Leica M8
Leica Elmar 24mm f/3.8 ASPH 6-Bit
24mm, 1/250 Sec at f/4, ISO160
Post Processed in Adobe Lightroom CC2015.6
On a Mac Pro, OS-X 10.11.5
Photo of the Month – June
Giving Blood
Not much happening today, apart from a quick trip up to the hospital to give blood.
It does not take long and you get unlimited chocolate biscuits, which is the main reason I go 😉
If there is a session near you, give it a go, free tea, coffee, or hot chocolate, lots of chocolate biscuits and a nice lay down. What more do you want.
Good Bye Ebony
After many years the owner of Ebony cameras has decided to shut up shop. The 30th June 2016 is the last day for orders.
These beautiful cameras made of ebony wood, leather and titanium metal.
For a large format camera they fold down well and I have hiked with one on a shoulder bag, holding the meter and filters as well.
Its a camera that will last my lifetime as long as I can continue to get hold of film.
Street Conversation
We woke this morning to the result of the United Kingdom’s EU referendum. Its certainly made talking politics popular right now.
This lunch time I grabbed my Leica and snapped a few photographs on the street.
It was noon and high sun, possibly the worst time you can take pictures. I have lowered the contrast in this picture, instead of my usual technique of increasing it.
Hasselblad X1D-50c
So what did Hasselblad release?
The worlds first small mirrorless medium format camera. Yep you heard right!
The spec is quite something and this has certainly re-invigorated the Hasselblad. Wifi, GPS and twin SD slots, and 50 Megapixels. The new lens also feature leaf shutters so flash sync to 1/2000 second natively.
Hasselblad have been losing medium format users to Leica with their S, but this should stop that.
Hasselblad to enter the Mirrorless Market?
A few more rumours are starting to appear now and it looks like the new camera from Hasselblad will be their first entry into the mirrorless market.
Yes I know they have already released mirrorless cameras but they were just expensive re-badaged Sony’s. If the rumours are true this will be a real Hasselblad.
Since Hasselblad turned their backs on us ‘V’ System users and made changes to the ‘H’ System to ensure less compatibility, they have been driving medium format users to the Leica. Leica released an adapter to allow full functionality with their medium format S cameras so Hasselblad have been making some changes recently to get users back.
This mirrorless camera may be their first step but will it compete, especially against cameras like the Sony A7 and the Leica SL.
A walk in the woods
Every few months the Lincolnshire Greyhound Trust organises a group walk for people who have adopted a greyhound from them. Yesterday we attending our first with Timmy the Greyhound, this was held at Willingham Woods near Market Rasen.
It was a fun walk and gave all the hounds a good chance to socialize with their own kind, as some greyhounds do not like other breeds having only ever met Greyhounds and humans during their racing careers.
Film Friday – Men at Work
Here is a film Friday. Taken when out for a stroll with the Leica M4, and a handheld meter.
Hasselblad and Leica M Mount Rumours
This week I have been hearing rumours about a new M mount camera but with a CCD sensor.
CCD has some advantages over CMOS, the noise is more random, giving a more natural looking image. The big advantage of CMOS is low noise at high ISO.
Still since Leica moved from CCD to CMOS people have been complaining, but with careful processing its actually very hard to tell the difference.
Hasselblad have now announced a press conference on the 22nd June, this is rumoured to be a digital XPan. With these two rumours people are now putting 1 + 2 together and getting 5, a new Hasselblad M mount camera. I do not feel this is likely but with Leica releasing cameras like M-D anything is possible.
Leica M-D gets its first Firmware update
Firmware 1.0.0.4 for the Leica M-D Typ 262 released. The only new feature that I can see is just a tweak to the power save mode.
One of the advantages of this camera is its power on speed and the fact it always seems ready to shoot, due to the fact it never powered down.
Having no screen and no video plus a big old battery it still lasted a full day. Now with this new firmware the camera does go to sleep after ten minutes of inaction. So it will be interesting how quickly it responds now.