eosfun wrote:
From a pure technical point of view the Leica doesn\'t offer more than other camera manufacturers do. In fact the Leica management decided a long time ago to purposely offer less than other camera makers do. That is a philosophy that makes shooting Leica a kind of experience that is unique. I think John Ricard explains quite well what this Leica experience is. The problem is, the market for this \"less is more\" type experience is very small and the use of labour intensive manufacturing of the rangefinder mechanics drives cost high. Until today the Leica M is not an example of modern rational production methods. This philosophy was for a great part the reason why Leica, just like some other German competitors, lost the market to competing Japanese camera manufacturers. Leicas and their mechanisms are easy to copy. This has been done many times before by Canon, Nikon, Zorki and so many others. But the fact remains that too many people want something different than a rangefinder. Back in the 60-ies it was the single lens reflex type camera that the photographic masses wanted. Today the paradigm is shifting from the D-SLR to EVF and OLED screen based mirrorless cameras with connectivity built in. The minimalist Leica M experience is a niche for a happy few, now and in the future.
Actually, Leica only came up with its \"less is more\" when it resigned itself to being a boutique maker, which really wasn\'t until the 1990\'s. Just look at the R8/R9 designs, which were very feature-laden (Much like the similar Contax RTSIII). Leica quite simply kept failing when it tried to come up with a more modern design (see M5, R3/R4/R5) or killed off successful modern designs when they threatened the flagship M (CL). Quite frankly a lot of Leica\'s blather about \'Less is More\' is excuse-making for 40 years of failing at introducing a proper successor to the M3, Leica most certainly does use \'Less as More\' today in its designs, but that is only something they\'ve recently arrived at with the current ownership (who quite frankly gets the Leica mystique in a way that the previous owners & management hadn\'t since Nikon supplanted them as the go-to option for the working PJ way back in the early 1960\'s when the market shifted to SLR\'s).
I\'ll admit to not being a Leica fan. I understand the attraction, but I don\'t share it. The single best minimalist camera I\'ve worked with is the NEX-7, which can be operated in a far more minimalist manner than an M9, unless you absolutely must have labelled dials. And yes, I\'ve used an M9. Nicely built but it doesn\'t justify the cost despite my work and style being overall well suited to it (and I strongly dislike being forced to focus & recompose rather than just focusing manually where I want focus).
Nov 02, 2012 at 06:26 PM
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