Why the Leica M Edition 60 is important...

Roger Hicks said:
Dear Mike,

Digital photographers have to have someone to look down upon, as they are quite low on the totem pole of "real" or "pure" or "better" photographers. It's just like social class: some people are desperate to differentiate themselves from other quite similar people. Consider

Those who coat their own sensitized materials, some of whom look down upon

"Ordinary" large format photographers, some of whom look down upon

Users of medium format, some of whom look down upon

35mm users, some of whom look down upon

Digital photographers

The great thing is that if you try hard enough, you can always find someone else to look down upon. For example, some Leica users are reputed to look down on users of lesser cameras, and certainly, plenty of people look down on Leica users.

Admittedly I regard film as more "real" than digital, but that's because I had over a third of a century of film experience before I even tried digital; early digital cameras were rubbish (low resolution, overpriced); early digital evangelists were idiots ("14 megapixels equate to medium format quality!"); and I was much better at using film. Today the main reason I regard it as more "real" is that film cameras last longer: I don't like being forced to buy new tools because the old ones are no longer reparable. But I still have an M8, an M9 and a Nikon Df (and a dead D70). And several dozen "real" cameras, from a Minolta 16 to a 12x15 Gandolfi.

Cheers,

R.
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Hi,

You left out those swine who use ready made dry plates. And they have the cheek to call themselves photographers.

Regards, David
 
mdg137 said:
Roger,
Eloquent as always. However, I might modify your hierarchy as follows:

"Digital photographers, who look down upon some or all of:

Those who coat their own sensitized materials, some of whom look down upon

"Ordinary" large format photographers, some of whom look down upon

Users of medium format, some of whom look down upon

35mm users, some of whom look down upon

Digital photographers"
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Thanks for the wonderful circularity. I think my amendment (in bold) improves still further upon your already excellent improvement.

The truth, of course, is that you can always find people to look down on if your hobby is looking down on people. Some apparently find it more enjoyable than photography.

Cheers,

R.
 
Keith said:
. . . They (Leica) are fast becoming a company with their heads so far up their own backsides it's amazing they can breathe . . .
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Dear Keith,

Whose bums would you rather they were up? Yours?

Leica make expensive cameras, some of them as limited editions. They sell them. This helps them stay in business. Shock! Horror!

Would you rather they didn't make any cameras at all? Or that they made only the ones you personally want and can easily afford? If the latter, why not buy the company?

Cheers,

R.
 
Keith said:
The thing that annoys me about the 60 is the fact that Leica have chosen to make it a limited edition .... once again showing their willingness to pluck a wad of cash from the affluent few who really want it by making it 'exclusive.' Personally I'm not interested in a digital camera with no display but I accept that there are people out there who are ... but fairly obviously they won't be the ones ponying up the eighteen grand to own one.

They (Leica) are fast becoming a company with their heads so far up their own backsides it's amazing they can breathe!

Enter Roger ... to shoot me down in flames for being a knocker. :rolleyes:
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Keith,
I think that Leica's intent wasn't to create a camera that only the well heeled could afford but rather in order be able to afford to test the concept this was the least number of cameras they could make and enjoy some economies of scale. Given the limited quantity, the price had to go up to make it a viable test run. Perhaps they could have made it a less expensive trial run by not including a lens and the Audi Design input but Leica loves its Special Editions;)
I think the problem now is we won't know if the trial failed because of price or concept.
My guess is we will see more reviews as Leica tries to stoke interest in the concept
 
^^^ +1.

Just remember that the M9 Titanium's LED frame-lines made it into the model 240 ... I like red frame-lines :)

I bet the next CMOS-based Monochrome will be sans screen. One would hope the result is a smaller camera compared to Model 240.

Roland.
 
I'm excited about the new M Monochrom. All of those modern advances will make me appreciate my first generation M Monochrom even more, just as the M240 was interesting, but when the time finally came to buy a color M (last week) I bought an M-E.

I could probably get the CCD look in post, but with the M Monochrom and M-E the DNGs are already very close to what I want. Less is more and all that. Oh, the screen on the M9 generation is so absolutely dreadful that its just like having an M60, only thinner.
 
The M60 is a beautiful object. The no screen is an interesting talking point but for me, that's about it. I can achieve the same effect by shooting with my D2HS and not bothering to ever look at the screen - which is rubbish anyway and not worth looking at.
 
It isn't about purity. It's about simplicity, about taking away all that is superfluous, and leaving in all that is necessary.

There is a trend in technology, pushing for an 'ease of use' that ends up by divorcing us from how things function. Ultimately, we will be incapable of doing anything except that which a machine does for us, preferably with a 'user-friendly interface'.

I learned photography the old-fashioned way : diaphragm, speed, depth of field and sensitivity of film. The speed dial was near the shutter button, where you could turn it while looking through the viewfinder, and the other hand worked the aperture and focus rings on the lens. Call me old-fashioned, but that is the best way to operate a camera. PASM systems add a layer of complexity I find irksome. Auto-focus has too many focus points, and they're always too far away from what you need to be in focus. Features like burst shooting, panoramas become futile, I never have the time to dial them in when I need them. Chimping is a waste of time, attention and batteries. And most of the buttons on the back are mostly just in the way, getting accidentally pressed by my nose or my right thumb.

The articles in the OP have a point. A digital camera doesn't need a screen and function buttons. It has to be a box with a reliable shutter, a calibrated lens mount, a viewfinder that allows focussing, a speed dial and a decent sensor. Some will consider a built in light-meter essential. And I don't mind using aperture priority auto.
But for speed shooting I'll just click faster, and for a panorama I'll carefully overlap my frames.

And processing RAW files isn't all that different from processing negatives. Having perfect files, straight from the camera, is a fine idea, but I haven't seen it happen yet. Not in negatives, and not in RAW. My first darkroom had soft, hard and normal papers as a matter of course, and Multigrade was a godsend. I don't see why this should be different from digital : some scenes need more contrast, some need less, some need deeper shadows, some need creamier highlights, some need dodging and burning, and some need colour filters to get the grey values right. I routinely darken blue skies, and for portraits I will put a green filter on in post : great! I no longer lose stops and scratch filters!
I like to shoot as if I were shooting film, but digital processing is at least as much fun as darkroom work, and a lot more versatile.

It doesn't have to be expensive, just simple and reliable. The M60 edition would fit the bill, if it weren't for it's absurd price.


cheers
 
mfunnell said:
To what bad end, though?

...yet enjoy both, using one or the other (or yet a different camera again) based on which is more suited to the task at hand or as the whim takes me. Certainly some types of camera make it easier to take certain shots than others, including modern cameras (nasty auto-focus SLR-y things, or digital versions of older-style cameras, such as my M240).

...Mike
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To the end that the reason that the M60 to exists is gone as it has become an M240.
 
lukitas said:
It isn't about purity. It's about simplicity, about taking away all that is superfluous, and leaving in all that is necessary.

It doesn't have to be expensive, just simple and reliable. The M60 edition would fit the bill, if it weren't for it's absurd price.
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Exactly...
 
Godfrey said:
You can look down on owners of any other submini. The Minox IIIS is the ne plus ultra of subminiature cameras, it has more panache than the later models with their built-in meters (Real Photographers don't need meters ...)!
... ]'-)

Actually, bravo on acquiring a delightful camera! I hope you enjoy it and make many satisfying photographs with it. You remind me that I haven't taken a Minox out for a walk in a very long time ...

G

4628148112_071397cd7d_o.jpg

"Subway Ride" — San Francisco 1999, on the MUNI
Minox IIIS ​
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Thank you Godfrey. The IIIs purchase was just a whim at a annual photo show here in western Washington. I had rented a table to dump a lot of unused gear and had intended to buy nothing. But the clean little IIIs at just $40 followed me home. Even the missus, who helped out at my table bought an old Kodak darkroom timer. When I fessed up and showed her the Minox she thought it was "cute". I'm not sure how cute she thought it was when I bought two rolls of Ilford Delta 100 at Blue Moon Camera for another $40. But I showed her the math that, with reloading, total film price per 36exp. roll will be less than $4 a roll at 12 rolls and will go down to about $2.40 a roll at 24 rolls. I'm really looking forward to using this little gem and hope an old modified Yankee reel will work for developing. I sure don't want to spend another $150 for a Minox developing tank.
 
lukitas said:
It isn't about purity. It's about simplicity, about taking away all that is superfluous, and leaving in all that is necessary.
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Quite right. After all, autofocus is entirely unnecessary if you're photographing football games for Sports Illustrated or ESPN. Indeed, superflous. Yet, somehow, the deluded folks who work for such publications do, in fact, use horrid cameras with superflous features that no right-thinking person would ever use. How do we account for that? The good old-fashioned Marxist notion of false-consciousnes? Some other mental debility? Or perhaps the idiotic Capitalist notion that they might like to get paid? Inquiring minds would like to know...

...Mike

P.S. And perhaps this shouldn't be, but more on topic with the original intent of the thread: I would like to re-iterate - I think and want and hope that Leica should produce a non-limited-edition equivalent of the screen-less Edition 60. It seems to me that there is a market for such a camera.

That I'm not part of that market fusses me not. If those who want such a camera get one then not only am I not fussed, I think it's great and wonderful. People who want a screen-less digital camera will be happy. And that is a good thing.

I'd just like (without hope this will ever be true) that they might stop to think their photographic interests aren't the only ones which exist. That they might acknowledge that others don't share their enthusiasms. And that, for example, someone who shoots football games for a living for ESPN might be a real photographer too, even if they use a modern DSLR with all the complex autofocus menu settings that go along with that.

But I do know that's hoping too much. The truly pure are more pure than we and that's the end of it.
 
Roger Hicks said:
...but purists don't play American or Australian Rules football either...
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Dear Roger,

Neither can I, at least not at a competitive level. I don't have the size for it. I topped out at playing Hooker for Combined Services, but that was in the days where you had to strike for the ball rather than the more modern circumstance where you bulk out the front row while the half-back feeds the second row. A different world...

...Mike
 
It isn't about purity. It's about simplicity, about taking away all that is superfluous, and leaving in all that is necessary.
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Yes.

In the large world of things photography, I think there's adequate space for an M Edition 60 type camera to peacefully co-exist alongside the magic Wurlitzer of modern full featured cameras.

I want one of each. It's why my working kit today is an E-M1 and an M-P, as close as I can get to the two ends of the spectrum in digital equipment at the moment unless I spend $18K. I celebrate using the E-M1 when I need what it offers. The M-P returns me to a different mental space when I use it as if it were the ME60.

When both exhaust me, I pick up my SX-70...

G
 
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