Collectors Should Be Shot (or at least, they should learn to shoot)

DBP · Aug 23, 2006

Any time you are buying something beautiful primarily for investment value, you are debasing your soul. I remember fleeing an art gallery some years ago when the owner started his pitch by telling me how fast that artist's paintings were going up in price. Silly me, I thought the purpose of having paintings was to look at them. And the purpose of cameras is to take pictures, though admittedly I do have a few around here as art or conversation pieces. But most of those get used too.

copake_ham · Aug 23, 2006

At the end of it - the reality is that folks are free to do what they want with their money. And we all know how quickly a fool can be be parted from his.

I'm not overly bothered by the kinds of collectors who never shoot their gear - and there are some collectors of vintgage stuff who couldn't shoot it if they wanted to do so.

I am more respectful of collectors who do at least occassionally shoot the functioning gear in their collections than I am of those who shrink wrap the damned things and put them in a climate-controlled safe! But the latter really do me no harm - and do provide me with some mild amusement!

John McCallum · Aug 23, 2006

I wonder though. Perhaps Leica just decided to make the best fit-for-purpose camera they could. If they'd known the built in reliability of the camera would eventually be detrimental to the longevity of the company, they might have chosen a different course.

Who has the "purpose of a lovely device was been so badly redirected" by? Not Leica. They introduced an electronic shutter with aperture priority in the most recent model in order to keep it a functional/working tool. A smight on the nose of the 'purists' and there was an outcry in response.

Hasn't the market just matured and split? I'm not sure the collectors have had a lot of influence on the prices since the early days. Don's purchase as a case in point.

It is an interesting suggestion that because the devices garnish a lot of talk, that this is bad for photography. But I then the immediate gratification by equipment talk is rife amongst photogrpahers, particularly. And unfortunately seems particularly rife amoungst RF users. If it wasn't leica there'd be something else.

To talk about images and concepts in photography takes much more effort.

But perhaps that was your point ...

BruceN · Aug 23, 2006

Frankly I can't think of anything I could do with a Leica that I can't already do with my OM-1 and Zuiko glass. And with results of at least equal quality. I'm sure I'll be barbecued for that, but I stand by it.

Bruce

PS - I'd still like to have a Leica, but I'm certain I'll never be able to justify the expense.

John Koehrer · Aug 23, 2006

Just a couple of observations on my part. Who suggested that HCB could have used a Nikon in his heyday? Was that Nikon available in Japan let alone Europe?
The global economy such as it is didn't yet exist.
Money? to someone that had $$$ in those days cost wasn't a concern & HCB & family had the $$$.
Leica was and is a fine machine and until the development of the post war Nikon had only Contax as competion in Europe.

firecracker · Aug 24, 2006

My understanding is that the big Leica trend came in the late 70s and/early 80s when the Japanese collectors started to sweep up many Leicas from Europe and the U.S. So the Leica owners started to sell their cameras and lenses they had kept in their drawers first at a moderate cost because there was no use for them. They had many Leicas laying around doing nothing.

Roger Hicks · Aug 24, 2006

firecracker said:
My understanding is that the big Leica trend came in the late 70s and/early 80s when the Japanese collectors started to sweep up many Leicas from Europe and the U.S. So the Leica owners started to sell their cameras and lenses they had kept in their drawers first at a moderate cost because there was no use for them. They had many Leicas laying around doing nothing.

What you describe pretty much exactly describes what happened to me.

When I was about 20, my girlfriend wanted a good, reliable, not-too-expensive camera. I recommended a Leica; she bought a II for twenty quid (under $50 at the time). After a few weeks she got tired of my using it all the time, and I had to buy my own, a IIIa (which I still have) for £30.

We bought some kit to share, including a fat barrel coupled 9cm Elmar for £11. It had an odd serial number, with both an asterisk (re-used serial number) and an 'a' (attrape, dummy) after it. We didn't care: it was a lens to use. It's in one of the collector books now.

For a few years -- about 5, maybe even 7, I don't remember -- I used to collect Leica stuff, such as a stereo beamsplitter and viewer that cost me £25. It was fun; it wasn't too expensive; and it was interesting. I met a few of the major collectors of the time, too. I used to buy and sell to try stuff that interested me, so I've owned most screw Leicas and borrowed most of the few I didn't own, such as 250 (FF/GG) though the only IIId (IIIc DA) I ever used was a self-confessed fake. I bought my first M, an M3, in 1974 or so.

In the mid-to-late 70s, I realized that I had a couple of grand's worth of screw Leica kit sitting around doing nothing, so I sold it, sometimes for ten times what I'd paid for it. Some of it is now worth 50 to 100 times what I paid, but hey, I had my fun and I had my profit.

What I was left with was a hearty respect for Leicas and (always) one or two or more Leicas to use. I don't remember how long I've had my older M2, andf I bought my first new Leica lens (35/1.4) in about 1982, after I'd had my existing 35/1.4 stolen in India. Since then I've bought a new 90/2 and I'm just now paying for a new 75/2.

Cheers,

R.

Roger Hicks · Aug 24, 2006

snegron said:
I hate to be the one to mention this little known fact, but many average income people such as myself can not afford Leicas. QUOTE]

Sorry, I just don't agree with you, but I completely agree with Lee: it's a question of priorities. I have known people with well below average incomes who own Leicas and other expensive cameras. An anecdote I have told elsewhere illustrates an example.

In the mid-70s I used mostly Nikon F, then recently discontinued. I had a couple of bodies and maybe 5 lenses. At a camera club model night, another member looked at my case and said, "I wish I could afford an outfit like that."

At the end of the evening, he drove off in a new Ford, I in my 25-year-old Rover 110 for which I had paid £70. The depreciation on that Ford, the day he drove it out of the showroom, would probably have paid for my entire Nikon outfit, all bought second-hand.

And, like Lee, I service my own vehicles; my wife cuts my hair; we eat out only when we are travelling; and so forth...

Cheers,

Roger

Roger Hicks · Aug 24, 2006

copake_ham said:
No matter how marginally better a Leica/Leitz set up may be - it is NOT worth the difference in price it commands.

Not TO YOU. But how easily can you afford a Leica? If I could afford it, I'd have a lot more new Leica kit. As I can't afford it, I can't really judge. But I've used Leicas for about 35 years and if I could have afforded it, I'd have bought my first one 40 years ago, in my 'teens.

A good few years ago, when I was still an employee and quite well paid, I realized that if I really wanted one, I could just about afford a bottom-of-the-line Rolex. I'd long wanted one, not least because my father always wanted one too. They were around £300 at the time. I looked at one in a jeweller's and decided that no, it really wasn't worth that to me.

In other words, it's easier to 'want' or 'not want' something you can't afford, because you don't have to consider what you'd rather have. There are a lot of things I'd rather have than a Rolex, but not many things I'd rather have than a Leica. That's why I have Leicas and a thirty-quid quartz watch.

Cheers,

Roger

Stephanie Brim · Aug 24, 2006

As someone who truly can't afford one right now...I'm pondering getting one next year. Why? I've noticed prices coming down slightly in what I assume to be anticipation for the digital M. I've thought about getting an R2M, but then I think about what I'd truly rather have...and I come up with an M2 as an answer. Why? I can't really tell you. It isn't really the name that attracts me. I think what attracts me is what attracts me to film photography in the first place: someone made that thing by hand. The thing has lasted 50 years and is built like nothing else for that reason. Someone took the time to put all those pieces together and get it just right. It's just like me: I develop my film with my own two hands. I feel a sense of pride in that. The Leica craftsman have to feel a sense of pride in every single camera that rolls off the assembly line. It's their craft, something they made. I'd be proud of that.

Saying a Leica isn't worth paying for is saying that the painstaking work that the people go through to put together those cameras by hand isn't worth it. There are some things in life worth paying for, and, to me, a Leica is one of them.

Dan Fromm · Aug 24, 2006

Um, er, ah, Stephanie, whether you should get a Leica depends on what you want to accomplish. Rangefinder cameras aren't well-suited to all applications. And larger formats easily produce better image quality than the best 35 mm camera.

When I got into photography used screw mount Leica bodies and lenses to fit 'em were very inexpensive. Same situation as Roger's. But I knew that I wanted to work at shooting unconstrained fish in aquaria. The only Leicas of the time that were well-suited to that task were the SL and SL2. Neither was, IMO, as nice a camera as a Nikkormat FTN so that's what I got. Leitz had great difficulty with electricity. I don't regret the decision.

These days my main cameras are a 2x3 Pacemaker Speed Graphic and a Nikon FM2n. When used with its normal lens and rangefinder, the Speed is functionally equivalent to a screw mount Leica with its normal lens. I find it easy to think of the Speed Graphic as a Leica interpreted by a locomotive manufacturer. Thing is, it is impossible to match the image quality I get from the Graphic with any 35 mm camera. Bigger is better.

If you buy cameras to have and to fondle, I suppose that Leicas can have a lot going for them. But if you buy cameras for the pictures you can take with them, Leicas aren't so attractive.

Good luck, have fun,

Dan

Stephanie Brim · Aug 24, 2006

I shoot street, portraits, and low-light. Rangefinders are ideally suited to my main photographic needs.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Aug 24, 2006

Roger Hicks said:
snegron said:

I hate to be the one to mention this little known fact, but many average income people such as myself can not afford Leicas.

Sorry, I just don't agree with you, but I completely agree with Lee: it's a question of priorities. I have known people with well below average incomes who own Leicas and other expensive cameras. An anecdote I have told elsewhere illustrates an example.

Click to expand...

Roger, you remind me of the fact that for the price I paid my laptop 3 years ago, I could have a used M3 body and a lens. Or a small Hasselblad kit. Or even a used Mamiya 7II.

I was into computers before being into photography, so I still ponder profoundly the expense of a 100$ Pentax lens to go on my Spotmatic, but I realize how quick I was to buy a good, solid laptop.

Funny how one's priorities change. The odd thing is that with the laptop I have, I don't feel I have to justify it as a "professional" tool. Computers are so common that this price is hardly something special. But buying a camera of the same price still means "going pro," and while that's a perception one may or may not choose to accept as valid, it's still a thought that the average consumer must confront.

We've been conditioned to accept a 1-2k$ computer as a normal household item, but for most people a camera is for snapshots at birthdays, so I suppose a Leica would look like a 600$ broomstick to them.

Click to expand...

Stephanie Brim · Aug 24, 2006

I don't look at it as so much going pro because I'll ALWAYS be an amateur. I never plan to do photography as my main source of income. I look at it as trading my kit up for something a little better because I've grown to need something else. It isn't a question of pro or not pro, but more a question of want and need for new and challenging equipment.

Lee Shively · Aug 24, 2006

There's no real reason to have to justify what camera you use or rationalize what works best for you. They're just tools and one should always use the tool that fits the job and feels right in the hand.

Back in the early Eighties, I bought my first Leica--an M4-P--out of anger over the poor reliability of the then-current Nikons I had bought. And the Leica proved to be highly reliable for me. But I had a problem in using the Leica. I had been using Nikon SLRs daily for so long, I couldn't get used to the direction of the focus ring or focusing with the rangefinder spot. Of course, it was my own fault, but I simply couldn't use the Leica effectively. So I sold the Leica equipment because it wasn't a tool that felt right to me at the time.

Several years ago, I bought Canon EOS equipment. After working with the Canons for a time, which manual focuses in the same direction of Leicas, and getting used to placing an AF sensor on the subject to achieve focus (which to me is much like placing the RF patch), I bought a used Leica M6. I took to it right away. It felt right this time.

I realize the camera doesn't make the picture--I have a favorite photograph on a nearby shelf that I made with a store-brand disposable. But feeling comfortable with a camera helps a lot.

df cardwell · Aug 24, 2006

My teachers' advice on buying gear:

"Spend as much as you can afford,
on as little as you need"

"Buy a camera like you would buy would buy a pair of shoes:
you want to play tennis, buy tennis shoes;
you want to go dancing, buy dancing shoes."

"Get the camera you are comfortable with.
If the winding lever pokes you in the eye
don't buy it."

And finally,

"Don't buy it if you can rent it.
Don't rent it if you can borrow it.
Don't borrow it if you don't need it."

My own feelings are that we buy a camera to make pictures,
and the more crap we have, the harder it is to make a good picture.

Having the most toys wins ?
THAT is one of the most evil beliefs you can possibly have.

Finally, if you are a Collector, fine.

Collect Leicas, Martin Guitars, Tiffany lamps, whatever.

But if you are a PHOTOGRAPHER, posses less than
what you need to make your pictures.

.

Mark Layne · Aug 24, 2006

The two finest user rangefinder cameras of all time were built in the late 1950s - the Leica M3 and M2 both designed by Willi Stein.

Despite this I still prefer using Contax IIa and IIIa once equipped with proper finders, have never had a shutter failure.

Is there a discernable difference between Leica Zeiss and Japanese lenses of the same era. Very definitely but its too lengthy a subject and to a large extent involves the rendering of out of focus areas.
Mark

jimgalli · Aug 24, 2006

I'm guilty of owning more than I need, but not Leica. If someone has a nice old M3 / 35f2 (or 50 in a pinch) that's been in semi-continuous use since I was born and wants to see it abused with yet further photons, send it to me. I promise I'll put it in a leather sack and carry it around Nevada in a Ford pickup truck until I die. It would see some EV17 photons out here. Always wanted one. Don't ever expect to have one. I can trade some extra 8X10 kit.

rfshootist · Aug 24, 2006

Roger Hicks said:
Sorry, I just don't agree with you, but I completely agree with Lee: it's a question of priorities.
Roger

Dear Roger,

not entirely I'd say, rather within certain limits and relative to the persons lifestyle.

As for me, if I had to drive a 70GBP Rover to be able to buy my dream photo gear, this would be a significant proof hat I can NOT afford it !

Iam a car nuts and when I was young I thought I should have a Porsche 911 S and I had the money to buy a used one and to pay the maintainance.
But then I realized that I had to cut down to zero all my other budgets, Wine, travel, books, camera (!!!) , concerts, biking and so on.
And in the the moment I realized that I wasn't willing to give that all up I realized I could not afford that 911. Tho I had the bread.

Maybe it's because I simply cannot get obsessive enuff for one thing ( "Thou shalt not chain up your heart to dead things") to get my budget so extremely out of balance, no clue if this is a deficit or a blessing ? :confused:
All a matter of standpoint I suppose.

Best,
Bertram

Roger Hicks · Aug 24, 2006

Dear Bertram,

I didn't HAVE to drive a £70 Rover; I could have had sonething newer and no Nikons... Besides, I wouldn't have called it 'dream gear': I was already working professionally in London (in advertising photography), albeit only as an assistant, and bargains turned up, as they do.

Seriously, the old P4 Rover was a nice car, a '59, in very good order and requiring minimal maintenance, though I did decoke the head once (inlet-over-exhaust straight six, 2638cc). It finally died of old age (kingpins and water pumps were harder to get for old Rovers then than they are today). As I recall I replaced it in around 1978 with a '63 Land Rover, £800 + VAT, which I sold a few years later when my new wife (Frances!) didn't like driving it. Again, I could have bought a new car at the time (that was when I considered the Rolex, as I recall) but I couldn't see the point in buying something with that kind of depreciation; I've only ever bought one new car in my life, in about 1990, and I don't miss them. Land Rovers, that you can fix forever, just suit me better.

Yes, I used to miss out on hardback books (paperback only in most cases) and I didn't travel much outside the UK in those days, but that was a conscious decision: by the time I was 19 I had moved 19 times, in Cornwall, England, Scotland, Malta and Bermuda. I felt I needed to stay put for a few years. Then in '81 I went to California and met Frances...

Today, because I've always bought to last ('Quality doesn't cost, it pays') I can afford to travel quite a bit. I don't need new cameras very often, and I'd rather spend another day in (say) Malta or India or the Pyrenees than go out to dinner here in France. I prefer to get straight into the bath after a haircut, another reason for Frances to cut my hair, though the village hairdresser has recently moved and is now maybe 60 metres away on the other side of the Mairie and the cafe-bar.

Frances and I do live very modestly by most standards, and we tend to travel economically too, but we eat very well at home (tonight, for example, is fenech stufat, Maltese rabbit stew in red wine) and in the last eight months or so we've been to England, Scotland, Florida, Spain (twice) and Portugal, as well as some travel in France. As the old Arab saying has it, "Take what you want, and pay for it, saieth the Lord."

Cheers,

R.

Roger Hicks · Aug 24, 2006

mhv said:
Computers are so common that this price is hardly something special.

By the time I was working professionally in the mid-70s, cameras at that price were pretty common too, so perhaps I didn't see second-hand Leicas (or Nikons) as expensive. I still remember my first computer, though: £1600 in about 1983. Now THAT was expensive -- but having worked in photography, I was perhaps conditioned to the idea that you buy the gear you need to do the job.

Cheers,

R.

copake_ham · Aug 24, 2006

Roger Hicks said:
Not TO YOU. But how easily can you afford a Leica?...

Cheers,

Roger

Roger,

Without going into specifics - I can afford a Leica should I want one. Just as you spoke of priorities so I will speak of relative value.

No matter how well-build a Leica camera body is in relation to other high-end competitors - it is not WORTH the price differential. Beyond the actual value of the Leica - one is asked to pay a much higher price for the cache. The same holds true for Leitz lenses. Yes they are very fine specimens - and by some tests perhaps the "sharpest" etc. But they are priced beyond their actual value with respect to their quality versus others.

The fact that I could afford a Leica is not what informs my buying decision. To me, I want to feel that I have gotten true functional value for what I paid - and not an additional cost simply so I can display the red dot - and then worry about whether I should remove it so as to deter potential theives!

rfshootist · Aug 24, 2006

Roger Hicks said:
Dear Bertram,

Seriously, the old P4 Rover was a nice car, a '59, in very good order and requiring minimal maintenance, though I did decoke the head once (inlet-over-exhaust straight six, 2638cc).

R.

Roger,
I know this P4, no matter what you paid for it, it had style !!
Nice way to save money,

bertram

Claire Senft · Aug 24, 2006

I am somewhat in disagreement with DFcardwell's teachers advice. I do not know that there is an advantage in having less than you need to take your photos. I do believe that if you wish to take photos it is best to start at the end..the print and work back to the beginning and buy equipment that is well suited, when funds allow, to taking photos of that type. It is extremely good advice I feel not to get caught up with poorly thought out purchase that do not fit the tasks to be accomplished.

If your desire and need for photos is to make 20x24 landscapes that have wonderful detail and fine gradation some equipment fits that task and some does not. The same would go for street photography where the goal may be to make very nice 5x7.5 inch prints mounted on 8x10 or 11x14 board. Here agin there is equipment that is well suited to the task and other equipment that is not.

A photographer is well advised to think thru how suited a piece of equipment
is for the goal of taking photos of the type desired.

Making sensible choices in acquiring the minimum of equipment suited for the goals set is good for your photography. Then make sure you use it a lot...I mean a lot. Experience, with a thought out goal will make you a more sucessful photographer. Excess equipment is a burden..it ties up funds, uses up space and complicates decision making. And makes you less competent in using the equipment due to lessened familarity in using it.

firecracker · Aug 24, 2006

One complaint I have is that more than often I end up receiving awful cleaning and repair services for my Leica M3 and a 50mm Summicron lens. Maybe I'm just so unlucky, but I think I've already spent way too much time and money for that.

A few months back I was in search for the lens cleaning in Japan, and I didn't get the service. One place refused me as a customer, and other two places, they were members-only Leica clubs charging way more than the average. They are the collectors' places!

Well, there's always Golden Touch in upstate New York that I like, but it's too much of a hustle in a way to have to ship the lens internationally just to get it cleaned.

This is what's holding me back from buying a new used Leica body and a lens at this point. I've had the same problem with Apple computers in the past when I needed one. That was very frustrating, too.

Collectors Should Be Shot (or at least, they should learn to shoot)

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