The good folks at LFI Magazine in Germany have made me an offer I couldn't refuse: the loan of their Leica M9 full-frame digital rangefinder camera plus the use of three of their finest lenses - the 21/2.8 Elmarit-M, the 35/1.4 Summilux-M and the 90/2.0 APO-Summicron-M ASPH. In total it is about 20000 US$ worth of kit which they have entrusted me with.
Whilst I am getting familiar with this camera, the differences to my trusted Canon EOS kit could not be greater: the Leica is manual focus, centre-average metering only, with a simple but slightly cumbersome settings menu on the back, a small buffer for shooting series of images, and a maximum burst rate of 2 frames/second. But it is - if you compare it to watches - like wearing a Rolex after you've grown up with a Casio.
In a single word, the optical quality of the Leica lenses is superior. Period. I don't have the time or the space to go into elaborate comparisons, highlight examples of its image quality in tiny image crops enlarged to 100% or otherwise list the Leica's many fine qualities - there are other places for that (such as DP Review, Luminous Landscape, Ken Rockwell, Digital Journalist and many others.
Instead, I feel compelled to talk a little bit about how this camera feels, how it makes you respond to everyday scenes on the street, and how the images look. Given its classic Leica rangefinder design, the all-metal camera is both lighter and smaller than its SLR cousins. The manual focusing system does not lend itself to point-and-shoot actions, which means you generally have to think more about your focus, exposure and composition before pressing the shutter. In short, it is not a camera for beginners, but it makes you take different pictures (especially if you're used to shooting with SLRs).
I have now completed post-production of the first 100-odd images selected from my various trips into central London, and the results blew me away! Whilst the images are of everyday things in London, their technical quality is outstanding. The optics allow for even sharpness from the centre into the corners, vignetting and distortion is negligible and needs to be added in post-production if desired. Despite their overall sharpness, each of the lenses shows a wonderfully creamy bokeh in the out-of-focus areas that gives photos their signature 'Leica' look.
Colours are fairly neutral, reds need to be subdued a bit, and overall contrast is moderate - that means you can add a punch at the processing stage without wrecking the shadows or highlights. Even at high ISO settings, there is no discernible noise in the images - whatever noise there is, it looks like film grain and adds some grit to those night-time pictures.
I could go on and on, but think it best to add a part II to the Leica Files at a later stage, and let you see some of the images for yourself below:
No comments:
Post a Comment