Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/07/28

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Subject: Re: [Leica] potential image quality
From: Alan Ball <AlanBall@csi.com>
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1998 16:12:02 +0200

Eric Welch wrote:

> >with the question : "Zeica quality is not useful for normal 35mm handheld,
> >100-400 ISO film, mirrorslapped shooting ? "
> 
> >From personal experience, this is not an accurate assessment, unless the
> definition of quality photography is based solely on sharpness. I find
> Leica lenses have a lot more going for them than just sharpness.

Yes, yes, yes, I agree with you: M lenses are small and fast, or a
little larger and extremely fast. And M and R lenses are extremely well
built and a joy to use. We all agree they are way better than what is
needed in normal handheld shooting conditions (so are most
Nicapentolteiss lenses BTW). So why are we all spending so much time
laying aspherical upon apochromatic layers of megabytic mail on the
sharpness issue? In other words, how often do YOU use a super heavy
tripod with ISO 25 stock at f5.6? And a wider question to the LUGgers
who do regularly use such a setup: why do this painstaking work to end
up with a 35mm piece of emulsion ? Just curious and ever puzzled...

Friendly regards
Alan
Brussels-Belgium