[Leica] Re: Camera life

[mark at rabinergroup.com (Mark Rabiner)]

On 1/24/07 12:29 PM, "jon.stanton@comcast.net" <jon.stanton@comcast.net>
typed:

> The mechanical durability of a digital camera is of little consequence.
> Advances in digital technology will relegate it to the trash bin (forever) 
> in
> single digit years. Is there a "Moore's Law" for digital camera's?
> Already I am receiving e mails from software companies (QuickBook$ for
> example) informing me that their product$ are not compatible with MS
> Vi$ta....That I will need to upgrade my program$
> 

An opinion of which I am particularly unfound. example:
A current 50mm Leica lens produces far superior images than a one made
decades gone by does that mean we put it in the trash bin?
No! many of us are using them. Its much of what this list is all about.
I'm shooting with one made in the 50's as soon as I send this off and put my
coat on and get outside heading up the hill.
As we are shooting with bodies whose technology was upgraded.

You could say a body with a meter in it makes you have to throw your M4's
and M3's in the trash bin. They are no longer viable picture taking tools.
Don't even bother putting film in them.
Or that the M7's "A" Auto feature makes non auto bodies archaic.
Trash bin city. God forbid you'd actually have to set your own aperture;
center a needle yourself.
Its all baloney now with digital as well of course.
What's with this short sighted narrow minded consumer digital mindset?

One has images, 
13x19's maybe on the wall taken with an earlier digital body.
Gorgeous prints perhaps.
These images don't become all of a suddenly unviable just because the level
goes up this week on megapixel size or physical CCD size or numerous other
whatever's with current digital cameras.
...Than the one you took those pictures with....
The kit you used to make those images will still make images just like it.
Cover another wall. Fill another drawer. Fill another uploaded gallery.
Better probably --
as other things in your workflo (I hate people who use the word workflo)
will sneak your images higher on the food chain.  You WILL have a new
printer sooner or later which better rez and inks and paper. YOU WILL get
better at making those prints. Photoshop will get better. You'll get better
at Photoshop. Your tie will match your jacket better. So will your hat.
Every day in every way ...


Perhaps it turns out that my real point is it is not how well gear
progresses;
But how well we progress using our gear.

And THAT depends on using the same camera for more than a year or two.

Let me capitalize on that the whole sentence structure...

AND THAT DEPENDS ON USING THE SAME CAMERA FOR MORE THAN A YEAR OR TWO.


Its not what our gear can do for us
But what WE can do for our gear.

A shame that blurb doesn't quite work.

Its not what.....?????



Mark Rabiner
New York, NY
40?47'59.79"N   
73?57'32.37"W

markrabiner.com