Why rangefinder and not SLR?

Recently I put some film in a couple of my slr's and forced myself to use them. (Nikon F4, Minolta XK) I finished the film and now they're sitting on the shelf again and a Rollei 35T is in my work bag.
 
Last edited:
Purchased a DSLR in December.... then just recently an M8. Now the DSLR is seeing less and less sunshine. Although I'm not yet sold on the M8, I enjoy the experience much more when using this gear (& when using the M6). Couple things I love about RFs:
1. Viewfinder
2. The user's involvement in the process.
... was going to include size & shutter sound, but re. size - there's dslr's & slr's out there (E420 & OM series) that are approx the same size as RFs & re. sound - well those Oly DSLR's are pretty quiet (probably a little more so than the M8).
This (photography) is just a hobby for me so #2 above gives me a lot of pleasure.

BTW, Frank... how's that Rollei 35?
 
jky, the 35T is lovely! With a bunch of cameras on hand, there is quite a competition for my attention. I have a roll of film to develop from it and the second roll is in the camera, so I actually have not seen any results yet, but it functions well. I bought it to give it to my daughter, but she found the total manual operation with scale focusing too over-whelming to use. Since I coveted it so much, I traded her a Pentax K1000 and some lenses for it!
 
Good to hear, good to hear, Frank... sometimes I regret getting rid of it, but I'm glad it's in good hands getting good use!

Sorry to the OP to have hijacked this thread...
 
Roger Hicks said:
Dear Bill,

But equally, an adze finishes wood differently from a plane, and there's a difference between an egg fried in a wok or in a flat-bottomed frying pan.

The tool does work differently -- continuous viewing (and therefore more engagement with the subject, in the view of many), easier to hold still (most people find it so, anyway), no zooms, etc. -- and therefore it is hardly surprising that people take different pictures with different cameras.

In other words, the tool shapes the photographer's vision, just as the photographer's vision shapes the choice of tool.

Cheers,

R.
Click to expand...

Did you ever post on this forum under the name MAGUS?

What happened to our old friend?
 
Last edited:
For me, it's very simple. Much better wide angle performance. I use an SLR for tele and RF for wide. Both for normal.
 
"Because deep in the mechanism of each rangefinder camera there resides a tiny part of the eternal soul of Henri Cartier-Bresson. This enters the subconscious mind of the well-attuned photographer via the shutter release finger and whispers "Maintenant, mon ami." very softly at each decisive moment"
....that explains it! I always wondered why my non Leica RF had such a tacky magic! It was an Impersonation of HCB sould done by Saturday live nights Rob Schneider!
Now in earnest that´s a poetic explanation and at lest for me true....
 
apologies if anyone has already said this (as I'm in a rush tonight, I had to skim some of the replies) - but an excellent reason to shoot with an RF is the unique and amazing selection of lenses available. An M-Mount rangefinder can mount anything from a pre-WWII leica to a brand new ZM zeiss, even to a modified canon 50mm f0.95, and can cover a huge range of aesthetics and budgets. In fact the thing that got me interested in RF in the first place was the wonderful voigtlander 35mm f1.2 nokton - a lens that has no equivalent in the SLR world.

Of course, the SLR world has it's own selection of lenses that have no equivalent in the RF world (in particular, I'm thinking of lenses faster+wider than a 28mm f2, such as the Canon 24mm F1.4 L prime).

As an aside, personally I quite like the idea of having a film RF for shooting where my own subjective existence/experience is an integral part of the image (a sort of "gonzo photography"), and for having a DSLR for where the external event/environment is more important than my own preferences (or for when I'm out of provia :p ), but that's just my own preferences..

cheers! papasnap
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom