Discussion
I found a time expired roll of Kodak Gold in the back of a cupboard, stuck it in an old film camera I'd bought years ago out and tried it out.
Made do with my phone as an exposure meter, and I'm not a good photographer at the best of times.
But the camera was a Leica M3 with a Leica 50mm lens and the prints are stunning. I still suspect the fabled 'Leica look' is wishful thinking from people trying to justify the cost, but there does seem to be something special here. The uncanny sharpness of the foreground against the smoothness of an out of focus background has almost a 3D effect.
I bought the 60 year old camera a few years ago out of curiosity, justifying it because my building society account was earing virtually no interest so I might as well put the money into a camera.
Not only are the results good, but the camera is great fun to use, it's clearly a quality piece of kit making my perfectly decent Nikon DSLR feel like a toy by comparison.
The problem is, film is darned expensive.
Made do with my phone as an exposure meter, and I'm not a good photographer at the best of times.
But the camera was a Leica M3 with a Leica 50mm lens and the prints are stunning. I still suspect the fabled 'Leica look' is wishful thinking from people trying to justify the cost, but there does seem to be something special here. The uncanny sharpness of the foreground against the smoothness of an out of focus background has almost a 3D effect.
I bought the 60 year old camera a few years ago out of curiosity, justifying it because my building society account was earing virtually no interest so I might as well put the money into a camera.
Not only are the results good, but the camera is great fun to use, it's clearly a quality piece of kit making my perfectly decent Nikon DSLR feel like a toy by comparison.
The problem is, film is darned expensive.
Tony1963 said:
How can the look be fabled and wishful thinking, and then in the next breath something special is going on?
My point is that despite my scepticism there does seem to be something special looking at an individual batch of pictures. It may be my imagination, or maybe there really is something unique to Leica. Or most likely it's something about any quality lens compared with a cheap zoom.Austin Prefect said:
Made do with my phone as an exposure meter
For the full hairy-chested analogue experience I believe sir needs one of these: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/406224976829Austin Prefect said:
Tony1963 said:
How can the look be fabled and wishful thinking, and then in the next breath something special is going on?
My point is that despite my scepticism there does seem to be something special looking at an individual batch of pictures. It may be my imagination, or maybe there really is something unique to Leica. Or most likely it's something about any quality lens compared with a cheap zoom.Lenses have always been critical but more so in days of film as you couldn't dial out imperfections with on-board processing. Leica and Ziess lenses were properly crafted, hand made and hand calibrated. They designed them to yield a unique look that wasn't necessarily better than others but provided a style that some favoured.
Back then, the differences would have been subtle and like high-end Hi-Fi, only noticeable to those that knew!
But today, you've spent the last 25 years looking at digital images which are great, but when you see a fresh, film print, it looks entirely different because the way the light is captured is more natural, more analogue.
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