Help me make a life long investment (buying advice)

raid said:
You are motivated for a long term relationship with Leica. My M3 is over fifty years old. It functions like new. If you need a meter, get a CV Meter II for the flash shoe of the M3. If you want to use a 35mm lens with the M3, use the enire viewfinder. The M3 was made for someone like you.

There are many excellent lenses.
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+1 with Raid.

Also there are lenses with google if you want to use 35mm on M3. ;)
 
Thanks so much for the replies everyone. Let me elaborate a little further, I shoot a whole lot, both digital and a fair amount of 120 and 35mm,however buying a leica and using it for the remainder of my life is more (for me) a spiritual experience and therapeutic process. I have never been able to keep a journal or diary but i have always been able to express myself through photography. I plan to keep shooting digital professionally and for many of my jobs/personal projects I will shoot digital(all depending on what the right tool for the job is) the leica isn't something that is going to be my only camera but it will be the only camera to be with me constantly, for jobs and such i will break out the digital gear, but for sheer documentation of my life and my experiences will be on the leica.

As for the film supply going dry, over the next 20 years i'm confident that at least black and white will be around, and by the time i should have put myself through college and gotten a decent paying job in law or photography(my chosen paths) and i will stock pile like no other, probably with whatever i can get my hands on. Even if i have to limit my shooting to 2 36 rolls a month. I'll need to stock pile 400 rolls which isn't too crazy.

as for prints and stuff I plan to do a lot of hybrid processes, shooting film and scanning digital, but ofcourse i will be in my school dark room making prints until they ask me to leave. But the major love of it for me is the negatives, there is something special about holding negatives in your hand. if you destroy negatives than that is it, its over its like the neg is the soul of an image. with digital if you delete a file, you use a file recovery program and its back.

As for cameras i plan to hopefully work something out with km-25. but if that doesn't work i will probably pick up an m3, m4, or m6.

It might seem unlikely but when i was 11 i raised the $600(for 2 years) to by my first camera and started shooting with it. A couple years later reading every single book, magazine, internet article, even stealing photo books from my middle school library just so i could learn and teach myself. After years of teaching myself, I have gotten a lot of recognition as a photographer and i haven't lost an ounce of my desire to continue my education photographically, i few more years and i may need to start looking for a photographers anonymous.
 
I'd go through 400 rolls of film in a few years. If you're as active a shooter as you say, you're probably underestimating how much film you need.

Phil Forrest
 
In the room I'm in now sits a Mamiya-Sekor 500 TL SLR on a display shelf. I bought the camera new with a 50/2 lens 42 years ago this month. The guy at the camera store gave me a nice break on the price because I was a college student, married and had a 3 month old baby I wanted to photograph so his grandparents 400 miles away could see him growing up. Oh, and the winder mechanism was mechanically rough... some sort of manufacturing defect I think.

The 500 TL was a low budget alternative to the Nikon, Canon and Pentax SLRs that dominated the market then. But today the camera still functions just fine (the winder is still not smooth but no rougher than when new). The final roll of Tri-X I will ever shot went through the camera 5 years ago. It needed repair once when I sloppily left a dead battery in it for so long there was corrosion. There's no reason at all not to get a mehanical masterpiece like a Leica, but my lowly, low-budget SLR works just like it did 42 years ago. Film is film and a light box is just a light box. I am not the least bit worried you can use a mechanical film body for six decades.

How you will acquire film 6 decades from now is an entirely different discussion. This issue has been discussed endlessly here and there is really nothing new for anyone to say that hasn't been said many times before by many of us. Obviously you are confident it will be practical to use film half a century from now, so I think this aspect of your plan requires no further discussion.

I suggest you eventually acquire a second (or even a third) back up body as cameras can sudenly fail, be dropped, damaged, lost or even stolen. Also, sometimes it's nice to have a second lens already mounted or a different film instantly available.

It's nice to hear from someone who knows exactly what they want. I wish you well.
 
IMO:

- If you must have an internal meter, go for an M6 / M6-TTL. I never stopped regretting selling mine :(

- If you must have brass, get an M4 or M4-2 (M4-P used zinc) and use a shoe-mount meter like the VCII (however that will slow things down quite a bit)

Good luck with whatever you choose!

My 0.02
Scott
 
Phil_F_NM said:
I'd go through 400 rolls of film in a few years. If you're as active a shooter as you say, you're probably underestimating how much film you need.

Phil Forrest
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Yea, i mean normally i would shoot a lot more but in the event that the worlds film supply goes dry i would have to limit my shooting. but while the film supply is still ample i will definitely be shooting a lot.
 
There is nothing like the M3. No meter but the VCII works fine until you hate how it ruins the form of your Leica and start guessing at exposure and realize that you are pretty good at it with 400 speed B&W film. Good luck and I hope you reach your goal.
 
I got my M3 a few months ago and it will be my 60+ year camera. I recommend to get one in good cosmetic condition as well as inner so you can experience every scratch of the way!
 
I did not read every post in this thread, it's just too long and I'm too tired.
I too am 18 and I would also like to be shooting physical media 60 years from now.

You want an M6. Not true brass, but ages beautifully. Mine was born in 1986 and has just gone in for it's first service last week. Failing that, M4 or M4-P with a Weston Master V. I'd also stock up on a range of films, 'cause you can 'go off' a film in an instant...(or be like me and *shock horror* not like Tri-X)

I'm very relieved that other people with an interest in photography do in fact exist in this age group, though :)
 
willie_901 said:
In the room I'm in now sits a Mamiya-Sekor 500 TL SLR on a display shelf. I bought the camera new with a 50/2 lens 42 years ago this month. The guy at the camera store gave me a nice break on the price because I was a college student, married and had a 3 month old baby I wanted to photograph so his grandparents 400 miles away could see him growing up. Oh, and the winder mechanism was mechanically rough... some sort of manufacturing defect I think.

The 500 TL was a low budget alternative to the Nikon, Canon and Pentax SLRs that dominated the market then. But today the camera still functions just fine (the winder is still not smooth but no rougher than when new). The final roll of Tri-X I will ever shot went through the camera 5 years ago. It needed repair once when I sloppily left a dead battery in it for so long there was corrosion. There's no reason at all not to get a mehanical masterpiece like a Leica, but my lowly, low-budget SLR works just like it did 42 years ago. Film is film and a light box is just a light box. I am not the least bit worried you can use a mechanical film body for six decades.

How you will acquire film 6 decades from now is an entirely different discussion. This issue has been discussed endlessly here and there is really nothing new for anyone to say that hasn't been said many times before by many of us. Obviously you are confident it will be practical to use film half a century from now, so I think this aspect of your plan requires no further discussion.

I suggest you eventually acquire a second (or even a third) back up body as cameras can sudenly fail, be dropped, damaged, lost or even stolen. Also, sometimes it's nice to have a second lens already mounted or a different film instantly available.

It's nice to hear from someone who knows exactly what they want. I wish you well.
Click to expand...

In the room that i am in sitting in I actually have a mayima sekor 500 DTL with a hanimar 135mm haha

and i have a few other cameras, I have a canon 60D, yashica model A, and couple cheap 35mm slrs. I have a few back up cameras, and i'm sure i will eventually pick up another leica body later in life just to have but i want just one body to be my photographic best friend if you will haha. I'm not inferring that i NEED a leica, or that any other camera won't suffice. I'm sure i could pick up a slr and it would work fine. But if i am going to attempt to carry a camera with me all the time for a very long time it would be nice to have a camera that i really like, and the value of the camera kind of adds to the magic of the project, shooting a life long project with a cheap camera is cool, but shooting a life long project with one of the worlds best cameras is kind of magical in a way.

Also I am going to really try to do this project, and if what many of you say is true and i won't be able to stock pile film than so be it, atleast i tried, and maybe at that point i will buy a digital leica and continue my project.

atleast i am getting a leica to shoot with and not to put on my shelf and look at. I think of it this way, sure i am dropping alot of money on a camera(and for me, this is alot of money) but its an experience and I am passionate about photography enough to want to do it and i know that the camera i shoot doesn't effect my photos, i know i can take great photos with a nikon, or a canon, or a kodak and i have taken good photos with them. But thats not what this project is about in my opinion, every problem has its tool to fix it. If i shoot a wedding, i'll go full frame digital, if i am shooting skateboarding i'll go bronica with a fisheye, if i am shooting commercial i'll go large format, but if i am documenting my life i'll go with a leica, especially because most of its use will be street and off the cuff type shooting and i couldn't think of a better camera for that than a leica and a 50mm.

But hey if worst comes to worst, i'll sell my leica, its not like there is a shortage of people wanting leicas. But i'm not gonna refuse to do something because something else might happen in the future, that concept does't make sense to me. If a force greater than my own desire prevents me from doing what i want to do than there is just nothing i can do about that, but i'll be damned if I'm gonna say "oh well then there is no point in trying because some future inevitable occurrence will happen that will foil my plans."


again, thanks everyone for helping me out!:)
 
Carsten said:
Yea, i mean normally i would shoot a lot more but in the event that the worlds film supply goes dry i would have to limit my shooting. but while the film supply is still ample i will definitely be shooting a lot.
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In the event that film is unattainable, get a 4x5 and shoot glass plates. Score and cut the glass yourself. Etch and size it for your emulsion to stick to then coat it with the photo-sensitive emulsion of your choosing or own creation.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, you can buy 400ft and 1000ft cans of B&W 35mm movie film. 100, 200 and 400 ISO. If you're dedicated to a Leica body or bodies, get a few reloadable Leica film cassettes. You'll save a lot of money in the long run.

You're going to have to learn how to make your own developer and fixer to use traditional light sensitive metal emulsions because environmental regulations are probably only going to get more stringent and with the future disappearance of silver halide emulsions, the chemistry will go too. This is where your darkroom cookbook comes into play.

Back to gear, find the focal length you like best in a film camera then look for that lens made by Leica. Summilux, Summicron, Elmar, Elmarit, whatever. Save up for the lens, but it, then if you're on a budget, buy a less expensive M mount body like a a CV R2a or something along those lines. Save up more and eventually get your Leica M body. It took me a year to save up for my old M2 and a few lenses, none of which were Leica. What I should have done was to buy the DR Summicron that I later bought THEN to buy a Leica body.

All that said, Canon and Nikon both made some amazing lenses in their RF line as well as in Leica thread mount. Those lenses still can hold their own against modern optics and most of the older RF lenses add a kind of look or signature to your images that most modern optics don't. You'll get spoiled by fast apertures as well. For years my slowest lens was a 21mm f/3.4 Super Angulon. I was shooting an M4, M8 and M9. Now with my digital system, my fastest lens is f/2.8. I still have my film Nikon RFs but just don't shoot them much due to the expense and not having access to any developing equipment or a scanner at the time.

But just sticking with one camera isn't going to work for you. :D
You'll love the Leica but you'll want to try another body type from an earlier or later generation (brass v. steel gear trains, early type condenser 35/50/90/135 finder v. later non-condenser 28/35/50/90/135 finder, etc.) Then there's always getting into Nikon, Canon, Contax, Kiev, Diax, Minolta, Kodak, Kardon and many other systems. Not for collecting, of course, to shoot! I was completely smitten when I got to handle the Nikon SP of a fellow RFF member at a meet up in NYC. Now I have a whole system composed of all but the very rarest lenses and it's fantastic. And very inexpensive.

It's about the images but there is something to shooting with different cameras. Their handling and ergonomics change the way you work, the way you see when you're out doing what you do.

Phil Forrest
 
You know what you want as I did at your age. I mowed lawns and washed cars all Summer at age 13 to buy an FM2 and a 50, did not care what anyone told me to save for. As good as my M6TTL would be for you, if you are a 50mm man, there is nothing on this earth that compares to a finely tuned M3 with one. I have owned and used an M3, M6TTL and even a rare MP-3 and the M3 is "the" Leica to get with a 50mm. Since the shutter release has no meter attached to it, the feel of the release is astoundingly smooth as is the film advance on a single stroke model...

This is a tough call now that I know you are shooting mostly a 50. On one hand, the M6 is most likely the best bet because it is more modern, has a meter, tons were made in consideration of spares or spare parts and it is fantastic with other lenses like the 28, 35, etc.

But on the other hand, if you were to find a late serial number M3 in great condition, have DAG give it the once over and then put a 50 Summicron on it.....that's it Carsten, nothing else but your life, the world around you, a nail called Tri-X and a hammer called Leica.

Either one will do, they are wonderful cameras and lenses...
 
I just got my M3 more than a month ago and I love it! I've been using it without a meter, but I am planning on getting one very soon.
 
I got my first leica in 1965, a M2 as my father said: Your techique is so lousy that you should have a decent camera to look like a professional.For him it was a leica. After that a MP, several other leicas ( M4-2, M4-P , eventually an original M3 DS) most of the other stuff, Nikons, hasselblads, Fujis, Sinars etc are gone, Leicas remain, even digital ones. Yeah, you can say leica is for a lifetime. The best part with a leica is that "you don`t look like a professional" with that little toy camera, everybody takes it as a point & shoot camera.Go ahead, nobody knows what is the camera to use in 2072, maybe a computer linked to our googles...
 
Another vote for the M3. I have both an M6 and an M3 and I actually prefer shooting with the M3, with which I use an external meter.

Coincidentally, my very first SLR was a Mamiya Sekor 1000 DTL, which I bought new at the PX at Ft. McNair in Washington, D.C. in approximately 1973. I'm guessing I probably looked at buying the F2, but the Mamiya was so much cheapter (and I was not rich in those days) that I decided to go for it rather than the F2.
 
To all the people who think that in 60 years film might not exist, I am sure this little gadget will be reality by then: http://re35.net/ so OP will be able to continue to use his beloved film Leica....
 
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