Defecter Returns

[Adisak Soon <adisoon@pl.jaring.my>]

Hi,

a few weeks ago, I got a Canon EOS-1. The thing was magic, the AF just
captivated me. The lenses were long, sharp and the colours vivid.
Inevitably, in the excitement that surrounded it, my leica fell into disuse.
It came along in the bag during my EOS jaunts, but it normally stayed there.
With the EOS, subjects I've never tried before became my new all consuming
passion. Picking people out from a crowd with a telephoto became a new thing
that I grew to become familiar with. Close ups at little,itty bitty things.
Rolls of film later, I found one day that my EOS-1's lithium had died.(
Warning, this is not abt electronic weakness). I had film to shoot.. so I
pulled out the Leica, and began to walk through a crowd photographing like I
always used to. And then it was different. I felt stiff, movements not as
natuaral from lack of use. But slowly, this regained. And those moments that
made the Leica-M my choice came back again. I saw my photograph, focus set,
exposure set, elements moving in the viewfinder until the moment when I
rejoice to find that I have captured it. I had said something. First to
myself, then later to the people who will see the end result-the photograph.
The Canon gave me something else from this. It was a more mechanical, more
planned, more strutured kind of photography. It lacked the feeling that I
felt when I said something. Standing far away, I can't say much, standing to
close with something big and noisy, it becomes what is said, rather than the
recorder of it. 

My M is a beautiful camera. the scratchs on it are mine, because I made them.

Look at those photographs taken with a discreet, quiet little thing, and
compare them to those taken with a noisy big thing, the difference is there.
- --adisoon