather than later), if I don't keep my 20D and eventually upgrade to a 1DsMII. I'm not a follower by nature, which I guess is why I'm having this crisis in the first place.
Any serious advice would be greatly appreciated and taken under consideration. But please, no trolls or mean people because this is really important to me, and I can't ask anyone around here because there are no Leica dealers in this state and the camera dealers here all say Canon, Nikon, or die and insist that I need a 600mm prime lens and a bomb-proof Gitzo if I expect to compete with them. Plus, many opinions I've read online insist the only people using Leica, or rangefinders for that matter, are washed-up, curmudgeonly technophobes who'll have themselves buried with their film because the digital gurus couldn't pry it from their cold, dead hands.
I know this sounds extreme, but it's basically my creative interpretation of what I've been reading just about everywhere except this forum and the Leica forum. Apparently there aren't many people my age who would consider abandoning the auto-focus SLR realm like this (I'm 28), so I'm feeling rather annoyed that I can't seem to just accept my Canon and be done with it because it IS a very good camera.
Now that my story has become almost unnavigable at this point, I'll open it up for sincere, honest replies.
At the moment, I'm a bit overwhelmed. I've never used a rangefinder camera before, either film or digital, unless it was when I was very young and just don't remember, but I suspect I've never even seen a rangefinder except in online photos. This post is very long and I've probably provided much more information than you need, but I'm hoping to get some useful advice from R-D1 users and/or converts from Canon EOS DSLRs.
I currently use a Canon EOS 20D, mostly with an EF 50mm f/1.4 USM. I have bought and sold numerous other EF lenses over the past two years, but I never kept any of them for longer than about six months, but I could never quite put my finger on any good reason why I sold them - except for the fact that I HATE carrying around so much weight on my back/hips. I'm 5'8" and 130lbs., but I don't consider myself all that strong. Even if I were, my own personal "style", if you will, for everything in my life is "less is more." I just hate having so much stuff to get in the way of experiencing life. I'm also a big fan of being as unobtrusive as possible; that's the way I do web design as well. I guess it's like a universal personal aesthetic I have. I hope this makes at least a little bit of sense.
I've just finished the final project for my interdisciplinary master's degree and am about to get my business started. I can't say I'd be too excited about doing corporate photography like advertising and such. It's just not my style and it doesn't arouse my passion really. I'm more interested in photojournalistic and fine art travel and culture photography. I might do some weddings and such, but only for clients who appreciate a photojournalistic style. The one catch is that I LOVE animal photography as well, though I'm not into birds so much. Of course, a lot of it can be done without those back-breaking telephoto lenses as long as the animals are domesticated or in a controlled environment, but the pundits lead us to believe that we MUST HAVE 600mm+ if we want to be competitive - I can barely handle carrying around a 200mm+TC around for a few hours, and I'm not happy with the picture quality once I get home to my computer. I also prefer NOT to use flash. Every once in a while I'll use fill flash, but I've had two different Canon speedlites in the past but sold them both after only using each a few times. I usually expose manually using an in-camera meter because I think it's helping me to learn photography better than if I were to let the camera pick my exposures all the time.
OK, so here's my dilemma. I've started selling off my remaining EF lenses, except for the 50mm prime. As soon as I know how much money that will bring in, I was planning to sell my 20D and 50mm as well so I could buy an R-D1. I weighed the pros and cons for a fairly long time and thought I'd come to a definitive decision. But I'm having a few last reservations that I was hoping you rangefinder users could help me with.
I've never used a manual focus camera, but all my EOS lenses have had full-time manual focus capabilities, which I've had to use more often than I originally anticipated due to "hunting" issues and the like. To me, it's almost like it defeats the purpose of having auto focus if it doesn't even work properly half the time. Of course, I'm not nearly as experienced yet as most of you probably are, so this could be partially due to operator error, but I don't think I should have to compromise what I want to create simply because the machine overrules me according to its own will. I'm also a bit weary about switching to ONLY manual focus because I'm not currently familiar with how to use a rangefinder, so I'm afraid the learning curve will put me farther behind and I'm afraid I might stink at it and end up with remorse for ditching SLR.
Another problem is that if I do this, I have no choice but to sell my DSLR in order to finance the R-D1 and a Leica 35mm Summilux f/1.4 because I cannot afford to have two cameras or even two lenses for that matter - at least not until I get my business running smoothly. On forums all over the place I keep reading that professional photographers have to have Nikon or Canon or similar in order to get clients (I'm not sure if the same is true outside the U.S.). They say that customers won't take you seriously if you have such a tiny camera, even if it is of better quality, because they can't see past its physical size. They also say you need all the additional features that SLR provides, including burst rates, that fancy new Canon flash metering, autofocus, etc. What I can't figure out is if they're just saying that to scare potential competition into opting for another career path or if they really know photographers who have trouble getting work without the latest, greatest DSLR.
I thought maybe I'd get a Powershot S2 IS or a Lumix FZ20 for doing extra-long telephoto shots, since most of those would be for myself or for books, magazines, online, stock, etc. anyway and wouldn't necessarily need a full-frame sensor for quality. But maybe after getting the hang of a rangefinder I'll find that I really don't need a super-long lens like I thought I would.
If I do opt for an R-D1 and love it, I'll probably save up my pennies to get an M-Digital if and when they are released. But Leica's financial situation is a bit scary, especially since the lens I'm planning to buy costs $2500 U.S. from B&H. I need it to last me literally FOREVER, and since I take such good care of my equipment I have no doubts that it would last me my whole life barring some freak accident.
The last final reservation is the different between the 20D's 8mp sensor and the R-D1s 6mp sensor. On the samples I've looked at from this site and others, I can't tell much of a difference. Can I make just as big of prints from the R-D1 as the 20D? Will Genuine Fractals take care of quality upsizing to 20x30 and bigger because I already have a copy of that I've never used if you think it would alleviate my concerns.
Before you ask, going to film is not an option for me. I've invested way too much time, money, and energy becoming proficient at RAW processing and Photoshop, and I've got the astronomical student loans to prove it. Had I known I'd decide to become a full-time photographer when I started graduate school, I'd probably have quit then and saved myself 20 years of payback misery. Alas, the whole hindsight cliché.
Anyway, as you can see I'm really up in the air about this. Something deep inside me tells me that my personality and style would feel more at home with the simplicity and unobtrusiveness of a rangefinder. But that nagging propaganda voice is telling me that I'll starve, or end up working a desk job (something that would send a person like me to the looney bin sooner rather than later), if I don't keep my 20D and eventually upgrade to a 1DsMII. I'm not a follower by nature, which I guess is why I'm having this crisis in the first place.
Any serious advice would be greatly appreciated and taken under consideration. But please, no trolls or mean people because this is really important to me, and I can't ask anyone around here because there are no Leica dealers in this state and the camera dealers here all say Canon, Nikon, or die and insist that I need a 600mm prime lens and a bomb-proof Gitzo if I expect to compete with them. Plus, many opinions I've read online insist the only people using Leica, or rangefinders for that matter, are washed-up, curmudgeonly technophobes who'll have themselves buried with their film because the digital gurus couldn't pry it from their cold, dead hands.
I know this sounds extreme, but it's basically my creative interpretation of what I've been reading just about everywhere except this forum and the Leica forum. Apparently there aren't many people my age who would consider abandoning the auto-focus SLR realm like this (I'm 28), so I'm feeling rather annoyed that I can't seem to just accept my Canon and be done with it because it IS a very good camera.
Now that my story has become almost unnavigable at this point, I'll open it up for sincere, honest replies.
