35mmdelux
Veni, vidi, vici
ZI framelines dont move and plastic outside VF? After owning Leicas no can do..
bwcolor
Veteran
I've never had framing problems with the Ikons. I have many more Leica cameras and only two Ikons, but the Ikons are more pleasant to use because of the viewfinder. The one thing that gets me is that I really love the feel and sound of the mechanical 'M's shutter. Really, a crazy irrelevant reason to use one camera over the other. I don't shoot in quiet environments...
whitecat
Lone Range(find)er
I have both. The viewfinder is much better in the ZI.
thegman
Veteran
The answer, is to have both and use both, as I do. My ZI is most of the time coupled with the 35/1.2 Nokton, and I use it primarily in low light, the combination of excellent vision and great balancing with this lens makes it an ideal night photography combo.
Got an Ikon, never used an M7, however, if money were no object, I'd be compelled to get an MP instead of an M7. Otherwise, the Ikon is marvellous, and while I am over precious with it, I'd be way more so with the expensive M7.
Outstanding photo BTW.
35mmdelux
Veni, vidi, vici
While this may be true, the robustness of the M7 coupled with a variety of VF magnifications (mine is .58) makes the M7 I prefer by far.
Mister E
Well-known
Have you actually tried the Ikon? The 28mm lines are as useable in the Ikon as they are in the .58 Leicas, but the camera has the accuracy of .72....
sanmich
Veteran
I think the RF patch doesn't move.
I'd be very surprised if the ZI wasn't correcting parallax.
Mister E
Well-known
The only plastic viewfinder window is in the Leica. The Zeiss Ikon is etched glass.
Neare
Well-known
amateriat
We're all light!
The M7 is sublime (in certain ways), and the ZI is wonderful. But I've lived with a pair of Hexar RFs for eight years, with fairly heavy use. And that's been my first choice, period. I've had use of an M2 for about a year, and if the owner would sell, I'd have that as a companion body, but since that's not in the cards, I'd choose a ZI in a heartbeat...almost a non-motorized kissin'-cousin of the Hex, IMO.
Mind you, this is a very personal thing: none of the cameras mentioned here is anything less than damned good.
- Barrett
Mind you, this is a very personal thing: none of the cameras mentioned here is anything less than damned good.
- Barrett
thomasw_
Well-known
Actually I believe it is ,74x --- and the VF is very clear and bright which is a key to good focus accuracy.
Mister E
Well-known
Thomas, you're right. http://www.zeiss.com/zeissikon
kshapero
South Florida Man
Maybe I was brought up funny but owning a Leica always made me nervous that I would break it or scratch it. Everyone has their cutoff point, I guess. :angel:
Neare
Well-known
True, I could imagine.
Perhaps thinking like this means unconsciously you're thinking about its resale value down the line. Whereas others who love to brass theirs etc. do it to make it that much more personal, because it is a camera for life.
Just a thought.
kshapero
South Florida Man
I suspect you are correct on that.True, I could imagine.
Perhaps thinking like this means unconsciously you're thinking about its resale value down the line. Whereas others who love to brass theirs etc. do it to make it that much more personal, because it is a camera for life.
Just a thought.
smile
why so serious?
m7. definitely m7
P. Lynn Miller
Well-known
Interesting I have always been quite firmly in the Leica camp largely because of the quieter shutter and transport.
But after I burnt a hole in the shutter of my M5 and its meter decided to give-up the ghost, I sat down and made a list of my wants and wishes for my working RF...
Similar shape and dimensions to the M5... find the Bessa R-series and the 'normal' M's too small...
A metal shutter that I can confidently point into the sun... I can live with a noisier shutter as long as I have the M5 for quiet assignments
Long EBL rangefinder... removes the Bessa R-series
Accurate TTL meter... eliminates the Nikon RF's
After mulling this over, thinking about a modified Nikon SP or M5... I realised that I pretty much described the Zeiss ZI. Only question does the ZI couple to 0.7m... could not find a definitive answer.
To be honest, I was not that impressed with the time I have spent with the ZI, but then I had a definite criteria that required a quiet shutter and film transport for various assignments that I had at the time. I am not fond of AE cameras, but as long as manual exposure control is intuitive and straight-forward, this is not a bad feature.
I was in the market for a chrome M5 as a second RF body, but I am thinking that I should take a look at a used ZI as a possible alternative.
But after I burnt a hole in the shutter of my M5 and its meter decided to give-up the ghost, I sat down and made a list of my wants and wishes for my working RF...
Similar shape and dimensions to the M5... find the Bessa R-series and the 'normal' M's too small...
A metal shutter that I can confidently point into the sun... I can live with a noisier shutter as long as I have the M5 for quiet assignments
Long EBL rangefinder... removes the Bessa R-series
Accurate TTL meter... eliminates the Nikon RF's
After mulling this over, thinking about a modified Nikon SP or M5... I realised that I pretty much described the Zeiss ZI. Only question does the ZI couple to 0.7m... could not find a definitive answer.
To be honest, I was not that impressed with the time I have spent with the ZI, but then I had a definite criteria that required a quiet shutter and film transport for various assignments that I had at the time. I am not fond of AE cameras, but as long as manual exposure control is intuitive and straight-forward, this is not a bad feature.
I was in the market for a chrome M5 as a second RF body, but I am thinking that I should take a look at a used ZI as a possible alternative.
Mister E
Well-known
Manual exposure on the ZI sucks. If you plan to shoot mostly manually I wouldn't buy one, but the AE is divine!
The ZI couples to .7m.
The ZI couples to .7m.
P. Lynn Miller
Well-known
Nathan,
Can you elaborate? It was a few years since I handled a ZI and when I heard the shutter and film transport volume, I lost interest pretty quickly.
Thanks!
Mister E
Well-known
I very much love my Ikon. It is probably the fastest camera to shoot on earth. It also has the best finder of anything I've ever stuck my eye up to.
This being said compared to a Leica I hate using the manual exposure mode. I never even need to look at the shutter speeds in AE mode, they are generally out of site to the left of my field of view. I wear glasses, no idea how this would affect a more well sighted shooter, but it is slow and paintful to shoot manually using the finder. The speeds blink at you until you have adjusted the camera to the correct one. For TTL metering not much is more pleasant than the Leica MP, but that camera has build issues.
For me I normally take an Ikon for night and strange light situations and a M2 for everything else with a L-308 meter. For shooting with an external meter the Ikon is great, but the shutter speed dial is made of plastic so it doesn't feet great with a lot of use either. Again, the cameras two strongest suits are its AE and finder.