The day I was out shooting in Tucson….a buddy and I got there around 5pm and we were having a beer around 8. So, …what……give or take 3 hours of street work? I was with one of my film cameras and 35mm lens. I was also experimenting with my Voigtlander VC11 light meter which attaches to the hot shot of my Leica film camera.
Now,…loved it…loved it, loved it, loved it. A small learning curve cropped up I overcame. The camera is pure mechanical….nothing to help me as all manual. So the Light Meter was placed in the hot shoe but since the camera isn’t at all mechanical, it doesn’t read the settings on the meter like other cameras might. So, a few mishaps where I just shot without transferring those settings to my lens/camera, but ….it worked all in all. It takes one step more, so not fast. It almost pays to just use the sunny 16 and estimate, …time wise that is.
But as the sun faded, as it does fairly early in our western area…my camera soon found itself unusable. Simply no light. So I ended up walking around watching Robert have fun with his digital.
Yet like all things, …one needs to look at the silver lining which was this experience got me thinking. I need a (EGADS) digital camera for certain situations but, and this is a huge but….it has to fit my ‘analog craving’ lifestyle. Is there such a beast out there? So my homework was ahead of me and I did just that. I read up, questioned, was on forums etc… all on that analog / digital quest. And I ended up with my perfect style…my analog digital style. I found a camera that was an analog wanting to be digital, instead of a digital wanting to be analog.
A Leica M8, and while not a Monochrom, with the CCD sensor, it surely produced excellent BW images.. COSTLY….remember that. Don’t try this at home unless you are aware of the cost.
The M8. I only shoots in BW …period so color rendition beyond is useless to me. That meets my style. It is 15 years old…..with a crappy LCD you can’t read, …yet, I don’t want to even have a LCD so a crappy one is next best thing. Some other NO’s…
NO live screen….. NO exposure meter beyond center weighted (very limiting). NO automatic focus….all manual baby. NO wi-fi, NO video…NO SD card over 32 MB. NO usable ISO beyond 800. My style is showing. NO EVF but only an optical which is what I shoot with on my manual film cameras. NO ratta-tat-tat as continuous shooting is nil. NO quiet shutter sound. Can I get any more analog…any more like my Leica M6 or MA or Olympus OM1 or OM2? Just happens to have as an ‘output’ some digital files instead of negatives but wow, pretty dam analog.
The games begin…..