Leica M & Canon 35/1,5 LTM: a sonsy couple

Next to the lithe X100s, the camera you see above is chunky, heavy, and in many ways, a woeful backward piece of technology. But then again, Leica's 35mm cameras do not pretend to the tech throne.

Nor do they make retro for retro's sake. They make beautiful, iterative designs, that focus first on utility, then on technology. The M is a well thought-out device that takes pictures, keeps menus simple, and does away with the ridiculous electronic noise and clackety clacks which are part and parcel to every other digital camera. 

Only Leica would dare make the M. And the M is a very welcoming entry into the world of digital Leicas.

The 35mm on its nose is Canon's classic 'Japanese Summilux', a speedy devil that weighs about 180g, and takes odd 48mm filters. It's got the awkward infinity lock, a 180º focus throw, and flare galore. It shoots very much like my favourite compact 35, the Canon 35/2 LTM, aka 'Japanese Summicron'.

Unfortunately, while Leica still make high quality mechanical objects, Canon no longer do. But the Japanese Summilux, and the M, are beautiful together. In the next few weeks, I'll show how they also are a beautiful shooting couple. Later, I shall pit the Canon 35 against the Fujifilm XF 35 in a match to the X-T1. That should hit Fujirumors in the same manner my review of the Novoflex BALPRO T/S has.

Note: click the images below to advance to the next frame

Mirrorless VS. dSLR: a false dichotomy

Fujirumors's recent article quoted numbers, that on the face of it, look interesting to fans, and manufacturers of certain cameras. Of course, As Thom Hogan pointed out, interpreting data reveals bias. 

As always, I scrolled through the entire comment section. And found this excellent summary by anonymous user, FCameron:

“Going by the charts, it appears Mirrorless peaked in the fall of 2012, and has never again attained that shipment market share.

At best it’s been bumping along at 25% for the last 5 quarters, and despite everything has been unable to penetrate any further. The recent trend then over those last several quarters is that both mirrorless and DSLR are holding their own. This is a far cry from the interweb prophets who for the last almost 8 years have been proclaiming the death of the DSLR.

Personally, I think the whole idea of mirrorless vs reflex is a false dichotomy. There is no one manufacturer for either. Some manufacturers make both. The cameras are far more alike than they are unalike. The mirrorless vendors themselves (Sony, Olympus, Fuji) are vendors who tried and failed to make it as DSLR vendors.

It’s not mirrorless vs reflex. It’s Sony vs Nikon vs Panasonic vs Fuji vs Olympus vs Canon vs Pentax vs Samsung. Each vendor wants to succeed on its own.

Sony is not content leaving money on the table for Fuji because Fuji is ‘mirrorless,’ and therefore some sort of ally. Samsung is happy to take sales from Olympus, they are not ‘partners’ because they don’t feature reflex viewing. They are competitors, all of them, with each other. Panasonic shareholders don’t make more money when Sony sells more mirrorless cameras. Each mirrorless vendor would be happy to see other mirrorless vendors go away.”

It certainly is more fair to think of it Company A VS. Company B, rather than one genre of camera VS. another. The camera industry is in decline. No one is doing well. Everyone is floundering. And as FCameron says, "everyone wants to succeed on its own".

3,200 megapixel LSST camera gets construction approval

This lad has for years gone weekly to download new panoramas taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. Its successor, the James Webb Space Telescope, will be launched in 2018. In the meantime, the almost equally ambitious earth-bound LSST telescope has been approved for a trip up the Chilean Andes. 

These are exciting times to be a sky watcher.

I'll house 189 16 megapixel sensors to create gigantic panoramic images of 3200 megapixels. The DPReview thread about it has 237 comments and counting. Check it out. 

Here's more information about the LSST

Interpreting Data Reveals Biases

Before you go gung-ho about a certain brand gaining market share, or losing it, think about this:

“Individual data slices aren’t as revealing as multiple slices. For example, using BCN’s yearly numbers (Disclaimer: BCN changed the way they counted in 2014, going to a straight brand share instead of top 20 products determining share), we can see that Panasonic slid from nearly a 40% market share in Japan in 2010 to about 13% in 2014. That’s significant. Especially when you realize that such sales themselves peaked in the middle of that timeframe. Sony started strong in mirrorless in Japan, lost steam, then regained it. Nikon started modestly and has lost momentum. Canon started even more modestly and gained a bit of momentum. ”

Source: Interpreting Data Reveals Biases

'Mirrorless is the tablets of the camera world'

Speaking of DPReview's interview with Samsung, clickbait, and all that, DPReview member, sfpeter, distills the state of mirrorless cameras perfectly: 

“I’m as attached to a mirror as I am to whether you turn the on switch left or right. Right now mirrorless cameras are for the most part like advanced bridge cameras that can change lenses. Give me a mirrorless that is full frame, has the picture quality, battery life, and performance of a DSLR ad I’d use it. It HAS to have an EVF, and really the only shooting advantage I’ve seen is the display shows more clearly what the end result image will look like. Otherwise I keep feeling like mirrorless is the tablets of the camera world, something manufacturers tell us we need but we’re not too sure yet.”

Of course, mirrorless cameras must be defined as a non-Leica dSLR-alike interchangeable cameras that rely on a naked sensor for all photographic tasks from focusing to exposure. And, which are marketed as 'small', 'light', and 'the future of photography', among other things.

Thom Hogan addressed the interview perfectly in his article entitled: How Internet News Distorts Things.