As much fun as it gets.

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Leica M10, 35mm f/2 Canon LTM and 75mm f/1.9 Voigtländer Ultron.

When I bought my first Leica M3 in 1971 it was about as fast a street snapper as there was. Later autofocus, anti-shake and auto exposure were added to more modern cameras by the great Japanese camera makers and the Leica went from hero to zero when it came to operational speed. Only the stealth factor remained, something I always believed was enhanced by the amateur looking silver finish. For some reason that attracts less attention than the black favored by most camera makers today.

And speaking of stealth, no-one needs the stock red ‘Leica’ dot which screams ‘Steal me now’, so here it has been replaced with a faux silver ‘screw’ – you know, the one Leica charges $1000 more for on the M10-P. ‘P’ for ‘Professional’, you understand.

Yet the M body, now in digital form and, with the M10 and M11, finally identical in size to the film bodies of old, remains a favored street snapper. With the 35mm lens, stopped down a bit, zone focusing is as close as you get to fast autofocus, the shutter is quiet and the whole package is small and unobtrusive. With the 75mm lens, when detail is sought, a more contemplative approach to focusing is called for, especially with the unforgiving nature of the sensors in the M10 and M11. In turn these sensors will ensure you will never use film again. The M10’s sensor is as noise-free at ISO 6400 as Kodak Ektar film is at ISO 100, which is 6 stops faster. As for color rendering, the magicians at Leica have seen to it that colors are rendered every bit as well as that fine Kodak film delivers, but without dust, scratches and interminable processing delays. And film is not film any more. It’s all digitally scanned. Enough with the ‘film look’, already.

For street use I set the aperture priority exposure measurement to Auto and the film speed selector likewise, limiting the slowest shutter speed to 1/4f where ‘f’ is the focal length of the lens. That pretty much ensures an absence of movement blur, even when pixel peeping. Both lenses are 6-bit coded (by me!) which ensures that the correct focal length is communicated to the body, allowing proper determination of that 1/4f factor.

You can read more about the 35mm Canon LTM here with the 75mm Ultron profiled here.

Don’t for one moment think that there is any concept of value with a modern digital Leica M. Even a beater M10 will set you back over $4,000 and only the truly insane – or insanely wealthy – spend the $3,000 and up demanded for a used current Leica lens. The ancient Canon LTM and Leica lenses I use, over 50 years old, and the modern sensor in the Leica body makes these optics sing. Simply stated, those old lenses are better than ever. And Voigtländer fills in the gaps with its modern Leica clones at 21 and 75mm.

TOBEM* lens.

Sure, you can take street snaps with any number of modern, inexpensive digital cameras for a fraction of the cost of that digital M body. So why use the modern Leica? Well, nothing feels quite so perfect in the hand or so satisfies with its fit and finish. The optical finder – which shows details outside the frame – is a sheer delight, now made even better with LED illumination of the finder frames and with a higher eye point for the eyeglass wearer (me!) than the finders found in the film bodies. Further, my history with the Leica M goes back over 50 years and its use is second nature to me. So there are elements of familiarity and nostalgia in my choice. The only thing I had to unlearn when moving from the M3 to the M10 is film winding. There is no film winding lever and, strangely, I rather miss it.

The M10 remains my favorite street snapper and while the M11’s 60mp sensor is tempting, I don’t need that sort of pixel density. Plus I would rather stay solvent. The 24mp sensor in the M10 delivers perfect, noise free prints at 13″x19″ at pretty much any ISO setting, and if you want to print larger the viewer will be forced to step back to take it all in. So if it’s perfect at 13″x19″, it’s perfect at any size you want.

* There’s One Born Every Minute.

Here is a handful of recent street snaps, all taken with the M10 and the 35mm f/2 Canon LTM:

Easily done.

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Fairly recent Nikon DSLRs (D700, D800) have an effective ‘sensor shaker’ which can be set to operate when the camera is powered on or off and helps remove all but the most stubborn dust particles from the sensor. This is particularly important with Nikon lenses which are poorly dust sealed – such as the the 16-35mm and 28-300mm AF-S versions which I use. These pump mighty quantities of air into the camera’s innards, along with any airborne dust, when the zoom ring is operated. It’s so bad you can feel the air rushing in if you remove the lens and zoom it close to your cheek. Quite why Nikon does not have its lens designers vent this blast of air to the outside beats me.

The Leica M10 has no sensor shaker, possibly because the compact body is already so packed with electronics and mechanical parts that there is no room for one. It’s probably the same reason that precludes installation of an IBIS system, which would be nice to have. But Leica has a clever workaround when it comes to sensor dust detection and removal. Go to the last page of the Main Menu on the LCD and click on ‘Sensor Cleaning->Dust Detection’. You will be directed to mount a lens stopped down to f/16 or f/22, defocused and pointed at a plain evenly lit surface. I used the 21mm Color-Skopar at f/22, focused on infinity, with my test wall just inches from the camera. Take a picture and you get this on the LCD screen:

Sensor dust disclosed. Click the image for a (yecch!) larger one.

Quite a bit of dust, something which can become visible in large plain areas in images, like expanses of sky. The picture on the LCD screen is rendered in the same orientation as the camera, as the red lens mounting index at left indicates.

Now go to Main Menu->Sensor-Cleaning->Open Shutter, first making sure your battery is fully charged. You do not want the shutter to close for lack of power when you are poking around in there. If the battery charge is below 40% a warning message requesting the battery be recharged will appear. Holding the camera upside down, LCD to the ceiling, blow in some air using a rubber blower bulb, directed at the sensor, being sure not to touch the surface protective glass, and redo the sensor dust image. Do not use compressed gas of any sort. The goal is to loosen dust particles so they can drop off, not blast them further into the innards of the camera. I got this:

Sensor dust gone.

Nice implementation by Leica and very easy to work with. The sensor is now clean as a whistle. If things had not improved I would have cleaned the sensor with an antistatic brush. Had that failed I would have resorted to a wet cleaning solution. I have used this product with success, and it leaves no residue, but despite the listing it does not come with a microfiber cloth, so make sure you have one. I cut a business card in half lengthwise and wrap the cloth around it. This makes for a flexible ‘wand’ and I spritz the tip of the cloth a couple of times, no more – you want moist not wet – with the solution and gently swipe the sensor’s cover glass this way and that. (I avoid Q-tips, finding them far too inflexible, meaning they risk damage to the protective glass on the sensor). Then a couple of puffs of air from the rubber bulb and you are done. This works for any digital sensor, not just the one in Leicas!

Because Leica M mount lenses do not have a zoom feature (the relatively benign variable focal length feature of the two Tri-Elmar lenses notwithstanding) the need for such sensor cleaning should be fairly rare. Further, when the lens is removed for changing, the sensor is protected by the shutter blades. So it’s not that easy for dust to get in there.

I had not checked for sensor dust since buying the camera second-hand 3 weeks ago, so only just got around to this, after noticing an out of focus blob or two in large smooth tone areas in LRc in this image, where the small aperture and short focal length of the lens emphasized dirt on the sensor.

If the surface you use to take the dust image is not evenly lit you will get a message ‘inhomogeneous (sic) image’. I got this more times than seemed right, despite using a flat, evenly lit, wall. Removing and reinserting the battery cured the issue.

Small, unobtrusive, cheap.

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After the camera’s shoulder strap – and most vary from useless to down right dangerous – few accessories are more important than a carrying bag, if you propose taking more than just the camera and one lens on a photo outing. You can easily spend hundreds of dollars on a camera bag and it will almost certainly come with an aura (and labels) proclaiming ‘steal me now’.

Well, there is one born every minute.

Now that my small Leica M10 outfit is complete, meaning 21, 35, 50 and 90mm lenses, it was time to find a suitable shoulder bag to carry this hardware around. A little research discloses that the perfect Leica M outfit camera bag can be had for pennies. The dictates for the ideal shoulder bag are that it should hold a Leica M with, say, three or more lenses, one of those on the body. It should therefore have two dividers, be some 8″ long, 6″ tall to accommodate the M vertically and 4″ across for a like reason. Closure should be with a velcro flap like the one on the Thinktank.

Amazon lists over 30,000 bags (!) and the closest I could come to the specifications above is the oddly named Besnfoto. It has only one velcro divider but I have a bunch of these – so many years, so many bags – and unfortunately it does have a zippered cover underneath the outside velcro flap, but that can be left unzipped in use. Not a big issue. For the paranoid there’s a Velcro ‘anti-theft’ belt latch, illustrated below.

And did I mention anonymity? The color must be drab grey or green and the Besnfoto comes in either. Forget fancy leather and forget anything which says ‘Billingham’. Come to think of it, any label on the outside is just a bad idea. Quite the dumbest camera bag I have ever seen came from the Red Dot company. Notice anything? These were bought by the same people who like to park their BMWs with the car keys in the ignition and the doors unlocked in south central LA. But, you know, German cow full grain leather, grass fed, no antibiotics:

An invitation to theft.
The ‘legs’ are pure Schwabian silver.

Mind you, the Besnfoto is not much smarter in stock trim:

The loud label says ‘foto’ on it.
Yes, the ruler is a German Staedtler.

And they really do not want you removing that label as it’s both stitched and riveted. Whose idea was that? A few seconds’ work with pliers and a sharp blade and the label was gone. I can attest to the quality of the stitching:

No more advertising. I rather like the moth eaten look.

Here is the interior with one additional divider added:

Leica M with 35mm lens at left, 50 and 90mm
lenses center and right. A small front pocket
allows storage of spare batteries and a charger.

I do not keep any front or rear lens caps on any of the lenses. The fronts are protected by UV filters and the rears are sufficiently recessed that they will not suffer abrasion damage. In this way the lenses are immediately ready for action when a swap is called for.

In use I have the nice, broad shoulder strap on the Besnfoto slung over my head and the bag hanging at my left hip bandolier style, with the camera with its Upstrap over the left shoulder an inch or two above the bag. It must not rest on the bag as that will induce slack in the camera strap prompting the camera and lens to go crashing to the ground. This approach – bag strap on the right shoulder, camera on the left – also distributes weight nicely.

The rear of the bag has a velcro strap for attachment to your belt on those occasions when the belt is actually accessible – a nice ‘anti theft’ feature’ – along with a small carrying handle. Note the broad shoulder strap:

Belt attachment.

What if you want to stash more lenses in that bag? Goodness knows, there’s lots of room given their small sizes. Well, Leica used to make a double sided ‘lens coupler’ for just this purpose, and it is abundantly available on eBay for pennies. It permits attachment of two lenses back-to-back and works for all Leica M mount lenses other than those with deeply protruding rear elements. And there’s no need to align the mounting index on the lens with the red line on the coupler. The lens will fit in any of the four positions dictated by the bayonet mount:

The Leica M lens coupler, code #14836.
A very handy storage tool for small lenses.

The rear element of the 21mm f/3.5 Color-Skopar does not protrude enough, even with the lens focused at infinity, to strike the rear element of any other lens fitted in the coupler. However, do not try this with the earlier 21mm Color-Skopar f/4 or any early Leitz ultra wide lenses like the 21mm Super Angulons (f/4 and f/3.4) or the 21mm f/2.8 Elmarit. All of those have deeply protruding rear elements and you really do not want to use them on digital Leica Ms in any case, as they perform poorly. Here it is in use:

The 21mm f/3.5 Color-Skopar and the 35mm f/2 Canon LTM
lenses fitted to the Leica M lens coupler.

Stacked and in the bag. And there’s still room for an energy bar and a bottle of water:

35mm on the camera, 21+50mm center, 90mm at right.

This bag will not provide heavy duty protection against knocks and falls. That is not its intent. Rather it is in keeping with the Leica ethos of “small camera, small lenses, easily carried”. The Besnfoto camera bag is recommended.