swoop
Well-known
When the M8 started showing up in the hands of photographers we started to discover its flaws.
1. IR issue. Resulting in magenta coloured blacks. I was really miffed by this for the longest time until I splurged and bought IR filters for all my lenses. Not a small expense.
2. Backfocus. A lot of initial M8's, including mine. Had some seriously badly calibrated rangefinders. Resulting in a slew of backfocus issues. I had to manually compensate for nearly two years until I sent mine in for upgrading and subsequently repaired. I can only hope that the M9's coming out of Solm's are paid a little more attention to than the M8's that were rushed out the door.
3. Bad white balance. For a long time I simply set manual white balance. Ever since the last firmware update, I feel the auto white balance is better at getting it right than I am.
4. Loud shutter. For its entire history Leica has been known as a subtle camera. But the M8 shutter was a lot louder than those from the SLR makers. The M8.2 shutter upgrade was a good start. It brought things back to usable levels and made the Leica the reporters camera again. The Pentax K-7 has one of the quietest shutters I've ever heard. And it's an SLR. I only hope the M9 does better in that regard.
5 Battery life. The battery in my M8 lasts for about 470 shots or so. I don't think that's a terrible number. Especially considering the size of the battery. I once spent 5 days on the road and only went through 2 batteries. But still it could be better.
I hope none of these make it into the M9. But we could probably see new issues. I'm primarily concerned about poorly calibrated rangefinders. And severe light falloff on the sensors.
I also think Leica is setting themselves up for another upgrade program. Using a standard LCD cover instead of including sapphire glass. And including the same .68x viewfinder from the M8's instead of using standard .72x or offering .58x or .85x versions. I imagine this is going to help keep costs down initially. But that once enough M9's sell, I feel as if eventually Leica will offer another upgrade program where viewfinder magnification and sapphire glass will be options. I just wish Leica would offer these things from the beginning. Like an a la carte order for the M9. Instead of having to pay more for it a year later.
1. IR issue. Resulting in magenta coloured blacks. I was really miffed by this for the longest time until I splurged and bought IR filters for all my lenses. Not a small expense.
2. Backfocus. A lot of initial M8's, including mine. Had some seriously badly calibrated rangefinders. Resulting in a slew of backfocus issues. I had to manually compensate for nearly two years until I sent mine in for upgrading and subsequently repaired. I can only hope that the M9's coming out of Solm's are paid a little more attention to than the M8's that were rushed out the door.
3. Bad white balance. For a long time I simply set manual white balance. Ever since the last firmware update, I feel the auto white balance is better at getting it right than I am.
4. Loud shutter. For its entire history Leica has been known as a subtle camera. But the M8 shutter was a lot louder than those from the SLR makers. The M8.2 shutter upgrade was a good start. It brought things back to usable levels and made the Leica the reporters camera again. The Pentax K-7 has one of the quietest shutters I've ever heard. And it's an SLR. I only hope the M9 does better in that regard.
5 Battery life. The battery in my M8 lasts for about 470 shots or so. I don't think that's a terrible number. Especially considering the size of the battery. I once spent 5 days on the road and only went through 2 batteries. But still it could be better.
I hope none of these make it into the M9. But we could probably see new issues. I'm primarily concerned about poorly calibrated rangefinders. And severe light falloff on the sensors.
I also think Leica is setting themselves up for another upgrade program. Using a standard LCD cover instead of including sapphire glass. And including the same .68x viewfinder from the M8's instead of using standard .72x or offering .58x or .85x versions. I imagine this is going to help keep costs down initially. But that once enough M9's sell, I feel as if eventually Leica will offer another upgrade program where viewfinder magnification and sapphire glass will be options. I just wish Leica would offer these things from the beginning. Like an a la carte order for the M9. Instead of having to pay more for it a year later.
