The Future, Erwin Puts Predictions

[Bill Pierce]

Erwin Puts has written an interesting piece about the future of the rangefinder. I encourage anybody who has not read it to check

http://www.imx.nl/photo/Analysis/page149/page149.html

I think it's an important piece and would love to hear what others think about this important issue.

Bill

[Jamie Pillers]

Bill, thanks for the reference to Puts' article. It is an interesting read.

In reading it, I started feeling somewhat nostalgic for the passing CRF (coupled rangefinder) technology and Leica. Puts suggests that some of the advantages inherent in the CRF technology (photographers can select the focus point much more accurately than an 'umpteen' point AF system; viewfinder better; etc.) might make it possible for a company like Leica to hold on to some market share into the future. I disagree somewhat. Unless Leica can completely revamp their pricing, they are going to face the unbeatable competition of ever-improving digital wonders coming out almost monthly now. For example, the micro four-thirds stuff is beginning to take off and is probably only a generation or two from the so-called "Decisive Moment Digital Camera".

And when our generation dies off, how many people of the next generation are going to stay involved with film and rangefinders... surely far fewer than today.

Leica needs to build "it" before Panasonic, Olympus, or Samsung does. And it can't be ten times as expensive... in my opinion. :-)

[aizan]

And when our generation dies off, how many people of the next generation are going to stay involved with film and rangefinders... surely far fewer than today.

i'm not so sure. more gen y kids shoot medium and large format than any other, probably. same goes for rangefinders, except for maybe those fabled days in the 60s when used leicas were dirt cheap.

[Richard G]

I just bought some Tri-X and one of the young shop staff was leaving early, bicycle helmet in hand, Konica Hexar over his shoulder. These gen Y kids want to drive manual cars even. I am not sure about a lot of EP's arguments, which are always hard to follow. Lots of people, maybe more than ever, are using RFs and enjoying the distinct advantages. Compact, reliable, no nested menus, just a minimum of controls. The future of M film or digital bodies is unlikely to be too different to what we currently have, despite his musing on autofocus etc, or it wil indeed be something else entirely.

I read your chapter on available light photography in the 1977 Leica Manual when it first came out and only recently got my own copy on the auction site. If I can correspond with you about rangefinders on the internet here 32 years later, I am pretty confident I and many others will still be shooting film Ms in another 32 years, when I am 80. Thanks for the privilege of answering your invitation.

[buzzardkid]

Thanks for the link Bill, one this one I'm even partly agreeing with Puts (which is a rare occassion).

I'm convinced rangefinders will be used for a long time to come. The progression of computer tehcnology has brought us digital, which is the film camera killer pur sang, but internet has also broadened the view of many young people in more ways than we can even fathom (I'm a computer technology teacher at middle/high school) and they have the ability to choose from a far greater range of gear than we all had before the computer age.

Those young people that shoot rangefinders have come to shooting them by sheer will alone, since there are so many alternatives to be found. The 'newcomers' will keep the rangefinder community strong, they are the most dedicated, I'm convinced.

Home developing and B&W film will be logical artistic addition to this group of RF shooters. Developing and printing will never be a completely digital thing, even if they evolve so much that the distinction between digital and analog would be gone. Collectors and connaisseurs will always put value in a well developed traditional print, I'm positive.

In the end, rangefinder shooting may be limited to those art school students and old practitioners. Forums like these will slow that development down by singing the praise of the Leica.

Once the market has shrunk to 'art school students sizes', Leica will be gone I guess. Collectors will start to unload their cameras onto the market, since the pulbic eye will look upon the Leicas as having lost the opportunity/possibility to be used for their purpose. (Better make some bucks of the dinosaur). With these amounts of cameras, there will be no market left. Only some tech repair men will survive.

But: I love being self-sufficient with a good Leica, stocks of film and Rodinal!

[Spoks]

At an earlier article Erwin Putts deemed the old M rangefinder system dead. He now seems to understand that, if so, there will be nobody around reading his long articles.

The future of the Leica M system is really not up to Erwin Putts. It's up to, first of all, Leica to design and produce a camera that is far better and more reliable than the M8 which will be attractive also to younger folks. That implies that the price of this camera is affordable too.

I forsee obvious improvements to the Leica M system, if it's going to compete in the future market:

This mechanical, unreliable and all too expensive viewfinder system must be changed to an electronic & solid state system that costs a fraction to produce and will be far more accurate. - By the way, is the new 0,95 Noctilux out yet...?

There is really no way around AF. It got to be introduced sooner or later.

But first of all Leica must solve this sharp-light-angle-hitting-the-sensor problem. Or a sensor designer/producer must create such a product. do anyone know that such a product is available at, say, Kodak? Last time somebody performed a bodycount, just a few months ago, there was no such sensor available. So, how Leica can claim that the development of the M9 is well under way is beond me. If they don't have a suitable sensor, they have no camera.

With the majority of the customers being over 60 Leica is in a hurry. The major part of the customer base might be under the turf by the time such a sensor is available.

That's my 5 cents. Far shorter than Erwin Puts, but still...

[Kevin]

I decided to stop reading that fool's long-winded, strangely worded ramblings 2 or 3 years ago.

[Al Kaplan]

Leica has backed itself into a corner price-wise by insisting on only building a high end and high priced product. For the most part it's only the over sixty crowd that can afford them. The once plentiful supply of used Leicas following "The Great SLR Revolution" ? They're either being used by those who can find one, sitting in a "collection" unused, or forgotten someplace at Grandpa's house.

I don't think that we'll ever see a return to the traditional neighborhood camera shop with showcases full of used cameras, but then we now have a generation used to ordering on-line, and Fed-Ex will get it to you over night so you don't have to wait for Saturday to go shopping downtown. Odds are that the shipping will be less than you would have paid in sales tax had you bought from a local shop.

Those of us who grew up with traditional cameras, whether by Leica, Canon, Nikon, or even Yashica, Miranda, Pentax and others, might think that a Bessa just doesn't "exude quality" but college students don't all drive Mercedes and BMW's either. Nikon saw the future when they realized that their original Nikon F was priced out of the range of most people. They introduced a Mamiya made but Nikon badged camera equipped with the then new "Copal Square" shutter, which also had a much higher flash synch speed and a built in meter rather than the add-on metered prism of the F. The Nikkorex wasn't so much marketed as a "lower priced Nikon" than as a second body that could do things that your F couldn't do, yet still allowing use of all of your F optics. People didn't stop buying F bodies. A whole new bunch of photographers could now afford "a Nikon" and would be buying Nikon lenses.

Leica missed the boat when it let Zeiss grab the upgraded and rebadged Bessa. There will continue to be an over sixty crowd to buy "real" Leicas. In the meantime the Bessa is getting a lot of younger photographers back to rangefinders and film. A lot more than Puts is doing.

[Al Kaplan]

Everybody except Leica left the rangefinder market nearly forty years ago. First Zeiss, then Nikon, followed by Canon. Of course some cameras were still being produced in the Soviet Union, and Minolta half-heartedly flirted for a few years with the CL and CLE. The lens companies such as Schneider, Shacht, Angenieux, Komura, etc. stopped producing LTM glass about that time also.

Actually, we have it pretty good these days! Hey, Canon! How about a modernized VII with a behind the lens meter, M mount, black paint over brass option of course, and a modern design, perhaps aspheric, 50mm f/0.95 lens? And a new 19mm f/3.5 too!

[Spoks]

Al,

You forget Contax. I was very close to buying a G2 just before the digital was let loose on us. If a suitable sensor - to a reasonable price, was to appear on the market, it could be technically possible to blow life into that old brand. With AF and all...

[wlewisiii]

Everybody except Leica left the rangefinder market nearly forty years ago. First Zeiss,

Which really still depresses me. How much better off photography as a whole would have been if they had built the Contax IV (S3 like finder, plans for TTL metering, Voigtlander glass... ) instead of opting for the money-pit that was the Contarex...

William

[Krosya]

Al,

You forget Contax. I was very close to buying a G2 just before the digital was let loose on us. If a suitable sensor - to a reasonable price, was to appear on the market, it could be technically possible to blow life into that old brand. With AF and all...

Konica Hexar RF was made not that long ago too.

[notturtle]

My advice to newbies: Buy a Leica MP and joy the next 60 years :D Someone will be able to repair it, you will be able to find film with 99% certainty and the rest is up to you. I dont think film will die and so neither will 35mm I suspect. The RF may only be made by one manufacturer in the end, but if it is, there will still be enough for those who want to buy new. For the rest, there are used cameras aplenty.

Puts has exactly what relevance to photography? He is neither a professional photographer nor a visionary. If he choked when the ZM lenses were released, what chance has he got of getting the future of RF right?

[Al Kaplan]

OK guys, my crazy idea: Take the basic Olympus Pen F body, shutter, film transport, meter, etc., but no SLR "guts". Adjust the thickness so it'll take M lenses. Make it with a rangefinder, looking out over both sides of the top of the shutter disc. Don't cripple the marketing folks with a namby-pamby name such as "Half-Frame" or "Single-Frame". Pick something BOLD lke "Four Thirds Film", FTF for short. Yup, that's it! The Pen FTF! We could jokingly refer to the new camera as the "F. U. Leica". :eek:

[Trius]

I am not so sure that the current gen-y crop shooting film in CRF or MF gear will be that long a trend. I see their commitment to be largely a reaction to pricing of high-end digital gear, inscrutable and dysfunctional user interface design and generally crappy image quality with respect to emotional content.

The young have time to their advantage -- no family responsibilities, low cost of living, entry level jobs that mostly do not require extra work during "free time" ... not to mention youthful energy. When those conditions change, we may see a huge falling off.

I personally don't care if Leica ever makes an M9. I am content with a film CRF, be it M4, ZI, CL/E, Bessa, etc. I cannot afford a new MP, much less an M8. I do not see how Leica can survive without a complete revamp of their pricing structure.

Thankfully the world is awash in used bodies and glass ... even new glass is somewhat reasonable from Zeiss and CV ... and one can stockpile chests full of film and chemicals to prepare for Digigeddon.

[Trius]

Al -- another film format?? Uhhhhh ... I doubt it. :D

[Jamie Pillers]

Maybe they're developing a hemispherical-shaped sensor that could then receive the light at the proper angle without using all the 'bells-and-whistles' being used today? :-)

[Pickett Wilson]

The new sensor is being developed in a warehouse in Eureka?

[Jamie Pillers]

Take it further, Al. Leave out the film transport and replace it with a 1.5x RAW sensor. No LCD needed to make all those JPEG adjustments. Done. M9 killer.

[Al Kaplan]

Trius, I wasn't so much thinking of a "new" film format so much as figuring out a way to give the 18x24mm film format a more "macho" image. When the original Olympus Pen F, the meterless model that started the whole thing, hit the market back in 1964 there was plenty of speculation about a rangefinder version.

The Univex Mercury and Mercury II had no rangefinders, but the screw mount lens was interchangeable. I don't think that they, or anyone else for that matter, ever made another lens to fit it though. It also had a rotary shutter like the Pen F seies, but the camera was big, heavy, noisy, ugly, etc. I recall that it only got about 55 exposures per roll because the frames were slightly wider, about a 4x5 aspect ratio instead of 3x4.

Jamie, we now have a generation of casual photographers who wouldn't believe that they actually made an exposure if you denied them an LCD screen to chimp! Nor would they have a clue as what you do with a RAW file.

[Jamie Pillers]

Al,
True. But I can always hope... hoping is free! :-)

[Kent]

I guess there is some kind of retro hype going on. Time will show if this is only a hype which will end one das all of a sudden or a real nostalgic movement that goes on and tries to keep some "outdated" technology alive.

[Roger Hicks]

At an earlier article Erwin Putts deemed the old M rangefinder system dead. He now seems to understand that, if so, there will be nobody around reading his long articles.

The future of the Leica M system is really not up to Erwin Putts. It's up to, first of all, Leica to design and produce a camera that is far better and more reliable than the M8 which will be attractive also to younger folks. That implies that the price of this camera is affordable too.

I forsee obvious improvements to the Leica M system, if it's going to compete in the future market:

This mechanical, unreliable and all too expensive viewfinder system must be changed to an electronic & solid state system that costs a fraction to produce and will be far more accurate. - By the way, is the new 0,95 Noctilux out yet...?

There is really no way around AF. It got to be introduced sooner or later.

But first of all Leica must solve this sharp-light-angle-hitting-the-sensor problem. Or a sensor designer/producer must create such a product. do anyone know that such a product is available at, say, Kodak? Last time somebody performed a bodycount, just a few months ago, there was no such sensor available. So, how Leica can claim that the development of the M9 is well under way is beond me. If they don't have a suitable sensor, they have no camera.

With the majority of the customers being over 60 Leica is in a hurry. The major part of the customer base might be under the turf by the time such a sensor is available.

That's my 5 cents. Far shorter than Erwin Puts, but still...

(On your comment which I have highlighted in bold)

Why?

Tashi delek,

R.

[Al Kaplan]

"Reading his long articles"? Most people don't buy the newspaper for the comics, but they read them anyway.

[Bill Pierce]

For me, personally, the heart of the Leica system is the bright line viewfinder, that unique ability to see everything in focus and to see outside the boundaries of the bright line frame. But from the first time I photographed violence I slipped bright line finders into the accessory shoes of my SLR’s to gain that option. Today I travel with a bag of bright line finders from 15 to 135 and they are just as at home in the accessory shoes of DSLR’s and and digital point and pushes as Leica bodies.

So my number one reason for using a rangefinder is transportable to a variety of gear.

Number two, accurate focus of high speed lenses is available in a rangefinder camera if you send all your lenses and bodies to someone like Don Goldberg and have him null-null them, taking out the tolerances out of rangefinder follow arms and cams so that all your lens and body combinations focus spot on. (This is worth a thread on its own.) Since a somewhat similar correction, user installed, is available for the 5D Mark II and factory adjustments are available on some other DSLR’s, this does a great deal to eliminate the focus advantage that custom adjusted rangefinders had in accurately focusing high speed wide angles and normals when manual focus was king.

So my number two reason for using a rangefinder if I’m using a DSLR that provides focus adjustment is no longer limited to a rangefinder.

Number three - a rugged, top of the line piece of gear in a smaller, quieter package than a DSLR. The M8 is bigger than the M6 and the first version is certainly noisier. Small cameras from the Olympus E-P1 to the Sigma DP2 to what will probably appear in the near future may become the stealth cameras of choice.

So my third and last reason for using a rangefinder is fading fast.

[Pickett Wilson]

Bill, I think that is a fair assessment. The ability of new DSLR's to micro adjust the camera to the lens is a major step forward. Now that the size barrier is about to fall (with future incarnations of mirrorless cameras, whatever their format) it is going to get really hard to justify the RF on practical grounds.

[Tuolumne]

Some bizarre stuff there, especially about auto-focus: "Anyone who has had experience with the multi-focus points in a modern slr camera will notice the frustration that the camera selects a focus point you do not want." Why would anyone other than a blithering idiot use auto-focus this way? You put it on spot auto-focus, and it focuses on what you point it at - usually an area as small as an eye. And it does it faster and more reliably than you ever will do it manually.

/T

[Sonnar2]

I can't see any nostalgy in manual focussing either. You point - the camera focusses. Either right or wrong, fast or slow. Compared to this, the photographer is always slow, and often wrong. DOF is a different consideration, though...

Puts mentioned the Micro 4/3 (EVF) in the beginning. To me, this is the future approach in semi professional photography. (The mass will keep use their cell phones to make pictures, though). DSLR is dead, finally. The micro 4/3 EVF is closer to the CRF (Leica M) approach as to the DSLR anyway.

[Roger Hicks]

I can't see any nostalgy in manual focussing either. You point - the camera focusses. Either right or wrong, fast or slow. Compared to this, the photographer is always slow, and often wrong. DOF is a different consideration, though...

Puts mentioned the Micro 4/3 (EVF) in the beginning. To me, this is the future approach in semi professional photography. (The mass will keep use their cell phones to make pictures, though). DSLR is dead, finally. The micro 4/3 EVF is closer to the CRF (Leica M) approach as to the DSLR anyway.

Not if you are pre-focussed on a spot, e.g. in a race, or for portraiture, or indeed, at a concert -- anywhere you can predict fairly accurately where the subject will be. Then, it is always faster than autofocus.

Also, autofocus is at least as often wrong as I am, even when it doesn't 'hunt' and lose the shot.

It's not nostalgia. It's just what I prefer. Much in the same way that I prefer a manual gearbox to automatic. What I query is the belief that something mass-market and all but idiot-proof (e.g. auto-focus, auto-gearbox) must always and inevitably replace the specialist product. The specialist product doesn't have to be better for everyone: it just needs to be appreciated by enough people that they buy it and keep it in production.

Tashi delek,

R.

[Bassism]

There are a lot of interesting trains of thought in this thread.

I don't think there's any question in the future of the M camera as it is used today. However, as some have pointed out, the vast majority of Leica's customers are older people. This is not because young people are not interested in Leicas, but because if I were to buy an M7, M8, and a new Summicron 50, I would ring up a bill that is half of my current student loan debt. By way of comparison, my M2 and DR Cron were still quite expensive on a student budget, but something I could work into my budget.

M cameras will continue to be used for a long time, that much is certain. Whether Leica will be able to survive selling $5,000 bodies in an entirely different question.

I prefer shooting my CRF M to anything else for day-to-day photography. With the bright-line finder, coupled rangefinder, small size and simple three-knob operation, it presents a feature set that cannot be matched by any SLR or EVF camera. Even as EVF cameras become more and more attractive as a camera that can fill much of the niche of a CRF, the distinct advantages of the optical viewfinder with coupled rangefinder will remain distinct. When I need AF, I turn to an AF camera, and I could see using an EVF camera as one of my tools as well. But most of the time, the 50 year old M2 does exactly what I need.

Ultimately, I don't think Leica's camera design needs to adapt to the future. The M7 is about as technically advanced as the CRF can get without losing its essence. The M8 needs to sort out some niggling details stemming from the switch to digital, but its design is sound as well. The addition of something like autofocus would necessarily detract from what I see as the advantages of the M camera (small size, solid technical feel, simple manual operation, possibly even backwards compatibility). Nikon and Canon will probably always do better AF than Leica and for less money, so I see no reason not to turn to them when I need AF.

Ultimately, as Mr. Puts concludes, the Leica is a unique camera that offers capabilities as a tool that are unmatched by anything else. The camera doesn't need to be updated to the modern age. If Leica wants to survive, they'll need to capitalize on the strengths of their product. They need ads explaining why one would want to use a manual focus rangefinder over a much cheaper autofocus slr, not black/white affairs showing an old European guy having a love affair with his camera. Don't romanticize about precision engineering, extol the virtues of being able to see the scene in front of you so closely. Most of my friends don't even know what a rangefinder is, but are intrigued once I explain to them how it works and let them hold it in their hands. The M camera is a strong product, and it has been for the last 50 years. There's no need to be apologetic and try to turn it into something it's not going to excel at.

Once they've got a younger potential market, they'll have to come up with a new CLE so that those younger people will be able afford a Leica. I can realistically see Leica's market all but disappearing as the older users stop buying cameras and the younger prospective users haven't gotten to a point in their lives where they can justify 10k for a camera and one lens.

[Pickett Wilson]

I don't think they can actually sell fewer cameras and survive. They are selling only a relative handful of cameras each month, mostly in Japan. There was a video posted somewhere where they said the exact number.

I'm not sure they have time to innovate. I'm pretty sure they aren't going to create a budget camera aimed at young people.

[sevo]

If ... wants to survive, they'll need to capitalize on the strengths of their product.

That is a popular notion. But from a marketing perspective, it is wrong - people do not buy a product because of its strengths, but because it has some property they believe they need. Marketing tries to manipulate that belief. But whether it can make the Leica M competitive with a photographing iphone is questionable - for one person who'd pick a camera which is just a tool for skilled photographers you'll find a million who'd rather buy a camera which makes their wife/husband/children/friends look like supermodels and draws a smile into every face.

Sevo

[kshapero]

I don't think they can actually sell fewer cameras and survive. They are selling only a relative handful of cameras each month, mostly in Japan. There was a video posted somewhere where they said the exact number.

I'm not sure they have time to innovate. I'm pretty sure they aren't going to create a budget camera aimed at young people.
That video says they built about 120 units a month. I would think that a number that low would pretty much spell disaster for any global company. If ever you wanted a new Leica this might be your last chance unless they can built a real low cost (we are not fooled by the re badged Panasonic's) unit, digital and film.

Plus I agree with Roger about manual focus. I know it is personal preference but I find manual focus more to my liking. probably should drop some coin for a Katz Eye split rangefinder for my D200.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3314/3647137790_54c956e1e4.jpg?v=1245593103
taken with an IPhone.

[Eric T]

Edwin Puts very elegantly and succinctly describes the advantages of the CRF M design.
Based on my experience, I believe he is correct on all points. But as others have said, will the CRF M design ever be adopted by a sufficient number of young people to maintain a large enough market to justify digital production into the future?

There are plenty of used film-based Ms and LTM cameras around but I don't see young people adopting film. The digital M is terrific but expensive. The advantages of digital are just too great - especially the financial advantages of avoiding the cost of film and development.

I believe that there needs to be a significant leap in the CRF M concept to remain viable. The new micro 4/3rds cameras come close but their compromises are too high. The EVF on the Panasonic G1 is not ideal as it draws significant battery power with its constant live view mode is odd to some. The new Olympus EP-1 is interesting but it has no viewfinder at all!

We need a CRF design that has the option of manual focusing and AF. We need a CRF design that allows easy control of apertures (one reason I don't use my Canon dSLR and EOS lenses very often). A compromise design was the Panasonic DMC-L1 that has a beautiful Leica lens. It's easy to change aperture manually or use in auto mode. AF and MF are easy to choose. But again, the problem with the L1 was its dark SLR viewfinder.

I bought a 5 MP Nikon Coolpix 5000 in 2002. It was state-of-the-art for a compact digital camera at the time it was introduced. It had terrible ergonomics but the images were nice and I liked its rangefinder-like characteristics. The viewfinder was able to zoom with the lens and you could use MF or AF.

So if we look at the designs of the recent past, we can find examples that incorporate all that is needed to satisfy current CRF MF users and appeal to those who prefer total auto exposure and AF. As others have said, the Contax G is one of those.

[Avotius]

I think there was nothing much profound in that article, it was all things we know either from reading or from experience. I know auto focus is faster then manual focus but the reason I dont use autofocus all the time is because I zone focus and none of my modern Canon lenses have aperture scales for zone focusing, that and after being liberated by the view through a rangefinder I find it extremely hard to use a SLR for anything but telephoto. The biggest advantage for me going with a digital RF though would be film development costs (which are getting astronomical) and scratched negatives (which are more and more lately) then you got scanning and all that other stuff.....but right now I cannot do the huge one time cost of going digital and have to stay with the incremental costs of film for now.

Oh and also because DSLR's plus those huge lenses gave me neck damage on one trip. That I dont ever want again....

[notturtle]

Manual focus is not nostalgia. I made a deliberate decision to return for manual focus for what I do. I could not do it with an AF SLR. This is not me defending cameras I love but explaining why I forked out on a RF system when I had a perfectly good SLR outfit. I did not want to; I needed to to be able to work the way I must to get the sort of shots I want. AF slows me down considerably, but there are tasks I will take AF for every time.

[antiquark]

One thing Puts missed is that people will continue to use RFs for psychological and aesthetic reasons.

Some people simply enjoy using RFs more than SLRs, for reasons that are impossible to describe.

Those arguments comparing RFs to SLRs miss the aesthetic factor. It's like saying that jazz will vanish in the future because heavy metal is cheaper, has more notes, is faster, and all the young people listen to it :)

[Tuolumne]

Not if you are pre-focussed on a spot, e.g. in a race, or for portraiture, or indeed, at a concert -- anywhere you can predict fairly accurately where the subject will be. Then, it is always faster than autofocus.

R.

This is not really manual focus either. It is pre-focusing, as is using hyperfocal distance. You can pre-focus an auto-focusing camera just as readily as a mechanical camera, just by putting it in manual focus mode. They work the same. Unfortunately, where AF lenses do loose out is in their ability to use hyperfocal distance, because they are not marked for it. A pity, since many street shots can be taken that way.

/T

[vincentbenoit]

Those arguments comparing RFs to SLRs miss the aesthetic factor. It's like saying that jazz will vanish in the future because heavy metal is cheaper, has more notes, is faster, and all the young people listen to it :)Good analogy.

[Tuolumne]

Not that good an analogy. I don't know anyone who would claim heavy metal is a replacement for jazz. But many people claim that an SLR is a replacement for an RF. To prove it, note how the volume of RF sales has changed compared to the volume of SLR sales over the last 20 years.

/T

[Harry Lime]

I can't see any nostalgy in manual focussing either. You point - the camera focusses. Either right or wrong, fast or slow. Compared to this, the photographer is always slow, and often wrong. DOF is a different consideration, though...

AF certainly has it's advantages, but have you ever tried to scale focus with an AF lens...? It's a nightmare to do.


Puts mentioned the Micro 4/3 (EVF) in the beginning. To me, this is the future approach in semi professional photography. (The mass will keep use their cell phones to make pictures, though). DSLR is dead, finally. The micro 4/3 EVF is closer to the CRF (Leica M) approach as to the DSLR anyway.

One of the biggest problems with EVF is that they aren't fast enough for decisive moment photography. Even if that tiny screen is running at 60fps, it's too slow. For that sort of work you need a viewfinder that operates at the speed of light and that means a direct viewfinder (Leica) or an optical SLR system. Personally I consider EVF displays mass consumer technology.

[PetarDima]

full frame sensor in ZI body... Oly DFR camera is great little camera ... but without zone focusing option.

[redpony]

I've been shooting with SLR's for a long time, until about a year ago when I picked up an Olympus 35 RC on a whim for 20 bucks. Nowadays I really do not like shooting with an SLR. It strains my eye in a way that the rangefinder never does and I now realized that it had created a "tunnel vision." I ended up with a Zeiss Ikon, but a new MP is still attractive simply because it's what I consider the pinnacle of the format.

The general consumer market is heading in a different direction, but I think the CRF's long-term prospects as a niche product are just fine. The future economy will be kind to specialty markets that cater to the long tail.

[Pickett Wilson]

redpony, I'm afraid the RF market doesn't have a long tail. With Leica shipping 120 units a month, it sounds more like a bob tail to me.

[Al Kaplan]

But how many units are Zeiss, Voigtlander, etc. shipping per month? That's part of the tail also.

[Pickett Wilson]

Those would be interesting numbers to know, indeed.

[Al Kaplan]

If we expand the discussion to include used cameras what's happening to prices of "users" and is the supply expanding or contracting? What about fixed lens rangefinder cameras from the 60's and 70's and beyond, such as the Canonet, Konica's examples, the various Yashica models, etc.? Prices stable? Up? Down?

If a market exists somebody will cater to it, even if it turns out to be a Chinese copy of a Nicca assembled in India.

[Harry Lime]

Harry your eyes [brain] might be bothered, and at 60 you might see flicker, but you would be in a vast minority. Lag is the issue.

Exactly, that is what I was trying to get at. Even of that screen is running at 60fps, it's too much of a lag to really nail something that is timing critical.

[Harry Lime]

redpony, I'm afraid the RF market doesn't have a long tail. With Leica shipping 120 units a month, it sounds more like a bob tail to me.

They are trapped in a vicious cycle.

At $4,000 nobody is buying bodies, which drives the price up, because the volume is so low, but volume is low, because the prices are so high.

Maybe Leica will start making them in runs, like Rollei did with the TLR. They make a few hundred or thousand once per year and that's all that is available until the next batch comes along...

[Trius]

They are trapped in a vicious cycle.

At $4,000 nobody is buying bodies, which drives the price up, because the volume is so low, but volume is low, because the prices are so high.

Maybe Leica will start making them in runs, like Rollei did with the TLR. They make a few hundred or thousand once per year and that's all that is available until the next batch comes along...

I actually think that would be a very smart move for Leica. It would mean a very painful cut to labour/employment, at least on a rolling basis, but I don't know any other way. The problem for Leica is their cost structure (i.e., high labour costs due to hand assembly and low volumes) is way out of line with the market. The market has changed, they have not.

[Tuolumne]

Leica will live on. Cosina will buy the brand name out of bankruptcy and do something sensible with the product strategy.

/T

[dazedgonebye]

I actually think that would be a very smart move for Leica. It would mean a very painful cut to labour/employment, at least on a rolling basis, but I don't know any other way. The problem for Leica is their cost structure (i.e., high labour costs due to hand assembly and low volumes) is way out of line with the market. The market has changed, they have not.

Have Cosina build them. They can batch them in right after the Zeiss and before the Bessas.
(Someone's bound not to like that suggestion....)

[Pickett Wilson]

Leica is building 120 cameras a month and folks still expect them to field a FF M9 in a couple of years. Now, THAT's faith! ;)

[Trius]

(Someone's bound not to like that suggestion....)

Do ya think?

[Al Kaplan]

The Cosina idea might just succeed if they make a few minor changes:

1.) Engrave the name Leica on the top plate. No printing on the body!

2.) Call the model "Wetzlar" so Wetzlar can be engraved directly below Leica.

3.) Price the body at or below $500.

4.) Pack a coupon book with the body. Each coupon would be good for so much off various lenses.

[Rui Morais de Sousa]

Since I started buying Leica / Leitz products in the 70's, that I hear about Leica beeing in deep financial difficulties.
I never was a rich man, but somehow, completely out of passion, I managed to buy five M cameras (one demonstration, one as new, the rest used. Plus a couple others, including a IIIc and CL, that I re-sold or traded) and nine Leica lenses, ranging from 21mm to 280mm (seven of them brand new).
Plus Visoflex III, bellows, filters, hoods, table-top tripod + head, Leicameter MR, etc.
I also bought a brand new Pradovit Color 250 projector, an used Focomat Ic with enlarging easel, and four or five Leica / Leitz binoculars (some new, some used, a couple for friends and relatives, a couple for myself).

Professionaly, I also used several Leitz equipment in the University of Heidelberg: cameras, lenses, Reprovit IIa, Focomat IIc, etc., etc.

So I think that I can say, in complete peace of mind, that I gave my "small" (whatever that can mean...) contribution to the company...

I am not a fortune teller (or marketing expert), so I can't predict the future of Leica.
I am very sorry, but this average guy and average photographer has no answer or solution!

Looking at the kind of products the company has to offer (endless special editions and collector's gimmicks), and looking at the respective price list ( lenses in the 5K regions...), I think that I can effortless predict MY future without beeing a guru: I MUST believe that I will never be able to buy a new Leica product again.

Maybe sad, but true...

RuiAL-MOST-LY PHOTOGRAPHY (http://ruimoraisdesousa.blogspot.com/)

[MCTuomey]

My advice to newbies: Buy a Leica MP and joy the next 60 years :D Someone will be able to repair it ...

Who is this "someone" you mention?

Do Sherry or Don or Youxin have apprentices?

I don't want to sound morbid, but my apprehension is that leica bodies will be paperweights once they need work after the current generation of repair people pass from our midst.

I really hope this is a mindless fear.

[Gabriel M.A.]

I see Mr. Puts continues to disregard many grammar rules; if he is to be academic, his writing ought to reflect this knowledge.

He raises a lot questions that he does not answer himself, and does not know where the source of his refutations come from.

In spirit, I agree with his "reflections" on the out-of-the-ether semi-dialogue he's seemingly interacting with. In practice, I don't think he's saying anything that contributes in any concrete fashion to the debate I believe he thinks he's engaging.

In short: the rangefinder is still a very usable tool which can be fine-tuned but anything beyond that will be a reinvention which has already been addressed by other tools.

[Gabriel M.A.]

I decided to stop reading that fool's long-winded, strangely worded ramblings 2 or 3 years ago.

lol - I opted to be "tactful". ;)

[35mmdelux]

Leica is building 120 cameras a month and folks still expect them to field a FF M9 in a couple of years. Now, THAT's faith! ;)

Interesting observation.

[Gabriel M.A.]

One thing Puts missed is that people will continue to use RFs for psychological and aesthetic reasons.

Some people simply enjoy using RFs more than SLRs, for reasons that are impossible to describe.

Those arguments comparing RFs to SLRs miss the aesthetic factor. It's like saying that jazz will vanish in the future because heavy metal is cheaper, has more notes, is faster, and all the young people listen to it :)

Very well-put.

My favourite analogy is the Mini-van drivers complaining that the Harley-Davidsons are flawed as they're missing a pair of tires, a roof, three back-seats, the DVD player and power sunroof.

[sirius]

One day we will be able to screw an attachment onto the back of our leica lenses and plug them right into our heads to take pictures.

I don't care so much about Leica as I do about the difficulties of making a living as a photographer in the days of inexpensive high-quality cameras and the web's assault on intellectual property and decent funding models.

...

Though I still would like to own an M8.2 with a 28 'cron and make a living doing documentary work with it. *sigh*