Best M type camera ?

Best M type camera ?

  • M1

    Votes: 1 0.1%

  • M2

    Votes: 227 13.3%

  • M3

    Votes: 248 14.5%

  • M4

    Votes: 153 8.9%

  • M5

    Votes: 72 4.2%

  • M6

    Votes: 268 15.7%

  • M6TTL

    Votes: 157 9.2%

  • M7

    Votes: 155 9.1%

  • MP (new)

    Votes: 384 22.4%

  • MP (old)

    Votes: 11 0.6%

  • MD's

    Votes: 5 0.3%

  • Barnacks ( screwtype )

    Votes: 30 1.8%
  • Total voters
    1,711
I am twisted inside and out wanting to buy an m6...this thread isn't helping...especially since I just ended up buying this baby.

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Hi Magus,

You really want to buy a Leica with the word "Leica" splattered on the front twice(or the words "Leica" and "Leitz" for the earlier models), three red dots (roundel, lens and lens release!!), not to mention the ghastly zinc to which at least the chrome plating (if you want the chrome) takes to like... tin?? You want to buy a Leica which, if you happen to drop it on the sidewalk, is likely to crack?? (Yes, the RF alignment will probably stay intact... ) You want to pay all that money for a camera that doesn't even have a proper viewfinder?? (Try the flare, you'll just love it!)
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Come on, stop beating about the bush and just tell us straight - do you like the M6 or don't you? :D

Cheers,
 
I agree with another poster that the best M is the one in your hand. I love my MPs. The sense of quality is incredible ad they are a pleasure to own and use. The M6 did not for me feel the same. How much this is worth to you only you can say.

I would happily shoot with any metered M. For me however I wanted an MP (for many reasons already stated) and so for me that was obviously best!. There is no such thing as a universal truth (no debate intended) and that is an undisputable fact ;)
 
It's a pretty tough question and I think the answer depends on what you intend to use the camera for exactly... if it's to put on a shelf to be admired then I think the M3 (in mint condition, or black of course) would be my number one choice, owing to the superiority of construction, classic looks and history behind it.
To actually take photos with, I think the MP is the best bet given it's unsurpassed set of features and excellent build quality. (by modern standards)

That said I'm extremely happy with my M2.
Slow film loading aside there has never been a time when I feel I could've come away with a better shot by using different camera, unless it was on those days I didn't have a pocket meter with me and had to guess exposures.

Truth is I think too much is probably made of the difference between all of the M series cameras. They're all great, and all supremely capable in the right hands.
 
I've a somewhat ambivalent relation with my M4..

There are aspects of it that I really appreciate. Amongst these the virtually silent shutter, the viewfinder clarity and the rangefinder spot that doesn't go blank or fuzzy if my eye is not exactly centered.

There are also some things that I don't really care for, like its lumpiness, the film loading and the parts that fall off. I even had to kitbash a lens release catch from a piece of scrap metal. Now that's no fun!

But if you take my list, these traits are shared and similar between all models (with the possible exception for the VF/RF which is absent on the MD/M1).. so I must concur with the statement that the best M is the one you have with you..
 
I use my M6 nearly every day and I can't say the (very occasional) flare issue has caused me any anxiety at all. Nor the zinc top plate.

I have no idea if the M6 is the "best" M ever made, and I don't really care, any M is a very good tool for making pictures and everything else is emotional attachment and fondlerism (a disease we all suffer from, but which should be resisted).

Ian
 
To add my humble opinion: the (new) MP. This is simply the perfection out of all Ms build before ... (I agree with whatever Magus has written about the MP in this thread or elsewhere).

Thomas

P.S.: I love my M2 despite or because it has no build-in-meter
 
No need to get flighty Magus. I though rxmd put it exceptionally well earlier in the thread:

The main difference between the M6 and the MP is IMHO that the MP is mainly an emotional camera. It's for people for whom the minor improvements and the "return to quality" (as if the M6 was bad!) represent enough emotional added value to spend the extra money. Leica is now positioning its cameras with an explicit reference to this emotional undertone, which fits in with the general 1990s and 2000s trend towards "authenticity" as an ideal in products. In a way the M6 is to the MP what a good basque cap is to a 200 EUR txapela, hand-made from hand-dyed wool by a 85-year-old master hatter in a village near Oloron, and bought in a design shop in Paris. If you choose the latter, the actual difference in quality is not so important as the association of quality with back-to-the-roots authenticity and its emotional value.
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I'm well aware that "fondlerism" isn't in the OED, but perhaps it should be.

I'm not belittling emotional attachments, btw, just attempting a gentle correction towards judging cameras primarily on their picture-taking qualities, on which basis any M is a fine tool. I'm sure I would very much enjoy using an MP, but I don't think it's a better camera than any other M simply by virtue of its construction. It may be a nicer object, no doubt.

Ian
 
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I like it, but I like it least. I thought I've made that more than clear on manifold occasions. And here I was trying to pour a bucket of ice down cmogi10's trousers , since he said the thread was making him suffer from M6 lust...
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Hehe, but where were you last weekend when a bucket of ice down my trousers might have stopped me succumbing to my own M6 lust? :D
 
Anyone with me, or is the M6's viewfinder the equal of the MP's, M3's, M2's, M4's and I am simply bonkers?
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Being serious for a moment, I'm happy to hear factual accounts of the differences between different M cameras, and opinions as to the relative merits/problems of those differences. I'm especially grateful to hear about what are apparently considered the two main weaknesses of the M6 - the flare-prone viewfinder and the zinc body parts. I have, as it happens, just bought an M6 (paid for, anyway - it's on its way), and I did so with the opinion that the two possible problems are ones I'm happy that I can live with at the price.

I don't think there's anything "emotional" about openly discussing such issues, and had I not read this discussion I could not have made such an informed choice.

So I offer my thanks.

(And I suspect that if I had more - well, some - experience of M cameras I'd probably think the new MP was the best in absolute terms, but that the M6 is best for me right now at the price).

Cheers,
 
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