[Leica] IMG: M8 1st Shots and impressions.

[len-1 at comcast.net (Leonard Taupier)]

I received my new M8 late yesterday afternoon. By the time the  
battery charged, it was already dark and pretty cold out. So I played  
around in the house experimenting with different lighting, lenses,  
and Ultra Violet photos.

First impression. If you're shooting in tungsten lighting you better  
get the WB right for color or shoot b&w. My first color shots in my  
living room (WB tungsten) turned my blue chair purple. I expected  
that. So I took the same shot with a Tiffen hot mirror filter on the  
lens. The blue/purple chair turned brown. That I didn't expect so I  
took the same shot with my D200. Same tungsten WB, no filtering. The  
color came out exactly like the M8 hot mirror shot, brown chair. My  
only conclusion is I have some pretty screwy lighting in that room.

I then decided to have a little fun. Put my Visoflex III and bellows  
II on the M8. Put an EL Nikkor 135 on the bellows and the whole thing  
on a tripod.  Pretty kludgy but everything fits perfectly. Didn't  
have anything to shoot except the leaves on my African Violet. No  
flowers in a couple months. Here it is. Black light and B+W UV  
bandpass filter.

<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/LeonardT/M8/M8_UV1.jpg.html>

I then spent the rest of the night trying to figure out why I  
couldn't put my photos on my computer. I thought I had a bad SD card.  
It was on Leica's list. Should work. It turned out my multi  
everything card reader doesn't like SD very much. I ended up using a  
little SD only reader I bought for my cell phone. Works like a champ.

I then went to bed knowing at least that my camera works. Slept like  
a baby.

This morning, after coffee, I went out to my cold, frosty backyard  
and looked for something to shoot in daylight. Took a few boring  
shots of hibernating shrubs and stuff but the sky looked pretty  
interesting so I shot that.

<ISO 160, 21mm Elmarit ASPH, about f11>

<http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/LeonardT/M8/Dawn.jpg.html>

A few impressions about the M8.

It's an extremely well made camera. Mechanics and esthetics A+

Capable of very fine images given the right lighting and camera setup.

Purple problem doesn't bother me.

Uses Leica glass. No vignetting with any lens I tried including the  
Noctilux at f1.

Don't like jpg photos. Kinda dark in comparison to raw taken at the  
same time. Most noticeable on flash photos ( SF20 in A mode). RAW  
shots nicely lit. SF24D on order but I don't think that's the problem.

Operation (mostly firmware dependent) not nearly as refined as any C  
or N digital I have ever used. (Many models, mostly N).

I'm able to use CS2 to process raw files in exactly the same way as  
my C and N files. I did not install any other software on my Mac.

I'm definitely not sorry I bought it. Need more time to learn it's  
idiosyncrasies. Like most of you I couldn't find a spare battery.

Sorry for being so long winded but it's cold outside and I'm not  
going anywhere for awhile. Now to catch up with the last 100 or so  
LUG e-mails.

Len