At the end of the day, despite any emotional or sentimental attachment elicited from the potential of creation, a camera is still a tool. After a decade long journey of jumping between brands and unhealthy relapses into the dreaded state of Gear Acquisition Syndrome, I believe the Leica M system retains the essence of stills photography at its simplest form.

The past decade has seen an exponential advancement of technological improvements to image quality and practical image-making assistance that has seen major brands partake in a race that can be interpreted as purely a numbers game. Upon any new release, you can find the comments section of any rumour mill to have enthusiasts deliberating the written specs and comparisons to rival brands and equivalent models. No stone is unturned; from ISO to Dynamic Range performance, the amount of stops compensated by the in-body image stabilisation to even the frame rate and bit depth of video recording.

Perks of working at a Leica boutique, from the night of the Leica M Monochrom launch, with a special performance from ambassador Seal.

My introduction to Leica and rangefinder cameras began at the end of 2011. I was working in camera retail, a store called Fotoriesel which became one of the first Leica boutiques in Australia. There, I managed to pick up a Canadian made Leica M4-P with a 35mm Summicron. At first sight (and touch), I was smitten with the size and elegance of the simplicity of operation… Set your shutter, aperture, focus and shoot (ISO was predetermined by the film loaded). I don’t recall when I flipped this camera, and it would be years later then I would endeavour to rebuild this collection.

I could easily write 10,000 words on the history, prestige and luxury experience that embodies Leica, however, the remainder of the post will focus on my current kit and usage.

STATE OF THE COLLECTION

Leica M6 Classic

The Leica M6 is probably the most recognisable and remains one of the more highly sought after classic Leica cameras today. The M6 was first to carry a centre-weighted lightmeter in the classic body design (The M5 which was technically the first model to introduce a lightmeter was an odd deviation from the M3, M4 body structure).

My Leica M6 at the time of writing, experimenting with the crazy thin yet rangefinder coupled Lomo LC-A MINITAR-1 Art Lens 2.8/32 M

It was the camera I had coveted being my first choice to dive back into building a Leica ecosystem and was paired with a Leica Summicron-M 35/2 ASPH. The camera body which I had bought from a seller based in Amsterdam for approximately $1500 AUD back in 2014, now sells for anywhere between $3500-5000 AUD in 2020 depending on condition. If you ever thought about investing in cameras, you would not be disappointed by the return on Leica film cameras.

I treat the M6 as a leisure camera for when I feel like a change of pace to standard DSLR/ mirrorless shooting and it usually finds a place as a travel companion due to its compact footprint.

Leica M3

The next acquisition was the original Leica M, being the M3 (chronologically the MP, M2 and M1 were released later). I managed to score this single stroke unit at a good deal as it was re-leathered which I didn’t object to (blue colour matches well with denim).

The initial EDC kit configuration all matchy- matchy for when I’m feeling “blue”. The M3 is coupled with the Summitar 50, Leitz tabletop tripod and M&D x Leica 0.95 headphones.

The M3 had limited frame lines which made the 50mm frame guide more prominent and better suited for the matching lens that I had sought, the period-appropriate 50mm Summitar LTM, chosen for its beautifully organic rendering with a slight petzval swirl and busyness to the corners in the defocused areas.

Over time, the M3 found less use than the M6 due to the lack of a meter in the viewfinder, despite the addition of a Voightlander VC II light meter on the hotshoe to compensate for this. Hence, the M3 has now been converted to shoot Instax Square film much to the amusement or chagrin of fellow Leica owners.

The Leica M3 converted to output Instax Square with the use of the Instant Magny 35 towers over any other system in my collection (coffee for scale).

Leica M10

Whilst I can appreciate the Leica M8 and M9 cameras, I would not have spent the money on a CCD sensor with comparatively worse noise performance than CMOS cameras of the time, regardless of the filmic nature of the colours, rendering almost like digitalised positive film. The M240 I could fault ergonomically as being thicker than the traditional Leica film M bodies, despite aesthetically matching the M shape. I could not reconcile the feel of the thicker body, especially without a grip. Others would rightly complain that the newly introduced CMOS sensor lacked the same magical rendering as the M8/M9 CCD sensors.

Whilst on the wait list for the M10, I had already decided on the aesthetics of personalising it, case designed by @jnk_handworks.wanderer with a limited edition Komaru brass shutter release button.

Fast forward to early 2017, I was going through that I would now justify as a “quarter-life crisis” and had attended the M10 launch (held by retail partner DigiDirect). It was love at first sight (or touch?). The removal of movie functionality and slimming the body back to a film M camera format sold me instantly. Prior to this, I had been adapting my Leica glass to the Sony A7 I owned at the time. It was a tactile, more native shooting experience without the guesswork of film. Some would even call it instant gratification.

The M10 combines the best of both worlds, as a leisurely shooting experience but also being a semi-workhorse camera on relaxed shoots allowing for instant review. Especially critical when paired with faster lenses, such as the Voigtlander NOKTON 50/1.5 Aspherical or longer portrait lenses such as the Elmarit-M 90/2.8 with shallower depth of field.

As a modern digital camera, I can appreciate the optical viewfinder and the native Adobe DNG raw files which handle the Leica M10 colour rendition flawlessly when post processing.

Final Musings

Could I say for certain that I’m done with collecting Leica? For the time being, I can confirm that I am satisfied with my kit and no longer find myself wanting for more. Do I use my kit enough to justify the overall expense of the system? Definitely not. But that’s beside the point… Leica for me would always be the camera system I would fall back to when I want to return to the simplicity of photography, or when I need a break from the bloated modern format of recent digital cameras, overloaded with “practical” conveniences. It serves as a reminder of the roots of photography as much as it is a pleasure to shoot with.