Month: May 2014

Micro Four Thirds, when announced was supposed to have a number of advantages over full frame.

Gradually as sensor technology has improved they have finally reached there potential.

There weakness is still focusing, but this is something shared by all mirrorless cameras and the new full frame mirrorless cameras are at the moment even worse then there smaller sensored competitors.

Optical physics is a hard task master. A full frame optically perfect 50mm f/1 lens would be large, heavy, slow and difficult to focus. The cost would be far in excess what 99.9% of photographers would be willing to pay.

The smaller sensor allows for simpler, smaller lens, when combined with mirrorless technology it allows camera bodies to be smaller then some photographers could comfortably hold.

This all leads to a small kit and several lens that can be fitted in a small bag and can comfortably carried all day.

These systems have good depth of field and for street shooters using pre-focus techniques can be a real advantages.

Smaller sensors have a multiplication factor to the lens focal length. Wildlife photographers often need long expensive lens and full frame long lens run into many thousands of pounds.

Some of the faster focusing small sensor cameras like the Nikon Series One with a 2.7 crop factor are becoming more popular for users that need long lens. Fitting a traditional 300mm f/4 lens to this gives you a stunning 800mm f/4 lens at a reasonable cost.

So after yesterday’s full frame good and today’s full frame bad post what is the truth?

Should you go for a micro format or a full frame. DX is the compromise, if you want an SLR there are many options but I have to say as a Nikon user I find some of the lens in the Nikon DX lineup somewhat lacking in some areas. In the Mirrorless department I think Fuji have it with there X range from SLR style cameras to Rangefinder style cameras. They have also proved to be a manufacturer that offers great support even to older out of production models.

Since the Canon 5D and Nikon’s D700, we have a growing number of full frame cameras coming on the scene.

Until recently if you wanted small and a mirrorless option then there was only the Leica M9 and the recent M.

Now we have Sony with their A7 and A7R, true full frame mirrorless options. Before that Sony even released a full frame compact the RX1.

It would seem everyone wants full frame now and it does have a number of advantages.

First it’s traditional and the original small format invented my Leica. When we say a 35mm lens with that field of view we all know what we mean. Even now when you use a 24mm on a DX camera they are often marked as 35mm as it has the same field of view on a DX camera.

It allows one to separate foreground from the background by using narrow depth of field.

Lastly there are image quality advantages to 35mm full frame. The large sensors allow for larger sensor pits allowing more photons to be collected improving sensor signal to noise ratios, as demonstrated by the stunning Nikon D3 when it was released.

So Full Frame Good and DX, MicroFourThirds, CX Bad?

For those of us who love rangefinder cameras then there are only a few options.  Especially when we want to use digital rangefinders.

Currently there are three in manufacture all by Leica, the ME, the MM and the M.  The ME is basically the old model M9 rebadged and a few tweaks made and is now the budget rangefinder.  This of course is Leica so budget is £4000.

I would love Leica rangefinders to be cheaper but Leica is a small company and the rangefinder mechanism is very costly to produce.  With the M people are reporting far better focus and it looks like Leica made major improvements to the rangefinder tolerances.  It is not unusual for rangefinder photographers to regularly send their lens and rangefinder camera’s back to Leica to be re-calibrated.

So if you want the real budget option then secondhand is the way to go so like me many rangefinder lovers use the M8 and M8.2.  Unfortunately while the M9 is still in production as the ME and parts are still being made, the M8 has been out of production quite some time.  Also the company that manufactured some of the key components has now gone into receivership and Leica have been informed that they will receive no more M8 parts.  A number of M8 users with failed M8’s have been told they cannot be repaired.

So this is a worry now to M8 users and has also meant that prices are slipping again for M8’s, I have seen them as low as £1000 and £1500 for an M8.2.  If your shutter fails there is still hope as the M8.2 has the M9 shutter assembly and this can be fitted into the M8 and M8.2, but for some of the major electronic components there is now no repair option.

It does make me wonder whether to start saving now for a second hand M9 or M or maybe order a Leica T to at least give me something else I can use my Leica glass on should my M8 fail.

Its such a shame that while digital has in many ways given us better cameras they have such short lives, my M4 is now many years old and with the occasional service will last much longer then I will.

 

I was visiting the RedDotForum and included with David Farkas excellent review was a video about using the touchscreen on the new Leica T.  If your interested please check out his review and find the time to watch the video.  Its a great in-depth review and while you may dismiss it as David Farkas is an admitted Leica lover it is a very fair review.

The above shot is straight from my Leica M8 with my standard Adobe Lightroom M8 People preset applied, I left the White Balance as the camera had set it.

One of the advantages of modern digital SLR’s from Canon and Nikon is that you can rely on them to get the technicalities of a photograph right.

White balance, exposure, and focus; all taken care of and generally done very well.

With Leica until the new Leica M 240 and the recent Vario X and Leica T; while the optic’s of the older cameras could never be faulted the electronics were always a little behind the times.  The Leica M8 which I use and even the M 240 when first released had a poor colour profile and decidedly iffy white balance.  Now with the latest updates both cameras are very good, though I do still carry a grey card for those tricky situations with my M8 as it can still get caught out more often then a Leica M9 or M 240.

Its an area that at least Leica and also a few other of the more minor camera manufactures are doing well at, continuing to release updates and improving there older camera.

With the dark of the Drill Hall and the overhead spotlights I suspected my little Leica would have a hard time getting the white balance right but it surprised me.  With the old CCD sensor I did not shoot higher then ISO640 and stopped my lens down half a stop to f/1.8 so depth of field was at a minimum, with moving subjects and manual focusing I am very pleased with the results.

Would a digital SLR been a better choice, well possibly, there were others there with SLR’s and they were also using flash, they would have gotten technically better images but people were noticing them and reacting to them.  People either did not notice me or ignored me.  The small rangefinder in these situations has an advantage and one that is shared by many of the latest compact system camera’s, though many of them would have struggled to focus in the low light and with there laggy EVF’s may have struggled to get the shot in those conditions.  If I had any choice of camera then I think a Leica M or Fuji X100s would have had the best chance of getting the shots.