[Leica] More M8 impressions

[cummer at netvigator.com (Howard Cummer)]

Dear Luggers,
Here are my impressions of my M8 camera after a week?s use in  
Pondicherry, India.
First, how nice to get back to the size of an M camera after hauling  
around bulky Dslr?s with their zoom lenses. Second, how nice to have  
a rangefinder that is accurate in both horizontal and vertical planes  
? just as it came out of the box ? not like my three RD-1?s. Third,  
how nice to go back to fast street shooting without having to use a  
rapidwinder ? the Tri-Elmar was my most used lens in the daytime and  
mostly at the 50mm setting at f8.0 or f11.0 to use the depth of field  
to cover any focusing errors.

I took over 1400 pictures in 7 days ? all of them combined RAW/JPEG.  
Most days the battery lasted through the day but I was fortunate to  
have a spare ? especially imported from Singapore in advance of the  
trip (thanks Roland!)

It has not been so much fun trying to deal with RAW on my MAC system.  
I tried Capture One but am not used to the interface so went back to  
downloading files using my old faithful Nikon View 6 and then opening  
the DNR files using the trial copy of Silky Pix 3.0. After adjusting  
a DNR photo in SP I save it in JPEG to a separate folder for  
developed pictures. This works pretty well but is quite slow on my  
system and I have yet to master batch processing with SP. I have now  
purchased the 3.0E version of Silky Pix so that looks like the way I  
will be going.

Out of my 1400 photos I had one example of a green line down the  
center of a picture of the sun rising over the Bay of Bengal ? where  
the sun was just at the edge of the frame. In the next picture when I  
had moved the camera slightly the green line disappeared. In two  
cases I managed to product bluish pictures on start up ? caused, I  
think, by pushing the shutter before the camera was ready to go. For  
night photos I used mostly the 35 Lux Asph and that lens with ISO  
1250 was a formidable low light combo and focused accurately. Two  
evenings in Pondicherry there was a free music festival and to that I  
took along my 90 Elmarit. It really wasn?t fast enough for the dim  
stage lighting and I tried using ISO 1250 and adjusting the EV by two  
stops to avoid using ISO 2500. The results were mostly muddy and not  
pleasing. In fact, the two shots I took at ISO 2500, after cleaning  
up for noise, were better. Also, my latest style Elmarit front  
focuses on the M8 and needs to be sent for adjustment. Since my 50  
lux focuses accurately as do all my other wide angle lenses I assume  
it is the lens and not the camera that needs adjustment.

I don?t yet have the IR filters for the lenses. I experienced little  
trouble with colour shifts and the infamous magenta cast under  
tungsten light ? except in three or four night shots. When that  
happened, after downloading I transformed the pictures into Black and  
White ? the easy way out.

I don?t have any difficulties with the camera ? my problems are with  
processing the images after they have been taken. This would be less  
of a problem if the Auto White Balance was more accurate in JPEG mode  
but it isn?t and you have to work around it. Luggers who are expert  
at Capture One or Photoshop won?t have much of a problem I suspect.  
For me, for now, SilkyPix is proving an easier and effective solution.

Hope to have some pictures up to show shortly,

Howard (back in Hong Kong)