Camera Labs

Here's another video by B&H, a brief look at the Leica M9:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCoZyiYUN1g

- Bjorn -

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Leica M9-P (my article on Camera Labs) | Leica D-Lux 5 | 50mm Summilux

Hi Bjorn,

Thanks for that.

The poor video quality version of the full presentation I linked to above is now available in three segments on Vimeo in HD and can be seen as Part 1, Part 2 - M9 and Part 3 - X1 and S2. There should be a Part 4 somewhere as well, which is the "Seal" segment, but it appears not to have been uploaded yet.

There's also a Leica M9 "First Look" over at the Luminous Landscape.

Bob.

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OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

saw the m9 in the movie, all about Steve.

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.
and another Luminous Landscape sourced video is an interview with Leica's Stephan Daniel about the M9 made some weeks before the official release. The video runs to over an hour in length and can be viewed here. Some interesting factoids:

• Leica make around 10, 000 to 12,000 M-bodies (includes film) a year.
• Send your camera in for service and the whole camera, not just the repair, is warranted for a year.
• Leica may be working on a zoom lens.
• The next digital M may move to CMOS and incorporate Live View (or it may not!).

If I stopped smoking 40 cigarettes a day I could probably save enough to afford an M10 by the time it's released (UK prices). Of course I'd have to start smoking so I could stop and save the money but smoking kills which rather defeats the object. Drat.

Bob.

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OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

How about using Leica's M lenses on a micro four-thirds body as an interim measure? Not rangefinders, of course and they have a crop factor of 2 rather than 1.3 but they do offer other bells and whistles in compensation. My thread Using Leica M lenses on micro four-thirds bodies refers.

Bob.

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OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

I just replied about it in that thread

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Hi folks,

There's another M9 preview available from Focus Numérique which you can read here (Googlish). As expected the high ISO IQ leaves something to be desired, IMHO.

Update: There's a review of the CameraQuest Leica M to Micro 4/3 Lens Adaptor here on the Luminous Landscape site. A Panasonic G1 was paired with a Leica Summilux f/1.4. The review's conclusions might be a surprise.

Bob.

_________________
OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

Hi folks,

Guy Mancuso has penned some thoughts about the M9 as a series of posts on the thread here and also provided a couple of links to videos. Very usefully he has also made more than a few DNG (RAW) files available for download here. Each file runs to 35MB but can be opened in Adobe without problems so you can do your own post-processing and check out the IQ. Enjoy.

Update: There's a PDF document, authored in 2002 and available from the Leica web-site, entitled "Leica M-Lenses - Their Soul and Secrets" available here. I mention it because it's not given a lot of prominence on the web-site but it does provide a nice description of a number of lenses as well as the MTF graphs already available in the individual data sheets.

Bob.

_________________
OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

Hi folks,

Another M9 review from one of the fortunate four who visited Leica in the summer. This one is from David Farkas and can be read here.

Bob.

_________________
OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

The ultimate use of an M9: street photography...

http://www.vimeo.com/6497905

- Bjorn -

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Street and documentary photographer | Google+ | Twitter | Blog | Tumblr

Leica M9-P (my article on Camera Labs) | Leica D-Lux 5 | 50mm Summilux

Turns out Bob already posted the video, among others, here:

http://www.cameralabs.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17785



- Bjorn -

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Street and documentary photographer | Google+ | Twitter | Blog | Tumblr

Leica M9-P (my article on Camera Labs) | Leica D-Lux 5 | 50mm Summilux

.
Do keep up, Bjorn.

_________________
OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

Thought I had found something new and exciting...

- Bjorn -

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Street and documentary photographer | Google+ | Twitter | Blog | Tumblr

Leica M9-P (my article on Camera Labs) | Leica D-Lux 5 | 50mm Summilux

Hi folks,

Just a quick post to point to the latest M9 "field review" from Michael Reichmann at Luminous Landscapes. He doesn't gloss over the bad points though he admits right from the start to being "a huge fan of M series Leica cameras". Enjoy.

Bob.

_________________
OM-D E-M5 + ED 12-50mm, H-PS14042E, H-F007014E, L-RS014150E, M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 45mm 1:1.8.
Gitzo GT1541T, Arca-Swiss Z1 DP ball-head.
Astrophotography: TEC 140 'scope, FLI ML16803 camera, ASA DDM60 Pro mount.

Ah: "...you can have the camera automatically determine the minimum shutter speed to be used based on the lens mounted." Meaning based on the focal length of the lens the camera determines the lowest shutter speed for auto-ISO. Great! Why had Nikon not come up with this - and I s'pose Canon or Sony can't do it either

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