Leica M3 as a wedding camera

About 18 months ago I went to a wedding of some friends of ours.  I took the Sony NEX, as well as my Leica M3, along with a 50mm Summicron and a 90mm Summicron.  The Sony photos turned out well, but truth be told, manual focusing for a wedding wasn't that fun.  You can see the shots from the Sony here.  Unfortunately I forgot about the film shot on the Leica and only found it recently when I got a whole lot of rolls processed.

The results from the Leica and Fuji Neopan combination were very, very good.  It shows low contrast, but tons of tonality in a typical Leica way.  Such a look isnt really a typical way to shoot a wedding these days, but I still love the look, and so did the bride and groom when I showed them recently. 

As a wedding camera, the M3 only really works as a second or third shooter.  The slow manual focusing means you have to plan your shots, and quick candids are quite difficult.  The 90mm Summicron is especially difficult to use due to the low depth of field, making it really easy to miss shots.

Still, it was fun, and I plan to do it again.

Nikon 35Ti Results

Recently I go the film back that I had been waiting to have processed that I shot with my Nikon 35Ti, and I was very pleased with the results. You can read my initial impressions here. I shot Kodak E100VS E6 slide film, and after reading some user reviews on the web, I set the exposure compensation for +2/3 of a stop.  This was a wise and fortuitous move, as all the exposures were close to spot on.

The other thing that impressed me was sharpness.  The lens in this camera is excellent, with tons of detail resolved on the film.  A 35mm f2.8 lens is enough to isolate objects and throw the background out of focus, as well as keeping the lens small.

There are two things that annoy me even more about the camera from when I used it..  The first is that the panoramic switch is easily and unknowingly moved, so a lot of my shots were (sadly) cropped.  The second is you can't tell if critical focus has been acheived.  Some of my shots, especially those close to the subject when wide open, were out of focus.  Not much you can do about this though.

Lastly, the flash works fine, but it sure doesn't have the finesse of my Fuji X100 for fill in.

Otherwise, I was really very pleased with the quality of the photos, and I think I'll hang on to this camera for a while.

Leica 50mm Summicron M Type 4

Sure, you can buy a 50mm f2 lens from an OM Olympus or Fujica for about 20 bucks and get great results, and these lenses are simple and common, but I will say that my Leica 50mm Summicron M Type 4, with a used value of about $1,700, is by far the best lens I own.

You pay dearly for that last bit of quality, and the law of diminishing returns is clearly evident in any Leica purchase; this lens is really something special.  It's absolutely tack sharp at f2, where it already easily out resolves the 16mp sensor of the Sony NEX5n.  The bokeh is smooth and buttery, and there are no aberrations or distortion.

The camera I most enjoy using this lens on is the M3.  I really appreciate the accurate and bright rangefinder patch, which makes getting critical focus easy.

It has a reputation of being the best 50mm lens available at any cost, and I have no doubt that this is true.

Where colour is better

A while back I shot this scene of grass around some tree roots.  I liked the look of the roots and thought that by shooting the photo in black and white, it would enhance the look of the photo.  But it was not to be.  The tree roots and its immediate surroundings were already almost totally monotonic, and taking away the green grass meant that the roots were no longer framed, creating a very drab and boring photo.  So in this instance, colour was the better choice.

The sharpness mystery of UV Filters

Over the past years I've mainly  shot with some sort of filter on most of my lens, mostly to prevent the front element from getting scratched.  I learned the hard way once, when a lens that had no filter on, my Sigma 10-20mm f4-5.6, made solid contact with a door handle on the front element as I was rushing out of our hotel room in Spain.  This incident left a permanent mark, more of a coating mark than a scratch, and while it didn't at all affect lens performance, it did affect its resale.

However, much has been made about the reduced sharpness and performance of lenses with filters fitted, so lately I have been shooting my new Sigma lenses without filters, but instead regularly fitting the lens hood.  These lenses have taken some of my best photos in a while, with excellent sharpness, so there maybe something is to be said.  It also could be suggested that lens manufacturers don't design their lenses with filters in mind, and extra optics, ie the filter, may cause a deterioration n quality.

On the negative side to that argument, I had been using a crappy filter on my Tamron 24-135mm f3.5-5.6 zoom lens, yet it can still out resolve the D600 sensor at f8.  The same can be said about both the Sigma lenses on the NEX5n.  Weird.  The jury is still out, but I have decided that it I can get away with not using a filter and still offer some protection for the front lens element, then I probably will.

 Fuji X100 with old, crappy Toshiba 49mm UV filter fitted