My Dad’s M8.2

[NathanJD]

Fabulous shot! lovely film and lovely camera and I have observed these units falling in price myself. still not cheap enough for me to buy without receiving a thick ear from the missus though 😉

 

[BJ Bignell]

... or is there still some life left in the old notion ‘my Leica today is my Leica for life and even my kid’s Leica once I’m gone’?

Doesn't Leica still sell the new MP? And I believe that there are also plenty of very reliable used models on the market.

Since you're smart enough to pose these questions, I presume that you can also see past the marketing and consumer hype. If you want to buy a Leica as an investment to pass on to the next generation, it seems that the answer is more or less unchanged from 50 years ago.

 

[Petroleum V. Nasby]

Post 9/11 years are like dog years.

Everything is moving seven times as fast.

If you think you will still be able to use your 35mm film cameras in 50 years like they did 50 years ago, you will have to use your Hadron Time Machine to go back and buy film for them.

Or just pretend you're using a film camera in your Holodeck Simulator.

(assuming anyone is alive at all except for the radiation resistant cockroach/human hybrids)

Doesn't Leica still sell the new MP? And I believe that there are also plenty of very reliable used models on the market.

Since you're smart enough to pose these questions, I presume that you can also see past the marketing and consumer hype. If you want to buy a Leica as an investment to pass on to the next generation, it seems that the answer is more or less unchanged from 50 years ago.

 

[itf]

I think continuous, high speed capture streams, with resolution FAR higher than the current state of the art videos, will become commonplace. You'll then merely pluck hi-rez stills from the stream, possibly at many angles, maybe even with three dimensionality reconstructed by the processors.

Lots of interesting things to come in our lifetimes. I don't even think I can imagine what imaging devices are going to look like. Probably wearable or implanted, and you can capture every single moment of your life, and rewind to check anything.

The limiting factor will be review and editing. With regards to the first paragraph, what you describe is starting to happen now.

As for the second paragraph, that was happening a lot more 10 or so years ago; how many families have hours upon hours of video of every moment of the 1994 holiday to the Gold Coast. No one ever looks at it and no one ever edits it.

I grew up in a fairly touristy area and remember regularly seeing folks walking around with video cameras permamnently fixed to their forhead, hardly ever see that anymore (and that's despite huge improvements in editing systems and affordability).

My grandparents have been making home movies since they were married in the 1940's and have progressed from film to video, but never to mini DV or later. The only things that ever get watched are the film home videos, indeed they are the only thing that made it off their original recording media (also on dvd now). My guess as to why? The film had to be short, edited live in camera. The video just built up, nothing got done with it, and that brought the end to filming anything. The moving footage doesn't get looked at as much as photos; they're edited even tighter.

At some point having virtually unlimited possible stills from video to edit from will become more of a time consuming burden than editing live in camera, processing, proofing, editing, and printing.

I believe it was Dostoyevsky that wrote something along the lines of too much choice being the cause of misery.

 

[NathanJD]

Doesn't Leica still sell the new MP? And I believe that there are also plenty of very reliable used models on the market.

Since you're smart enough to pose these questions, I presume that you can also see past the marketing and consumer hype. If you want to buy a Leica as an investment to pass on to the next generation, it seems that the answer is more or less unchanged from 50 years ago.

Thank you, I see your point and I do indeed see through the consumer hype as i pointed out in post number 5. and agree about the MP as again mentioned in post 22 - it is the continuation and evolution of an excellent and timeless product that isn't in question - my request for conjecture was on the likelihood of the M8 providing tomorrow's enthusiast with as useful a tool as yesterday's M3 does today.

Maybe 20 years will bring about the death of film but then whose to say that in that time a sensor as thin and flexible as a 35mm frame of film sticking out of a unit the size and shape of a cartridge won't be a plausible non-intrusive film replacement?

 

[Petroleum V. Nasby]

You're talking about old-school video media. Almost nobody wants to look at them, no less edit them.

But look at the MIT experiments with total life-stream capture.

http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2007/02/lifelogging_an.php

It will be like a personal Akashic record. A company like Google will build in super-intelligent search of your imbedded device files, with immense storage somewhere in CIA headquarters of the World Big Brother Government.

"Show me the first time I met my wife"

"I want to see my father when I was 3 years old, before he died"

"Find me the last time I had my car keys in my hand"

"Pick out 100 beautiful girls I saw in the street, all angles, simulate 3D"

Nobody is going to edit thousands of hours of video or Super Eight film. But when any instant is only seconds away, it will be omniscient.

Not to mention melding and sharing with everybody else.

The limiting factor will be review and editing. With regards to the first paragraph, what you describe is starting to happen now.

As for the second paragraph, that was happening a lot more 10 or so years ago; how many families have hours upon hours of video of every moment of the 1994 holiday to the Gold Coast. No one ever looks at it and no one ever edits it.

I grew up in a fairly touristy area and remember regularly seeing folks walking around with video cameras permamnently fixed to their forhead, hardly ever see that anymore (and that's despite huge improvements in editing systems and affordability).

My grandparents have been making home movies since they were married in the 1940's and have progressed from film to video, but never to mini DV or later. The only things that ever get watched are the film home videos, indeed they are the only thing that made it off their original recording media (also on dvd now). My guess as to why? The film had to be short, edited live in camera. The video just built up, nothing got done with it, and that brought the end to filming anything. The moving footage doesn't get looked at as much as photos; they're edited even tighter.

At some point having virtually unlimited possible stills from video to edit from will become more of a time consuming burden than editing live in camera, processing, proofing, editing, and printing.

I believe it was Dostoyevsky that wrote something along the lines of too much choice being the cause of misery.

 

[Rayt]

What does it matter how long it'll last? As long as you use the crap out of it then you'll get what you paid for.

 

[dont45]

The perfect Leica camera to pass on to your grandchildren, guaranteed to work in 100 years is the m8.mp.😉

 

[NathanJD]

I like it Rayt! Concise and as true as the sky is blue! For me you just hit the nail on the head! no one bought the M3 back in the day because it was going to last - they didn't know it was going to last 50 odd years!, I suppose it's just one of those happy side effects just like pre-fabricated post war housing here in the UK - it was designed to last 10 years max, and a lot of them are still standing, the others only pulled down due to redevelopment or the dredded asbestos

 

[jack palmer]

M8.2 in 10 years = 1. electronic landfill, 2. dust magnet, 3. paperweight, 4. tack hammer😀

 

[NathanJD]

I would personally buy a rangefinder with a sensor in it, and an SD slot in the bottom - no screen, no menus, just RAW files - AKA a camera that does nothing but produce digital negatives that you need to port elsewhere to see, edit and the like. everything else would be manual just like an M with the ISO dial on the back and an M8 style film counter - they did get that bit right in my eyes.

only thing is, I may be the only one in the queue waiting for it.

 

[Thardy]

Anybody knows what is the "life expectancy" of a sensor ? IMO, this is probably the most critical part in the cameras overall durability. I still one a radio/Cd player from 1989, 20 years and still working with LCD screen and so on. I know cameras are more complicated, but apart of technology related issues (SD cards), is it really impossible for a M8 to last 20 years at least ?

I have a TV from 1985, and microwave nearly that old. I bought the microwave back out when our new (5y/o) built in model gave up the ghost a few months ago.

If the M8 is well built why would it not last? I agree about the data storage though. Think of the old PCs which probably still work but you can't find the big floppy disks on which to save your work.

 

[Mr_Flibble]

My point&shoot digital camera is an Ixus V2, 2.1megapixel that I bought in 2002. It makes loud grinding noises from all the dust and sand inside. it's lost a few screws, but the thing still works. The battery is starting to go though and it does freeze on opening or closing sometimes.

I sincerly doubt there will be many current digital cameras in working order in 40 years time, or your grandkids can have the M8.2 upgraded to the M26.8

 

[kipkeston]

"Several years from now, when M8's are selling for well under $1000 and Leica wants $2500 to fix some minor defect, they will be cannibalized by third party repairmen or turned into bookends."

I just had a long exchange with DAG about the possibility of making various FrankenLeica combinations and just about anything I suggested was possible for as little as $300-$600 in parts/labor. Cannibalizing old M6s and M3s is and will undoubtedly continue to be a necessity for keeping film Ms going but as interest in film Ms declines, the inventory for "parts cameras" should grow exponentially while also becoming cheaper. If Leica goes under as a company, the market will become flooded with skilled M repairmen looking to ply their former trade as moonlighters or full-on, next-gen DAGs; clock and watch repairmen will probably get into the action as well.

I don't see the same scheme playing out with M8s. Even if a particular part cannot be sourced to revive a mechanical M, a replacement can be machined for the right price. On the other hand, a dead motherboard is a dead motherboard. I also doubt Leica will ever see the type of sales volume that would lead to a sub-$1,000 M8. "Parts M8s" would not be much different than "Parts M3s" in that most of their salvage value would be in mechanical components, not electronic ones.

Did you ask what he thought about the M7?

 

[sirius]

Lieca doesn't have enough design restrictions already, they decided to add more for themselves! They have committed to the M8 body and years of upgrading all the insides. Their company really exists on its own plane of reality. I'm glad they have survived. It's enjoyable to have a company that thinks so differently than the rest. Though I do wish that their thinking made for equipment that I could afford...It's their game to win or loss and only time will tell if they made the right choices. If they go, I bet you it will be hard and fast.

 

[Petroleum V. Nasby]

All you cheapskates with 1985 TV's and microwave ovens need to go buy some new stuff.

 

[Leica0Series]

I still regularly use a Nikon D1 and an Apple iBook (the original one), both from 1999, so they're coming up on their 10th birthday. Both work as well as they ever did. The iBook is running OS X, too. Not sure about the iBook but I'm pretty sure the D1 will hit 20 years without much trouble, assuming I can still get batteries for it or even care to at that point.

 

[icebear]

I would personally buy a rangefinder with a sensor in it, and an SD slot in the bottom - no screen, no menus, just RAW files - AKA a camera that does nothing but produce digital negatives that you need to port elsewhere to see, edit and the like. everything else would be manual just like an M with the ISO dial on the back and an M8 style film counter - they did get that bit right in my eyes. Only thing is, I may be the only one in the queue waiting for it.

Hi Nathan,
I'd be number two - thing is that would be something resulting from "...ask the serious user what's needed". In today's world it's all about the marketing and the MP with sensor you suggest would be a lovely thing, only every reviewer would be ROFL (rolling on the floor laughing) about Leica and asking if they finally lost it completely. How often you see people on the street checking their digi screens if they got this shot instead of continue to keep there eyes focused on what is happening. The sensor-MP would avoid exactely that.

 

[Tuolumne]

i was thinking the same! the only other time i have seen the use of 'simulacrum' is in a neal stephenson novel.

Jorge Luis Borges, the Argentinian writer, used it frequently in his short stories. Wonderful writer, he.


/T

 

[Tuolumne]

After having owned an M8 for 18 months and having recently sold it due to near-total lack of use, I'm solidly of the opinion that Leica simply got the whole idea wrong. What they should have built was a digital MP -- simple, small, built like a tank, discrete, etc. A LEICA M. What they made is this loud, bulky, buzzing thing that feels more fragile than most midpoint dSLRs.

I doubt very seriously that many people would have balked if news came out that you still had to manually cock the shutter on the new Leica digital and that the shutter only went up to 1/1000th of a second because it's made out of cloth but that it's still dead silent and built like the camera equivalent of an old pair of army boots. Sure, some would chuckle but I believe that curiosity in this new/old camera would have lured more crossover users than Leica's current strategy which seems to be: make it as much like a dSLR so we can regain more market share from dSLRs. The Leica M will always be a niche product and will never compete head-to-head with dSLRs. Meanwhile, those of us who love our Ms because they are discrete, solid and simple little creatures have no real equivalent in the digital realm.

Personally, all I want is an MP with a sensor inside of it, a very simple menu rather than a camera back littered with buttons and dials, and a flip-out LCD screen that allows me to hide it when I don't want to be distracted by a fear of scratching the screen or so that I can simply pretend for an hour here and there that I'm still shooting with a film camera. I think back now and realize just how many things Epson and Cosina got right with the R-D1. Now only if it were built like a Leica and had a rangefinder that didn't go out of whack. What a camera that would have been.

It still is quite a camera. Mine has never gone out of alignment since its first realignment, and it has never given me a moment's trouble. It is my favorite camera still. Its haptics are not as nice as a film Leica's, but it's not too shabby over all. Feels like a CV Bessa in the hand. Highly recommended. It is indeed what Leica should have built - but that would be copy cat, wouldn't it, and Leica could never do that.

/T