Re: [Leica] Amateur Photographer testing the R8

[Edward Meyers <aghalide@panix.com>]

Before you read a camera or lens test it's a good idea to see
if the manufacturers have placed advertisements in that magazine.
Also note which manufacturer did not place an ad. Then read the
test reports with this in mind. I'm not saying that ads will
change results. But you should always suspect that they might. ed

On Wed, 21 Jul 1999, Leopold Green wrote:

> 
> 
> hi,
> 
> Amateur Photographer [a UK magazine] did a group test of 'top end manual
> cameras' in the current issue: R8, RTSIII and OM3TI and despite finding that
> the first Contax model failed, and the second one didn't handle 'difficult'
> lighting very well, and that the OM's shadow spot meter resulted in a
> completely underexposed slide, where as the R8 handled all exposures
> perfectly - guess what, first place the Olympus, second the Contax and third
> the R8! What was wrong with the R8? didn't like the strap lug positions and
> the manual rewind/wind on -- what did they like about the OM, all manual
> including wind on and rewind!!! They also criticised the Summicron 50 1.4
> for only focusing to .5 meter and therefore being no good for 'frame filling
> small objects'. In all of this no mention of comparative lens line up,
> except that there are many second hand Zukio lenses, which I'm sure there
> are since there are precious few new ones! I really do despair of the so
> called standard of these magazines. In the conclusions there was also a side
> swipe at 'Leica purists' 'who will have made up their minds as to the winner
> before reading the article'.
> 
> This is the same magazine that last year did a rangefinder test and placed
> the M6 a distant third behind the G2 and the XPAN. I suppose the range and
> quality of lenses really don't matter in these tests. I don't know why it
> irritates so much, maybe because there aren't any decent magazines published
> here in the UK.
> 
> Leopold
>