Tiger, Tiger burning bright...

Change.

A six letter word. Surely that makes it 50% better than a 4-letter word... or is it 50% worse? What's your gut reaction when confronted by change? Do you embrace it, or shy away? Do you see it as a good thing, or bad? Or does it not touch you at all? There are many types of change - climate..., small..., ...for the better, ...for worse. How we react to change is a measure not only of our own stability and confidence, but our own mutability, and the extent to which external events can touch us within.

This is a time of change for me. I have already changed cars; in the next week I shall also change job, phone, email - each in itself is not a major thing, but added together, the faff factor is significant. But am I bothered?

No.

Quite the contrary. This change has been a long time coming; it's time has come and I am both ready and eager for it. Those of you who have asked - or wondered - about my avatar, follow the next bit carefully; the 14th of February is the start of the Chinese Year of the Tiger; my own sign. The following day I start my new job. Tiger years are years of change; they pass in a whirlwind of activity. You either run like the wind, or get blown away by it. I intend to do the former.

Which will you do?

Hold that tiger...


I was on a course once, which addressed personality types in meetings. The presenter made it simple for us. He explained that there are only four basic types of behaviour to watch out for:

The Tiger - knows how to play the game, and plays it;
the Owl - knows how to play the game, but chooses to sit back and watch;
the Donkey - thinks he knows how to play the game, and tries to do so;
and the Sheep - doesn't even realise there is a game, and becomes a plaything for the others...

As in meetings, so in life. Some play the game, some spectate, and some are the ball.

So what does all this have to do with photography in general, and Leica photography in particular?

Good question. Give me a moment...

...only joking.

There was a massive upheaval in the world of Leica last September - 09/09/09, to be exact - when the M9 hit the streets. The first full-frame digital camera, it caused a minor riot. Pent up demand exploded, and as I write the waiting list is measured in weeks if not months. The evolutionary dead-end that is the M8 was deserted in droves as the early adopters vied with each other to be the first kid on the block with the new shiny thing. Those who embraced change led the charge, while others sat back, happy with what they had, unable to afford (or justify) the expenditure, or simply unconvinced that the M9 was really the sine qua non.

What has been surprising has been the extent to which we have seen the armchair CEOs and kitchen-table designers pour scorn on the M9. There have been a number of voices raised expressing dissatisfaction with the new Leica, and "designing" the M10 already.

Why?

I think that there are two reasons. First is a "disappointment" - the M9 did not go "far enough" for some. These are the same people who want the M10 to more closely resemble a Canon DSLR than a Barnack. Their philosophy is simple - "newest is best" and anyone who disagrees risks being branded a "Luddite". Change cannot happen fast enough for them; their greatest frustration is that they are not driving the pace. "The Disappointed" run the risk of throwing the baby out with the bathwater; there is genuinely a faction that believes autofocus can be added with minimal upheaval. Their answer to the "Luddites" who do not want it is that it can be turned off.

Yeh right.

The second group is more complex, more nuanced, in their thinking. These are those who will always say that they are waiting for the next thing, because it is safer than embracing the current change. When the M10 comes out they will assiduously justify why it isn't quite what they need, and why they will be saving their pennies for the M11. On the surface, they look like The Disappointed, but they are even harder to please - we will call them "The Dissatisfied". Their expressed frustration for Leica not having delivered what they want is just the tip of the iceberg. Their entire lives will be characterised by a general feeling of unhappiness with everything they own and encounter - nothing will be quite good enough, nothing quite up to their standards. They resist change by calling for more, more more - and never quite getting there.

Change is a fact of life. You can embrace it, become part of it and shape it, or you can resist it and like the rock on the seashore, eventually get worn away. Change is not to be feared, but does have to be understood and guided. If you ignore it, you cannot complain when the change affects you in a way and at a time not of your choosing.

So, whether you say Gong Xi Fa Cai or Gong Hey Fat Choy, in this, of all years, ride the Tiger of change - don't let him ride you.

Bill

--0-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.

Hell, no, we won't logo...

I was buying a new car recently and I was asked if I wanted it "debadged". I'm aware of this "service", of course - a bit like having your hair cut or liposuction it is one of the few services in which you pay more to walk away with less - but it has always slightly mystified me. I have no particular desire to hide the model of car I am buying, so why bother? The salesman smiled. "Very well Sir", he said. and was going to leave it at that.

Out of curiosity, I asked him what sort of customer said yes. His answer was an interesting object lesson in reverse psychology. It seems that debadging is most popular with those buying base models. They opt for it so that they do not have anything on the back of their cars that declares they have gone for the cheaper option. The irony is, the salesman continued, that it is for the most part only those buying base models who choose to debadge - those who can afford the top of the range have no issue in "flaunting it". Thus, he pointed out with a certain degree of schadenfreude, if you see a debadged car, it is almost by definition equipped with cloth seats, small wheels and a socially inept owner.

This led me to thinking. One of the stranger sub-plots in the world of Leica is the desire to eliminate the red dot; remove from the front of the camera that which proclaims most loudly that you are using a high-end piece of photographic equipment. There are regular threads on fora seeking views on the best tape to use, or the best means to eliminate not just the dot but also the white lettering. Gaffer, duck, duct, insulating, etc - all have their adherents (sorry!).

So what is going through these people's minds? The most oft-expressed desire is to make the camera more "stealthy"; to present a more ninja-like face to the world. The theory goes that the red dot catches the eye and the "decisive moment" is lost.

Bollocks.

What catches people's eye is a 160-lb bloke dressing like Action Man night-stalker, making sudden movements as if he has mallards in his underpants and waving a camera in their direction. The red dot, or lack of it, has no bearing in this situation.

Let's move on to justification #2 - "I don't want to attract the attention of thieves". In this case our taper has moved to a specific class of people by whom he doesn't want to be noticed. That red dot just SCREAMS money, doesn't it?

Bollocks (again).

The average street thief is a) opportunist b) unaware of the Leica price list c) not choosy. A camera is a camera. The thought of someone initiating a mugging and then saying - "oh sorry, mate, didn't realise that was a Niktax 3000P - thought it was the far more valuable 30xls. Sorry to bother you, mind how you go..." - is not really credible, is it? A camera is a camera - it is something you have, that they do not, and something that they can sell for money. It's that simple.

Red, and proud of it...

Sooo... Justification #3 - "I don't want to be seen using an expensive camera to shoot poor people." ...I love this one. Anyone who follows this philosophy really shouldn't be allowed out on their own. Let's turn it on it's head - a great way to test any argument - "I only want to be seen shooting poor people with a cheap camera." - Well, let me put it this way; if I were pushing a Lidl trolley along the embankment, dragging my cardboard after me and swigging from a meths bottle and two photographers approached, one with a cheap disposable, and the other with an M9, I know which is more likely to catch my good side - that's the one without the suppurating sores and alopecia. If this is truly an issue to you, just stick to shooting the sort of still-lifes and landscapes so beloved of Amateur Photographer - nice, safe, anodyne and completely non-confrontational.

...and that brings me neatly on to justification #4...

Aesthetics.

Yes, aesthetics matter. And to some extent, this is the one justification with which I have some sympathy. Here's my confession - I don't like logos. If a company would like to pay me for advertising their product, I will gladly do so, but I am neither famous nor high profile enough to be sponsored, so that isn't going to happen.

I had a splendid dispute with a car salesman (yes, another one) a few years ago. I was buying a Land Rover Discovery; the Series II model that still had the spare wheel on the back door. Now, I object to advertising a dealership, so asked politely for a plain spare wheel cover. Not only was this request refused (I later bought one myself) but also my request for no cover at all; I was told that the Sales Director would not allow a car to be driven off their forecourt without a suitably tacky cover shouting their name.

In the event, and having nearly cancelled my order, I came to what I saw as a suitable compromise; I collected the car, complete with stencilled cover, drove it all of one yard across the forecourt, got out and removed the offending article, before frisbeeing it up on to the showroom roof. It described a graceful arc, and settled somewhere highly visible but inconvenient. The salesman smiled - his responsibility was discharged - and my vehicle was no longer a 4x4 billboard.

But that's one thing, and easily dealt with. I would never dream of buying an article of clothing that proclaimed "Nike" or "O'Neill", or any of a number of other brand names. I may be a Bill, but I am not a board. However, I have never let a logo stand in the way of ownership either. I have never bothered about having "Olympus" or "Leica" on a pentaprism, and I am not about to start now. It is an integral part of the design, an integral part of the product. Nobody removes the Spirit of Ecstacy from a Rolls Royce, so why worry about that little red dot?

For those to whom it really matters, there is one simple alternative - buy a Leica old enough not to have the dot - suddenly all your problems are solved. Ok, it won't be digital, but for many who seem to care about such ephemeral matters, I have a sneaking suspicion that it won't really matter - it's all about appearances. After all - who actually takes pictures with anything other than a cameraphone these days...?

Bill

--0-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.

Tag, you're it...

I have in the past few days learned all about the joys of "Geotagging". For the uninitiated, this is the process by which you can augment the EXIF data of your photos with the physical location that they were taken. Small, relatively cheap GPS receivers are used to track your travels and the record that they keep can then be combined on your computer with the images that you have taken (usually by means of timestamping) so that you can append the co-ordinates of each photo.

That's the theory - great, isn't it?

When I first heard about it, my Inner Geek got all excited - the propeller on the top of his head whirred so fast he nearly took off. A new shiny thing! A new means of enhancing the joys of photography! I can RECORD where I took each photo! I can, within a few tens of yards, say EXACTLY where I was standing! Inner Geek immediately started conducting internet searches for Geotagging gizmos. Prices were compared, baskets were added to, complete with free postage.

Then my Inner Pragmatist rubbed his chin and chimed in with an awkward question.

"Why?"

Inner Geek froze, his spiny fingers just inches from the wallet.

"Pardon?"

"What will you use it for?"

Inner Geek excitedly rattled off the rationale. Inner Pragmatist shook his head.

"No. What will YOU use it for...?"

Inner Geek sagged, and shuffled back to looking for the best deals on Babylon 5 boxed sets.

Now don't get me wrong. I can see a multitude of applications for professional, technical and commercial uses. The ability to provide locational information - or proof - would be very useful in many situations, including stock photography.

What I cannot quite get my head around is the unseemly excitement this technology seems to generate in otherwise sane photographers of a certain age. It seems to be the self same men who would not dream of stopping the car and asking for directions but are happy to let the mellifluous tones of an in-car satnav direct them the wrong way down a newly one-way street. I think it is the same phenomenon that leads to the wearing of those fancy Breitling emergency watches by those who never go further out of their depth than the bathtub. "The big boys have it so therefore I must have it too!"

Me, I use a Moleskine - no batteries, no chargers, no upgrades, no wi-fi, no SIM, no bluetooth, no firmware, no fixes, no GPS, no calibration, no hassle. Multifunctional, always on, compact, fits in a pocket or a corner of your bag, there when you need it, interfaces seamlessly with pen or pencil...

...and you can use it during take-off and landing...

It's all I need - seriously. And it is all that 99.9% of us "need", if truth be told. There is a simple pleasure to using a map - a paper map, that is - and marking it with a pencil. There is enjoyment to be had actually writing about a location rather than just double-clicking it on a screen. A couple of years ago I went to Seville for the first time. No photo, no exif data, no tag could bring again to mind the smell of the orange blossom in the same way that my notes - made at the time, in a pavement cafe - can.


Old-school "geotagging"...


Finally, there is one other aspect to geotagging that bothers me - the invasion of privacy. This has many facets - many of which are distasteful at best, and downright dangerous at worst. Imagine as geotagging becomes more mainstream, the mayhem that will result when the first mistress is tracked to her back garden by a wronged and embittered wife. Or the first battered ex-wife is tracked down by her abusive ex-husband from the embedded data in an otherwise innocent snap on Facebook... Imagine the consequences when the whistle-blower in the witness protection programme has their new life blown apart.

...it goes on.

The genie is out of the bottle, I know. Pandora has nothing on Panasonic. We cannot retreat from this latest "advance" - and no more should we - but we can be circumspect about it's use and cognisant of the risks...

...can't we?


Bill

--0-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.

A room with a view?

When we go on holiday, we have to pay extra for a "room with a view" - of the sea, the mountains, whatever. Never mind that sometimes the "view" requires one to stand on tiptoe hanging from the balcony rail whilst our loved one(s) hang on to our belts. Book a cruise on a modern liner and it seems that they manage to distort space itself to ensure that nobody, no matter how close to the bilges their ocean-going broom closet is, is without a sea view.

So - the view is important to us, for so many reasons. Would you be happy if you stayed in a hotel room with no windows, no outside view, save for an LCD tv?

No.

Of course not.

So why do today's camera manufacturers persist in producing even high-end digital compact cameras with no direct vision viewfinder? The technology exists, and has done for many years. The compact albada-type viewfinder has been with us in various forms since being introduced by Zeiss on the Contaflex in 1935. This simple evolution of the original Galilean finder gave us an optically projected image that showed the edges of the viewing field within the viewfinder assembly. Minox introduced parallax compensation way back in 1939 and of course it was Leica that gave the world the first viewfinder that combined parallax compensation, projected framelines and a rangefinder all in one, on the M3.

So the technology is not only proven, it has a fine pedigree - so why do so few of today's cameras have this little window on the world?

Let us examine the debate for and against.

"Too expensive" runs a common argument - it simply costs too much to put in a viewfinder. Funny then that Olympus managed to produce 10 million or so Olympus Trips at a reasonable price for so long.

"People don't want it" - ah. Now there is a splendid piece of circular logic. It's not there, so people don't want it, so it's not there.

"People like LCDs" - So do I, for some uses, like changing a setting. But using one in bright sunlight? Forget it. And use in the dark is not much better. Not only do you ruin your night vision but the ghostly glow in which you are bathed attracts unwelcome attention.

I have two theories as to the real reasons why we find ourselves viewfinderless. Firstly the rise of the mobile telephone with a picture-taking ability. As good as they are becoming, there are three things they have never had, and I suspect never will - a hotshoe, a tripod socket or a viewfinder. Whether we like it or not, cameraphones are now not only a commonplace piece of equipment for most people, they are in many cases the only camera that they own. The compact camera will eventually go the way of the dinosaur unless it learns to evolve and do new tricks - Nikon's recent projector-camera is a good example of this. So people are getting used to not having a viewfinder and see it's absence as a small price to pay for convenience.

Through the round, er, oblong window...

My second theory is a little more controversial. The act of bringing a camera to one's eye clearly indicates that you are about to take a photo. There is no other reason for doing so. This alerts others to the fact that their picture is to be taken. Some strike a pose, others object, some just don't notice, or don't care. With an LCD display in "Goldilocks light" (not too bright, not too dark...) the screen would appear to the uninitiated to give an edge - suddenly you can take a photo without raising the camera to your eye! Suddenly you can capture images discreetly, without running the risk of a confrontation! To many, this would be an advantage, especially in today's paranoid society, where every photographer is regarded as a terrorist or pedophile, guilty until proven innocent.

The reality is of course not so simple. For one thing, discreet photography without the camera at eye-level has been practiced for years. One of my favourite books, now sadly many years out of print, is "Shots From The Hip", by "Johnny Stiletto". Mr. Stiletto - at one time a regular contributor to Amateur Photographer in the days when it had relevance and balls - was known for shooting a roll a day of street subjects. He encouraged "shots from the hip" - breaking free from convention to give more dynamic and engaging results.

Secondly, the digital photographer with his LCD viewing screen is typically far from inconspicuous. The camera is held out at arms' length, like a baby with a particularly snotty nose. This is most noticeable in middle-aged men, whose eyesight has started to deteriorate. All pretence at discretion is lost by this stance, and any advantage goes with it.

A viewfinder does not have to be complex, nor even particularly informative. The add-on viewfinders are for the most part throwbacks to an earlier age - a simple means of framing up the image with no clutter, complication or extraneous information. Those cameras with accessory shoes allow their fitment. I use one myself, on my D-Lux 4. In my case it's a 50 year old SBOOI - a 50mm Leica finder that happens to give the same angle of view as the 60mm setting on the D-Lux. To me, this combination of old and new just underlines the ridiculousness of the situation - come on, chaps - just build the bloody thing in again. You'd be surprised at the number of people who would cheer.

Speaking of cheering, 'tis the season to be jolly and all that, so let me take this opportunity to say something that I have always wanted to say since my days of reading Tiger, Sparky, Eagle, Valiant and the like as a child:

A very Merry Christmas to all my readers!

...and a happy and prosperous New Year to you all.


Bill

--o-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.

Rapid weight loss...

Back from sunny Malta, I've been thinking...

I am struck by the recent rapid growth in the availability of "good things in small packages". Hot on the heels of Four-Thirds - itself a move in the small direction - Olympus and Panasonic have forged ahead with Micro Four-Thirds, and Sigma and Leica have gone down the large-sensor-small-body route to give big camera performance in a smaller body. Even "ordinary" high-end digital compacts with small sensors such as the G-11, D-Lux 4 et al offer a "power to weight" ratio that would have been unthinkable just 24 months ago. The photographer no longer needs to carry a large "pro-spec" camera everywhere to guarantee a decent image.

History repeats itself, of course. The digital size/quality ratio improvement is just following the same trajectory as that of film many years ago.

But why?

What drives the urge to miniaturise? Is there truly a demand, or is it a vanity development on behalf of the manufacturers? Portability is a very strong argument, of course, and something that I have written about in the past. The smaller, lighter and more compact your camera the more likely you are to have it with you when you need it. That's a simple equation. But I think that there are other forces - dark forces - at work.

Ever since 9/11, passenger air travel has become a trial of patience and a challenge to the traveller's ingenuity. Ever tighter security restrictions have not just reduced the amount of hand baggage but altered it's very composition. Changes in airline pricing structure, encouraging hand-baggage only by imposing a premium on hold baggage has squeezed from the other direction. The travelling photographer wanting to cover all eventualities on a long weekend city break has to fit everything he needs in a bag measuring 56x45x25 centimetres. Being slightly oversized is not an option, unless you want to run the risk of having your bag taken off you at the departures gate and shoved in the hold - don't even try to argue with the gate staff...

All this is old news for the Leica M and LTM user, of course. They have long enjoyed the advantages of a high quality, compact camera system. With the advent of digital, the need to pack multiple rolls of film has been largely circumvented (only to be replaced by the necessary chargers, spare batteries, spare memory cards and a backup storage device, of course...).

All you need? Not quite - yet...


I recently travelled to Malta for a long weekend. Beyond the clothes on my back, everything else, including three cameras, fitted in a Tamrac photo backpack. I recommend the type with the built-in laptop compartment, by the way - it's great for "flatpack" items such as shirts and trousers. Once "in theatre", everything "domestic" can be unpacked and left in your hotel, and your "luggage" becomes an ideal daypack while exploring. I'll do the same when I go to Budapest later this year. I couldn't have dreamed of doing that a few years ago, when I carried a big SLR with matching lenses - that WAS my hand-baggage. I might have fitted a spare pair of socks in the bag besides, but only if I used them as lens pouches. But the encouragement to travel light is powerful, and now we have the high quality compact camera equipment to match.

Compactness is no substitute for planning ahead though - don't for a moment think it is. I have never forgotten traveling all the way to Hawaii and finding myself with no more than a 135mm lens while trying to shoot a pod of whales from a catamaran. I did the best I could, but I was "outgunned" by those who had lugged something a little longer. Not a single decent shot that day, because I hadn't planned. Lesson learned. Now I think about what to take, and squeeze in a longer lens if absolutely necessary.

For the most part though, a decent kit these days takes up little more room than a pair of shoes (alright, I have large feet) and takes far better pictures.

So there we have it. Darwinian evolution is at work. The days of the bulky (D)SLR for travel snaps are numbered, thanks to the cold hand of Al Qaeda. Think of that the next time you heft your camera to your eye...

Bill

--o-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.
- More imagery at: Lightmancer

There can be only One (Challenge)...

Now.

By the time you read this I shall be in sunny Malta, for this year's One Challenge. This was a competition wot I invented six years ago exclusively for the users of Leica cameras that frequent the Leica User Forum. That first year, twelve die-hard souls met up in the Chandos pub in St Martins' Lane, London, on a dank and dreary December day. Some lunch and convivial chat followed, then everyone made their way out into the gathering gloom to shoot 36 exposures in one hour, with one camera, one lens, one ISO, one focal length and one aim in view - to capture the essence of the place.

How far we have travelled since that first gathering - literally. Subsequent One Challenges have taken place in Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, Krakow and now Valetta. The shooting time is now two hours, but the other rules have remained the same; short, simple and truly challenging. Amateurs and pros alike are tested by the rules, by the strange surroundings and by the time constraint. It is not as easy as it sounds to capture the essence of a whole city in such a short space of time. After the event, the entrant has to select one of their thirty-six shots to put up for the public vote - the most nerve-wracking part of the whole thing. We have had some close-run voting in the past, but the winner has invariably been more than worthy.

It's not about the money, either. The "entry fee" has stood at ten Euros for the past six years. That forms the "pot" - winner takes all. Nobody is going to get rich winning The One, but they will have the satisfaction of knowing that their carefully captured and selected shot has won them the acclaim of their peers. On a number of occasions, the prize money has been donated to charity by the winner - a grand gesture that is in keeping with the spirit of Leica.

The One Challenge was always meant to be as much about the opportunity to socialise as about the competition. In recent years that too has evolved from a quick pint at the pub to drinks the evening before, lunch immediately before, dinner the evening after... it's a never-ending social whirl! It's great to meet up with old friends each year, and to put faces to new names. Long-suffering partners come along too, and make the evening dinner far less Leica-focussed - thank goodness!

The One Challenge has also spawned it's own offspring - The Uno Challenge in Los Angeles, and other spin-offs worldwide. It has been featured in the LFI, and has attracted sponsorship in the form of prizes from Leica and this year from Red Dot Cameras in London. Ivor, the owner has very kindly donated a D-Lux 4 to this year's winner - a tremendous prize and one well worth going the extra mile to win.

So. The One Challenge is now a healthy, active 6-year old, that shows no sign of slowing down. When we meet this year, we will discuss where to go in 2010 - that's half the fun of it. My thanks to the organisers, both for this year and past years, who took up the original mantle and have helped The One to be the fun event it is today.

Yes, I am proud of The One Challenge, but most of all I am proud of my third placing in 2007 - the best I have done so far!

Bill

--o-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.
- More imagery at: Lightmancer

Snob value...?

If I had a Pound (or a Euro, or a Dollar, etc.) for every terabyte of server space devoted to the subject of snobbery - particularly pertaining to photo equipment - I would almost have enough to afford an M9. I mention the M9 because as a brand Leica seems to attract more snobbery - both real and inverted - than any other brand of equipment with a lens on the front.

One of those ghastly on-line dictionaries - you know, the ones that claim that "lense" is a word - defines snobbery as "...the trait of condescending to those of lower social status". In this context "social status" is defined not by birth but by financial clout. There is no such thing as a "cheap" Leica; even second-hand they command a premium over comparable equipment - assuming that anything comparable exists, which is frequently not the case anyway.

So why are Leicas so expensive? And why do people with more money than sense buy them? Finally, why does Leica ownership inspire such envy in others?

To understand this phenomenon we have to understand the unique place that the Leica camera holds in both history and mythology. Long ago, it ceased to be just a picture-taking machine. It became a lifestyle choice, before the term was even invented. When Leitz Camera introduced the Luxus in the 1930s it set the tone for years to come. Never let anyone tell you that the Leica was a professionals' camera that has been adopted by well-heeled amateurs - the well-heeled amateurs got there first, at the time the professionals were still using bulky full- half- and quarter-plate folders and 120 rollfilm and looking down their noses at the new-fangled "miniature" format as inadequate for serious use.

It didn't take long, however, for canny pros to realise that those pesky amateurs were on to something worthwhile; the light and compact Leica and its contemporaries taking 35mm film loads were turning up all over the place and producing publishable results. From the Arctic to the Antarctic, from the gondola of a Zeppelin to the pyramids of Egypt, the world was being viewed through a small viewfinder and captured through an Elmar.

The Leica was never cheap. It was hand-made with quality materials and for years represented the acme of German manufacturing ingenuity. Have a look at a Leitz product catalogue from 80 years ago and you can see that the camera itself was just at the tip of an ever-increasing iceberg of accessories and attachments, each identified by its' own five-letter designation - LYCAN, FODOR, FODIS, VALOY and of course my all time favourite, NOOKY. The complexity of the system of course appealed to the boy within the man - it's the same thing you see today with modern gadgets - iphones, bluetooth headphones, GPS keyrings, Nespresso coffee makers - boy toys one and all. The Gnomes of Solms (well, the Gnomes of Wetzlar at that time) were quick to realise that the acquisition of the kit was as important to the experience as the end result.

Fast forward to today; Leica is no longer at the bleeding edge of camera design; instead the company and its' products occupy a niche that was until recently almost unassailable - the cost of entry is prohibitive to all but the most resourceful - or obsessed. Nikon, Canon, Olympus and the rest have left Leica to it, abandoning the rangefinder as the SLR moved into the ascendant. And with a few notable exceptions - Voigtlander, Epson, Contax, Zeiss, Rollei (has anyone actually SEEN a Rollei m-mount rangefinder?) that is the way it has largely stayed. Only with the advent of micro four-thirds has there been a resurgence of the non-SLR "serious" camera as - belatedly - the big boys have realised once again that there is a market for small, high quality interchangeable lens system cameras.

Snobbery abounds there too, though. When Panasonic announced the GF-1 interchangeable lens micro four-thirds camera it took about 24 hours before it was being derided on the internet as the "GirlFriend-1" - a camera that no "serious" photographer would be seen dead with. This is of course bollocks, but sadly is a school of thought to be found almost exclusively among middle-aged men with more money than sense.

...and there is the crux of the problem. Like many quality items in this world - expensive sports-cars, high-end watches, bespoke tailoring - Leica ownership is not a young man's game. Forking out the thick end of £5000 for a camera body is not something that the average thirtysomething trying to bring up a young family is going to regard as a high priority.

Snobbery - or is it passive aggressive racism? also surfaces in the form of the perennial "Where is it made?" question. To some, it is not a Leica if it isn't made in Germany. Leitz Midland in Canada and the Portuguese facility are dismissed as not quite good enough, and heaven help a lens made under licence in Japan! The highest opprobrium is reserved, however, for the products of the partnership with Panasonic. Derided as "Panaleicas", they are regarded as the bastard spawn of a desperate marketing manager's wet dream. The reality - that they are built in close co-operation to a high standard, that they bring in a newer, younger clientele that would otherwise never go near Leica, and the fact that they provide an "on-ramp" for new customers who graduate to the more expensive products - is conveniently ignored. This has reached new heights with the recent announcement of the X1 - the very thought that a Japanese company may have had a hand in its' manufacture sends some into a fit of the vapours.

Lastly, we have the "It's good but it's not a Leica" snobbery that is displayed at the sight of a non-Leica lens mounted to a Leica body. Cosina Voigtlander (CV) and Zeiss have brought to market some groundbreaking lenses in recent years. They may not be the match of the equivalent Leica glass, but more often than not they are not specifically designed to go toe-to-toe with Solms' finest. Until very recently, there was no overlap at all between the CV and Leica lens ranges. Either focal length, aperture or both varied. To this day Leica still do not offer a 12mm lens, for example, or a 40mm 1.4, both of which CV introduced. Above all, CV revitalised the screw-mount ("LTM" or "Barnack") market with a slew of new lenses, offering modern glass in the classic mount and bringing a new lease of life to the older bodies alongside their own offerings. Lenses should be regarded as a palette, or perhaps more accurately as a selection of brushes; each delivers a different result, in support of the photographer's vision. Sharpness may be a quantifiable absolute, but since when was photography about absolute technical perfection?

So.

There are Leica snobs - elitism is rife. But does that explain the bitchiness and envy that abounds? Every time Leica puts a foot wrong - or even dares to go quiet for a time - the nay-sayers and doom-mongers gather. Every time somebody dares to praise the company or its' products there are those who will crawl out of the woodwork to point out that somebody else does it better/cheaper/faster. Buyers are derided for spending so much money on something that is far more capable than they are.

It seems to me that, like Montblanc, Rolex, Porsche etc. Leica has fallen into the "lifestyle" niche - a discretionary purchase that says as much about the purchaser as it performs the task it is designed for. iPods are egalitarian - everyone has one and they are cheap and plentiful. Leicas are elitist because they are expensive and (relatively) rare.


Posh "porn" - Montblanc and Leica...

Ultimately, it doesn't matter. If you can afford it, buy it. Personally, I have a simple philosophy - "buy cheap, buy twice". I bought my M7 new back in 2002 when they were first introduced. Since then I have lost count of number of SLRs and DSLRs and compacts (with various innards) that have sat alongside it in my gadget bag. It has long since paid for itself, and will continue to do so for as long as I can get film to feed it. It has been joined in recent years by an M2 and a II - neither of them in the first flush of youth, but both capable of superlative photography for years to come.

Snobbery? No. Lifestyle choice? Maybe. Lifelong choice? Yes.

Bill

--o-O-o--

- All images on this blog are copyright Bill Palmer and may not be reproduced in any format or medium without permission.
- More imagery at: Lightmancer