williamcarter
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OK, here are my very unscientific first impressions of the M8. This'll be quick because I'm tired. (and please excuse any typos).
(1) Feel/Handling: While it's truly a beautifully made camera, it feels noticeably different from the Leica MP I have. I have them both here and they just feel different. Perhaps its more elctronics in the M8 versus more metal in the MP. I used to have an M7 and my subjective reaction is that the M8 feels more like the M7 than like the MP. It's not really a fair comparison, since the MP is one of the finest crafted cameras I've ever used. And it's not that the M8 feels "bad," it's just that I was struck by the difference. The size, weight, smoothness of the controls was a pleasure.
(2) Operation/Menu: For the most part, the menu system is clear and well thought out and easy to use. On the other hand, there is one significant stupidity: there are some menu functions that are set by pressing the "Menu" button and others that can only be reached by pressing the "Set" button while the camera is is in shooting mode. Aside from not being able to see any obvious reason for splitting what are all essentially "Menu" settings in this way, the idiocy is multiplied by the fact that I have to remember to press "Set" rather than "Menu" to change ISO because that's where ISO lives ont he M8. My annoyance is further compounded by the fact that the DMR I used to own had an actual buttom -- not a menu selection, but a button -- to change ISO, meaning I could always do it "on the fly" without having to think about it or dive thru menus. So, someone on the Leica design team, at least in the past, realized the importance of making ISO immediately accessible at all times. I think Michael Reichmann might have said this in his review: with digital, ISO is now the third shooting variable, along with aperture and shutter speed, and it needs to be as easily accessible as aperture and shutter speed.
(3) Viewfinder: I only got a chance to pop a couple of frames with the M8 today, with the 35mm Summicron and the 50mm Summilux. The 35mm framelines are easy to use; the 50mm framelines look tiny! (As compared to how they look in my MP). Somewhere, I have the Leica 1.25X magnifier that I bought specifically in anticipation of the M8, but I can't find the damn thing -- it's so tiny, it's probably stuck in the corner of a camera bag somewhere! :-) Anyway, I imaging I'll have the 1.25x mag permanently attached to the M8.
(4) Focus: I found that I had trouble nailing critically sharp focus. I wasn't off by much, but it's noticeable. Part of that is that I was shooting at large apertures (1.4-2.0), and partially because of how large the rangefinder patch is in comparison to the 50mm (effective 66mm) framelines. I'm a little frightened of how difficult it'll be to foucs my 75mm.
(5) Noise: none at ISO 160. A bit at ISO 640, but not objectionable. Didn't go higher than that.
(6) White Balance: I used auto WB, and it was OK, but only OK. About the same as the Leica DMR, which is to say, not as good as the auto WB on Canon/Nikon.
In short, I dig the camera thus. Gotta spend more time with it, though, to really learn how to maximize it. I'm sure that I won't be using it primarily in studio settings, but rather, for travel, street, and documentary work, b/c that's where rangefinders really shine.
Below are a couple of sample images. The first image in each pair is the JPEG straight out of the camera; the second image in each pair is with my usual base sharpening, gray balance, and levels adjustment. (But with my usual skin smoothing, blemish removal, etc). Please don't take these shots as indicative of my "serious" work; as I said, these were just a couple of shots between setups to test the M8; the "serious" shots were with my medium format rig.
Edited by williamcarter on Nov 04, 2006 at 09:38 PM GMT
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