The Mandler 50mm f1.4 has landed!

  

So.. ignoring what I said in my last post about culling my camera and lens collection.. I recently ordered a Mandler 50mm f1.4 lens.  Unless you've been living under a rock, or.. couldn't be bothered about anything in Leicaland.. you'll no doubt be aware that there's a new kid on the block.. in China no less.. making copies of Leica lenses.  But before I get into this 50mm, their latest offering, allow me to give you a bit of "historical" context.

In mid June of this year I reviewed their first effort, the 35mm "King of Bokeh" f2 lens.  It was indeed an amazing little lens for a very reasonable amount of money.  The Mandler crowd have taken Leica designs from the 50's and 60's, designed by Walter Mandler, who headed the ELCAN (Ernst Leitz Canada operation) for many many years, and was their principal lens designer.  Some of those lenses have gone on to achieve cult status within the Leica community. Chinese copies of Leica lenses is nothing new. 7Artisans and the very uniquely named.. TTArtisan.. have been making M mount lenses for quite a few years, although some designs have been hit and miss.  More recently the likes of Lens Light Lab from China have taken some of the rarer and more esoteric Leica lens deigns and made 1:1 copies of them. Well.. with some improvements that more modern manufacturing will allow. Those copies are in the thousands of dollars, incorporating esoteric elements like Lanthium into the lens glass.  And they have copied very rare and hard to find optics that sell in the tens of thousands.  

Mandler on the other hand has taken a completely different approach.  More in line with the TT/7Artisan crowd, they have taken some iconic but in some ways classical designs, and brought them up to date with some noticeable improvements in sharpness and features, as well made them as inexpensively as possible. I didn't say cheap, because their lenses are really quite well made with very minor cost-cutting.  The designs they have copied are so old they are no longer covered by trade mark or copyright or whatever other right there is out there.  What they have achieved is demonstrated by a simple fact.. their lenses have sold out on the day of release!  That's a hell of an endorsement.  I had to wait for their 3rd production batch in order to secure my 35mm lens back in June.  For their 50mm lens, I learnt my lesson and stayed up until 2 in the morning to ensure that I would be first in line, and managed to secure my order on the day they released it.  A scarce 15 minutes later and they had sold out.  Absolutely incredible!  The cost is, in Leica terms, an insignificant $368 US dollars.. That gets you priority shipping wherever you are in the world, and packaging that I think not even Leica offers these days.  

There's even a Mandler logo on the insde of the box
 

Upon opening my package this morning from Mandler, I was greeted by a box within a box.. within a box. And inside that box was a clear perspex lens bubble of the sort that Leica used to supply in the 50's and 60's.  A little instruction manual showing lens construction, mtf charts, field curviture charts.. And, a letter signed by the owner. As in.. signed with real ink.  Addressed to me, the artist.  That was quite a nice touch.

 

A personal touch 

On opening the lens bubble, was my (almost) pristine lens.  I ordered the black aluminium one because it was a) cheaper and b) lighter than the chrome brass model. However this lens feels dense and substantial!  The aperture clicks sound completely different to the Mandler 35mm.  A sharper and more positive sound.  

 

Some dust present.. 

 

The focus is smooth without feeling sloppy. Buttery isn't a word I'd use.. the consistency is a bit thicker than butter, if that makes sense.  The focusing ring will stay where you put it.  I like the feeling.  Additionally the lens focuses past the 0.7 rangefinder limit, to 0.5m.  This may not sound like a lot, but the additional 20cm allows you to really move in and frame your portraits, and is a welcome improvement to the Leica lenses of old.  The only lens (until recently) that Leica made that had a close focusing capability was their dual range 50mm f2, but this lens will not mount on any Leica digital except for the M11, so I sold mine.  Back to the Mandler.. Sadly, there is no soft stop at 0.7 to let you know you've reached the end of the rangefinder limit, which may be problematic to film shooters as well as users of older digital Leicas that don't have the option of digital viewfinder (M8, M9, M262).  This is a minor annoyance, but something that I would hope gets improved if ever Mandler releases a V2 of this lens.  

The 6-bit coding is blank from factory - you have to colour in yourself
 

As for the lens mount, we have a welcome improvement of 6-bit engravings which will allow you to code your lens so that your camera can tag images with the appropriate focal length and maximum aperture.  Both these features, 6-bit coding and closer focusing range were the two negatives I flagged in my Mandler 35mm review, so I'm glad to see that the company has taken those criticisms on board and made a better lens this time around!  Besides listening to their customers and reviewers, it also shows a desire to offer a better product, better even than what Leica was able to offer when they first made these designs in the 50s, 60s and 70s.  In Asian countries imitation is a sign of respect, and Leica is certainly very well respected.  

Now.. this unboxing does not porport to be an image review, simply because I just opened the box and took a few snaps.  I do not expect any surprises.. in the sense that I expect this lens to be an excellent optic.  As far as I can tell, shooting it wide open, centre sharpness is excellent and bokeh is quite pleasant.  Here's a photo of your author (or as Mandler referred to me in their letter.. Artist).

Not sure why I'm not smiling.. I'm just so happy with this lens!

Final thoughts 

Modern Leica has strayed more and more into luxury "Velben" territory.  A "Velben" good is one where the economics of price and demand do not follow normal rules.  The more expensive a product is.. the more demand there is!  Leica today makes very high quality lenses, often apochromatic and aspherical designs, but at increasingly unattainable prices.  The resurgence of the Leica M system has made demand for everything Leica go through the roof - stock is limited and new releases are stratospherically expensive.  This is by design.  Leica has become a lifestyle brand, pitching their goods less to photographers and more to affluent people.  And older lenses that could be had for a reasonable sum a few years ago now trade at significantly higher prices.  This means that if you want to shoot a Leica lens, you need to spend as much as a small car!  That's just ridiculous.  So I really welcome Mandler's ethos, which is to offer Leica-like quality and design, for the cost of producing it.  Obviously their cost is lower than Leica because they are also taking advantage of the Leica design.  So in a way it is unfair to compare the two directly.  However what Leica charges to design a lens today is all out of proportion with what it actually costs to produce. Ok.. end of diatribe.  We all love Leica. They gave us 35mm film. They gave us rangefinder focus. They even gave us autofocus (which they then sold to Minolta).  They gave us the first film camera that could be turned into a digital camera (Digital Modul R + R8 film camera).  They gave us amazing lens designs, and we are happy they exist, and continue to prosper after weathering two world wars, the SLR revolution and finally the digital revolution.  They have tried to compete on equal terms with huge technological change, and very often lost to quicker, larger and cheaper rivals. And so Leica has decided to go in another direction, that of luxury. And if that is the only way they can survive, then I accept that.  And why I am happy that the Mandler alternative exists.  It allows us photographers to afford the experience the beauty and joy of shooting a Leica M camera with an as close as possible lens experience as well.  I don't doubt the technical merits of the various Voigtlanders and Carl Zeiss and TT/7T and LLL and whoever else out there is making Leica clone lenses, but Mandler has managed to get the mix just right.  Leica design, with 21st century improvements, in a package that pays absolute homage to Leica itself.   

 

PS - If you found this (pre)review worthwhile and are interested in purchasing the lens you can do so at the following link.  I may get a microscopic commission. Please note that I only recommend products that I would personally purchase, such as this lens, paid for with my own money.

 

Oh camera, oh camera, where art thou??!

As this is my personal blog on photographic and other topics, I thought I'd just start some free-flowing automatic writing roughly in the corner of photography and cameras.  As time has gone by, I realise that I'm as much a photographer as a collector of cameras and lenses.  And to be fair, there really is a lot to collect and try out and play with.  I am attracted by new things, as in new to me, which in most people's book mean antiques. Anything made of metal and glass. Preferably mechanical, as a pose to autofocus tomfoolery. Although obviously electronic cameras definitely are collected and played with.  At the same time, this quest for newness means that I also tire quickly of the less than stellar items, and these are then put back into "circulation". Occasionally, I'll sell something, and then immediately regret it and look for another copy.  This happened with the Nikon F4.. twice! Just because.. it's a difficult camera to use and hold. However, it's place in the Parthenon of Nikon F series cameras, as well as being a truly revolutionary (as well as evolutionary) camera meant that I was always going to like it.  Always in Nikon territory.. the 85mm AF-D f1.4 lens.. what I call the Eye of Sauron.  When mirrorless came out all the AF-D lenses were turned into manual lenses.. but I just loved the way the lens drew, so when I chanced on another, I grabbed it.  I've always had a particular interest in fast portrait lenses.. and currently own 4 examples.. A Leica 80mm f1.4 R lens, the Canon 85mm L f1.2 and the aforementioned Nikon.. as well as a TTArtisan 90mm f1.25 for Leica M.. The fact that they cost me all an arm and a leg means that when I'm out photographing I have to hop around and try to take pictures one-handed.  It also means that I need cameras for each and every system!  God I love collecting camera gear!  And I even make excuses to get more stuff..

Having said all that, I'm actually in a contraction phase. Simply put, I'm culling the collection to the bare essentials.  I've already pared it down significantly from the stratospheric heights of previous collecting sprees, but I've come to the realisation that having a large camera collection just takes too much time to take care of it all, and my photography has suffered. I spend more time cleaning lenses and dusting bodies than putting rolls through them, and that is just sad. Because.. I got into photography because I wanted to take photographs, not to collect cameras. Along the way the impetus inverted.. and now I collect cameras, which I sometimes (rarely) shoot. So time for another drastic reset. 

And so I need to organise my collection into essential, nice to have, and superfluous.  These are arbitrary labels, and one day a camera can drift through from essential, to nice to have, then superfluous, and then straight back to essential! The vagueries of our brains!  But seriously.. I do need to reduce, concentrate. 

One thing I've definitely noticed is that film has become much less important to me.  There was a time, around the early period of full-frame digital, where I abandoned film completely, and sold off all or most of my film cameras.  This happened around the time I got my Canon 10D, a 6mp cropped sensor camera.  It was an amazing camera, and for a while I used it in conjunction with my Eos 3 film camera.. but a summer trip to Italy convinced me that the small digital camera was the way to go.  And so my various manual focus Pentax's went on the block (back then I was still a photogrpaher and not quite a collector).  Then something strange happened.. Over 10 years of digital upgrades and a huge upheaval in the photography market, and I realised that there was the law of diminishing returns that was finally affecting digital photography.  However most of the world had abandoned film, and so film bodies were plentiful and cheap on the secondary market.  Ridiculously so. Enticingly so.  And that's when I pounced and started buying up all the film cameras I'd ever lusted after.  Kodak went through it's bankruptcy and came out the other end leaner and meander and incredibly still making film, so there was still something to put into these cameras.  Ilford went through similar growing pains but thankfully weathered the most destructive phase of the digital tsunami, and was also still open for business..

So anyways, where am I going with all this?! Well.. need to downsize. Because although I've managed to own every film cameras I've ever desired (more or less..) I find that I use film cameras less and less. And they need to be taken care of. Cleaned. Lubed. Shot from time to time. So, having fewer to take care of will mean I'll use them more often.

Stay tuned for what goes on the block!  

An imperfect perfection.. my review of the Mandler 35mm f2 " King of Bokeh" clone

The Mandler in it's proper place, on Author's M10M

As you might have inferred from my previous posts about the Leica M system.. I got sucked in by a beautifully made and designed bag, and went on to purchase one of their most expensive bodies.  Not much cash left over for lenses.. and they can be VERY expensive. So I was excited to hear about the Mandler 35mm lens, released late last year but still very hard to get.  All the internet was abuzz.. Even Mr Leica (Matt Osborne) was waxing lyrical about it.. And so I decided, in my very individualistic and non-consumeristic way, that I needed to have one as well.  And after staying up till 3am for when orders for the next batch would open.. I finally managed to buy one!

 

Just some of the boxes..

And in short order the lens arrived.. And what a beautiful unboxing event it was. There were so many boxes! An outer shipping box. An intermediate lens box. And inside, the actual lens box.. and inside that the clear plastic lens holder a-la-Leica style. And then there were boxes for the filter, the square hood and the metal hood.. It was a long and drawn out experience.  Where am I going to store all these boxes?!

The lens.. was small! And it was light. And it was beautiful.  But it was also Chinese.. so there had to be a problem? Well.. let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet.  The experience of placing it on the camera and taking pictures with it was.. sublime.  This was a lens designed to offer loads of " character".. euphamism for lens defects that.. I really like. Flare? Check.  Vigneting? Check. Sunstars? Check.  Beautiful bokeh balls? Check.  It really did tick all the boxes and then some.  Wonderfully small and compact, it made my M10 almost pocketable. And as I looked at the latest Leica lens releases.. with their Noctilux 35mm f1.2.. and it's massive size, I was happy in the thought that with my M10 Monochrom sensor, I could essentially shoot with this smaller and lighter lens.  My wallet was also extremely happy about this decision, as it was still coming to grips with that I'd ripped out of it to get the M10M.  So far so good.  

Mandler in action, with it's very peculiar flare

 

But (and here my English teacher is rolling in her grave.. never start a sentence with a But!) one's journey with Leica M is never ending.. and so I gathererd more and more lenses to the stable.. almost none of them actual Leicas. And then in my Lightroom.. I started struggling to know which one I'd shot. And it dawned on me.. my M10M, and M8 that I purchased for a song soon after, could both read 6-bit coded lenses. So.. how to code my "clone" lenses?  Simple.. internet to the rescue. And there I found some bright spark who had designed a marking ring for the Leicas where you could mark the codes. And then another bright spark in China copied that bright sparks idea and sold the ring for less than half price.  The story of the 21st century.

 

My finger pointing at the offending screw - Voigtlander 35 f1.4 with space for manually applied code next to it

So now I had a marking ring to mark all my lenses.. and here is where I started to see the Mandler wobble a bit.. You see, the guys at Mandler were so busy copying the lens design and elements, that they completely forgot about one of Leica's great modern innovations, which is to let analog lenses talk to digital bodies - the 6-bit code.  If you are new to Leica or shoot exclusively film, this innovation is of no interest, and you are under no obligation to know about it.. But you probably know anyway, because any Leica innovation gets talked about by everyone. And the innovation is to engrave marks in the lens mount, and colour those engraved areas with white and black, and on the camera side what is essentially a bar-code reader scans and identifies the lens.  Not only that, on more modern bodies such as the M10M, the camera is able to apply profiles correcting for basic lens shortcomings, such as distortion, vigneting and (I believe) chromatic aberation.  And.. when you download your pictures and want to know which is your most used lens, the info is there.  Great for the geeks amongst us. I being one of them.  So what's the problem with the Mandler, I hear you ask?  Well, when this 6-bit coding was invented, oh.. when the M8 came out in 2006, most of the Mandler staff were still in swadling cloth.. and so didn't hear about it.  Because... (another roll around your grave Ms whoever you were teaching me english) they put a screw squarely where the 6 bit codes should go..  And considering that this lens was made in 2025/2026.. this is unforgivable..  It also makes this lens a bit less useful than I would have hoped, considering that it's a 1:1 copy of the Leica optic of King of Bokeh fame, and so the optical adjustments would have been perfect for it.  And also because when no lens is present, the camera defaults to a 50mm f2 profile. Which is not the same.  Not by a long (or short) stretch.

The lens hood button squarely where aperture ring indentations are

 

Next bugbear.. though this may be the same issue on the original Leica lens that it was copied from.. When using a lens hood, which has some groves to slot into the lens in a specific orientation (helpful for the square hood design for example) the springs that hold the lens shade in.. also interfere with you operating the aperture ring.  Now granted, one doesn't buy an f2 lens to shoot it at f16, and I am most assuredly a proponent of shooting lenses wide open. So under normal circumstances the aperture will sit at f2 and stay there for the duration of the shoot. However.. because the lens is so small, when you mount the lens, there is so little to hold onto that you invariably grab the aperture ring to mount the lens, and in the anti-clockwise motion of seating the lens, you invariably shift the aperture to a closed position. And when you start shooting, and are attempting to ensure aperture is wide open.. the hood is now in the way.. Solution.. ditch the hood. Better for flare. :-)

After mounting lens, the aperture landed at f2.8. Not bad.. not great.

 

Whilst these two flaws are not completely insurmountable - did Cartier Bresson fuss about which lens he used?  No he didn't.. because he only ever shot with a 35mm lens. Or was it 50? Can't remember..  No, the issue is that, once again, we are reminded of why Leica is Leica, and why the copy-cats are copy-cats. 

I'd like to say that though I've talked mostly about the ergonomics of this lens, the images are really quite nice and usable.  The flare at night is as spectacular as it is intrusive, though it might be a look that you may eventually tire of.  I quite like it and can now pick this lens out from the other 35mm lenses I now own (don't ask!).  The sharpness is enough for what I need, the images are pleasant and full of character.  However I've found it's replacement.. a faster lens with even crazier flare and similar form factor. So.. the Mandler will be going on the chopping block. Sorry my Sino-friend.  

Post script (or PS for short).: a few months after writing the above review I've come to a realisation that this Mandler lens is, despite the drawbacks mentioned above, quite a compact and high performing lens.  Right at the end of my review I alluded to purchasing a Voigtlander 35mm f1.4 lens, and preferring that. However despite the extra stop of aperture, I find I'm using the Mandler lens way more than the Voigtlander. Maybe it's a function of my M10 Monochrom, which can essentially shoot in the dark with no ill effects.. rather.. with an enhanced very film like grain generated by the noise. So.. I don't need a faster lens, and the character of the Mandler is exactly what I like. Crazy crazy flare, sharpness where I need it, and despite complaining about the lens hood ergonomics, I find it more pleasing to touch and handle than the Voightlander that I thought would replace it.  Image quality is a question of taste, and I very much like the taste of the Mandler, dare I say it, over the Voightlander.  Also I have to say that my Sino friends at Mandler have pulled off a very elaborate masterpiece, a homage to the great Leica king of bokeh, with as much respect as they were able to. Indeed, imitation is a sincere form of respect in the far east, an admission that who you are copying is better than you (albeit ALSO demonstrating the capabilities of the copyier).  So I will be keeping this fabulous little lens, even if it will get tagged as a 50mm f2 Summicron by my cameras. 

 

Leica Part 1.5 or.. How one bag ruined my bank balance - a review of the Billingham for Leica Combination M bag

Firstly, I must excuse myself for this rather back and forth with Leica. Truth be told many articles exist in the galaxy of my brain, doing concurrent revolutions around my sun (or.. living as 1's and 0's in my Macbook).  So at any time I could have three articles about the same subject, written at different times, about different stages in the thought process.. and being written in bits and pieces, more or less concurrently.  If this confuses you, don't worry, so am I. Basically I struggle to finish anything.. I start, good intentions and all, and then get distracted. My wife says I have undiagnosed ADHD.. I'm also left handed. So.. 

Anyway, this long preable just to say that there was supposed to be an earlier article to my Leica Part 2, but so excited was I when I received my Leica M10, that I wrote that piece, and completely hopped over my earlier work. So, this is my attempt to put the threads of time back in their place..

How one bag ruined my bank balance.. or a review of the Billingham for Leica Combination M bag

The innocuous looking bag.. Looks fairly harmless, doesn't it? 

It’s not often that something small has a massive, outsized impact, all way out of proportion with the object itself.  Think of an asteroid.  When it does happen though, you feel it.  But first a word from our sponsors.. No, no, none of that. Just an introduction with whom you’re “speaking”.  I’m a middle aged man who started photographing at 12 with film, and who over the past years has managed to own every camera that he ever dreamed of in his 20’s, when he struggled to afford expired film.  I own more bodies and lenses than my wife does shoes.. and that’s saying something. I’ve bought and sold into camera systems, expanded and contracted my “collection” through bouts of G.A.S. and progressively owned more lenses and taken fewer pictures with them. Sound familiar?   It was therefore inevitable that I would, one day, try a Leica.  And so it was.. I went on a Leica buying spree.. found a decent looking M3 for a(n) expensive song.. and an actual modern Leica lens, the Emarit-M 90mm f2.8.. supposedly the sharpest 90mm leica has made (words of Erwin Puts, author of the authorative Leica Compendium).  I was set for photographic perfection. And then a strange thing happened. I didn’t like it (pun intended).  The rangefinder ethos just didn’t gel with me. And so like a petulant child, I found something else to lust over, and promptly sold my whole M system (at a slight profit I might add!).  However that wasn’t the end of the affair with Leica itself, as I realised that it wasn’t the brand or the quality I had an issue with. Indeed, the M3 was like a jewel, a mechanical watch with Rolex levels of quality. It was amazingly well built. And the only other camera up to then that could compare to it was the Hasselblad 500c/m (which I also bought during a sleep deprived late night Ebay binge session).  So I then did the next best thing and started buying Leica R lenses and bodies.. and when I had enough I sold off the surplus bits (who needs 4 Leica R bodies?!) and kept the cream.

And then another thing happened.  I needed a nice bag to hold my jewellry.. I mean cameras! And after iterating through the usual American suspects (Lowepro, Temba, Peak Design, ThinkTank) I gravitated to Billingham.  Think of it as if you went from American fast food to a Michelin starred restaurant.  The American stuff just never quite filled you up, no matter how often you went back for more.. The Billinghams were the real deal though. Built to last, unlike the American crap that had sealed seams separate, plastic delaminate and metal bits rust.  No brand (except maybe Temba) survived my rigorous tests..  And so I started getting Billingham bags for different occasions and camera systems.  If you’re a photographer then you know.. you need several bags. One that will take your medium format system. Another for casual walking around. And then, you’ve gone mirrorless, right? Well then, another smaller bag for your mirrorless setup. Minimum 3. Probably many more.

So where am I going with this long-winded introduction into my rather uninteresting personal photographic journey?

Well, after tasting the Billingham style, I happened upon an unusual bag with Leica blazoned on it, but made by Billingham. A black one. Unusual because the Billingham dna is khaki with brown leather and brass.  This bag was different. Simpler. Black with chrome snaps and zips. And an intriguing little label inside that said Billingham for Leica. Such are the wanderings of Facebook Marketplace that you find these hidden gems. And so I researched the bag, and found out that it had been created to hold an M system (whereby the Combination M part of the bag name).  And so intrigued by the bag, I was, that I quickly arranged to buy it.  It arrived.. and contrary to my other Billingham bags I already owned (remember something about at least 3 bags...) this one exhuded.. style. But more than that, it had a simplicity of purpose, that my other Billinghams simply didn't.  There was no fuss with this bag.  It had been stripped down to the essentials, but it's strap went all the way around the bottom of the bag. Quality too. Fewer pockets and zippers than a standard Billingham.. It was perfect. Except.. my Nikon Z8 mirrorless camera wouldn't fit! Imagine that, I had a bag, and couldn't fit my camera.. So what do I do? Sell the bag, right? No... Get a new camera! 

The original text was in white on black background, but in my effort to "stealthify" the bag, I coloured in the text with a black marker. Still Billingham for Leica, just more discrete  

And so started my odyssey in searching for a Leica M.. Many hours of research.. many hours poring over the auction sites.. and many hours making lists of features that I needed, and things that I didn't need, or didn't want. And slowly the choice began to coalesce.  The M3 had not worked.. because it was film, and I needed instant gratification.. ahem.. immediate feedback on my out of focus shots.. So digital it would have to be. And then.. an external viewfinder was going to be necessary, because I like using wide angle lenses.. So out went the M8 and M9.. Then.. I thought long and hard about what output I wanted.. And then I remembered my recent trip to italy, where I had used my iPhone exclusively (no space for a mirrorless camera with big lenses), and then converted all my pics to black and white.. So..a monochrome camera (in Leicaspeak, we drop the E at the end). Ok, a monochrom camera.. And so it was, that my Billingham bag precipitated my biggest purchase of the last few years.. 

The slippery slope of owning a Billingham bag leads you down to.. this piece of expensive jewellery

Moral of the story. Use Lowepro!  

 

 

 

Leica - Part 2

When you repeat an action, but expect another result it.. I believe, is the definition of insanity. And if that is anything to go by, then I am insane. Because, yes, you guessed it, I've bought another Leica M.  After my last post, almost a year ago, where I explained in excruciating detail, why I couldn't make the Leica M system work for me.. I've gone and purchased another. However.. I might have cheated a little. And when I say a little.. I mean a lot. 

I mean.. insanity means you can do what you want.. think what you want. and change your mind when it suits you.

And so I purchased a Leica M10 Monochrom. Which.. had been sitting in the back of my mind ever since I heard of Leica's first Monochrom camera back in 2011 with the M9M.  So why is it a cheat?  Well, first off, it's digital, which means that the long wait between badly exposed photography and getting the pictures back from the lab went down from several months (the average time a roll lives in one of my film cameras) down to.. instant. And secondly.. because unlike a Leica M film camera.. with an M10 I can actually use a digital viewfinder and see through the lens. And that changes EVERYTHING.  The whole M equation is completely flipped, upended, rendered moot.  Now.. I can see what I'm doing, and I can get what I want out of the camera (a black and white image) right out of the camera.  This is truly.. amazing. Ok, let me be very clear. This is AMAZING! 

Why? 

Because my love of photography started with black and white images developed in the school darkroom in Sydney in 1982.  And all through my journey through different camera models and film stocks, mostly Tri-X and then Ilford XP (that's how long I've been shooting.. when it was just XP, not XP2!), then digicams, then DSLRs, then mirrorless digital.. I was always searching for the perfect black and white image.  Of course I also shot colour, and enjoyed colour. But it wasn't what I wanted. And I spent endless hours toggling images between colour and black and white, to see which worked and which didn't. And that's time of my life that I'll never get back.  Now however, from the get-go, I have my image in black and white. And with an M10, it's a better image than I've ever been able to achieve with a bayer filter camera (basically all digital's out there)..  Not only is the quality amazingly detailed with it's 40mp sensor, but my camera can see in the dark at ISO 100,000.  Sure, it maxes out at that number, the same as my Nikon Z8 in Hi 2, but at that ISO, the M10 images just look like film with a bit of grain.. Absolutely usable images. Whereas my Z8 is simply garbage.  I now shoot at night.. walking around.. with my M10. Simply outlandish! 

Not only that, but with 3 buttons on the back of the camera, and with a menu written for a child, it is possibly the simplest digital camera I've ever owned.  The Rolex feel of the buttons is not quite there, to the level it was with the M3.. but the M3 was Leica's masterpiece. However the M10M feels sculped from a block of brass, all hard edges and corners in a way that they just don't make cameras anymore.  

As for lenses.. well, remember that 90mm f2.8 Elmarit-M that I said I didn't use much? Well.. I found another.. a South African photographer who's downsizing.. we had a meeting of minds and an exchange of cash, and now I have my least used lens again :-)  Though I may not use it often.. it is a beautiful lens to work with, and with my high ISO, I can use it with impunity. 

Second Leica lens is quite an unusual one, the 50mm summicron Dual Range (DR for short) which focuses down the the rather useful 40cm.. much closer than the standard 0.7m of newer Leica lenses, which makes it an excellent close quarter portrait lens or semi-macro (nothing with Leica M's is ever truly macro).. Possibly the heaviest densest lens I've ever owned.. it is a joy to use in the same way the M3 was a joy. Mechanical perfection. 

More to say about this development in the weeks to come, but understand this, I haven't felt this excited about photography in quite a while. And it's not about holding a beautifully made object, it's about the images that I'm creating now.. 

 

 

Leica.. or photographic madness

A few years back (or more preciceliy, in 2018) I more or less forced myself to love Leica.  I found an M3 rangefinder in a niche serial number range with most of the later upgrades but with the more aesthetically pleasing buddha ears.. 

Confused?!  Well then, you, dear reader, are not a LEICA PERSON! I admit, I went full bore with my obsession, watching every online video I could find, and eventually purchasing the seminal work of Erwin Puts (1944-2021) called the Leica Compendium, a more or less complete catalogue of all their film cameras and lenses.  

I purchased the book directly from the man, so just a few years before his passing.  I pored over MTF charts, read his lens reviews, before settling on just ONE Leica lens, the 90mm f2.8 M. An absolute work of art, an engineering marvel.. and a lens I hardly used.  To this I added a more functional Canon "Sumilux".. a 50mm f1.4 LTM lens (for those few readers who are not a LEICA PERSON.. it means Leica Thread Mount) which saw marginally more action.. but far too little to justify the expense. 

Leica M3 with Canon "Summilux", with buddha ears hidden behind a leather strap

You see, though I might have considered myself a LEICA PERSON.. I was definitely NOT a rangefinder person.  I knew this of course, when I was given my father's Canon 7 with the absolutely magnificent 50mm f0.95 lens.. which after a few rolls ended up sitting in the cupboard (it's still there, after all these years).  So why persist with the rangefinder madness?  Perhaps my problem was that I had used an inferior Canon rangefinder, and the Leica was the ticket. And the Leica M3 WAS superior in almost every way to the Canon. The weight of a gold ingot, machined to Rolex levels of mechanical perfection (or maybe it's the other way around.. Rolexes are machined like Leicas..). It was truly a work of art, and a fabulous machine, and one that I simply could not use.. In the end I sold it for a modest profit, but I did not miss it. I mean.. it's not like I could wear it on my wrist!

However.. the love affair with Leica HAD been kindled, and so I decided to try out their SLR line, being more in tune with my personal preference. My first serious camera had been an SLR, the Yashica FX2000 followed some years later by the Pentax K1000.. the most basic camera you could hope to find.  So off I went to Ebay in search of some Leicas to play with.. and found myself with three. Just sounds like a good number I guess. First up was the R4, followed closely by an R7, last of the "traditional" SLR Leicas.. and rounded out by the Hunchback of Solms, the R8.  I fell for the R8 after trying out a friend's camera, as even though it was chunky and heavy, it has hewn from a solid block of metal, and evoked the spirit of the M3 with it's watch-like precision, that the R3 to R7 line simply did not, with plastic dials and bubbling top plates.  Then came the lenses, bought and sold in feverish fashion, as I tried to find optical perfection (with an eye to budget).. I mean optical perfection would have set me back several tens of thousands of dollars, so I had to tread carefully.  True, R lenses are generally cheaper than analogous M lenses, but ever since film-makers discovered they could adapt these Leicas to cinema cameras, prices have been going up.  I bought and (stupidly) sold a 50mm f2 

Summicron, thinking the f2 was too slow, and then just as quickly bought and sold a 50mm f1.4 Summilux.. which was absolutely dreadful wide open. I mean, why would one buy a fast lens and then shoot stopped down to f8.  And then I bought another Summicron, which in my experience is the sharpest with the most pleasant bokeh of any of the 40 odd 50mm lenses that I've used in my life. Even better than my Canon 0.95 dream lens (you remember, the one that's still in the cupboard?).  I tried some late zooms from Leica, the rather astounding 21-35 f3.5 and 34-70 f4 and both were beautifully built, with ranges that were quite useful.. but the relative slow speed and resultant dark viewfinder meant they were not my favourites, and were soon moved on. 

Two stunning zoom lenses of Leica design (earlier ones were Minolta derivatives)

But in the sine-wave that is our life's journey, my period of expansion into the Leica R world was followed by a period of contraction.  Gone now is the R7, fun as it was to use. 

Possibly the most comfortable R to hold, because of the extra bit at the bottom

Gone is the R8.. 

which I regretted as soon as I'd sold it.. But in my mind.. I had a plan.. to own the best that was ever produced, of anything. And what's better than an R8?! Well, an R9 of course!  Released in 2002, 6 years after the R8... I must say, in 6 years they didn't make any major changes! BUT... it is the very last film slr from Leica, and the refinements are quite nice. Lighter, focus and recompose actually works (my R8 would reset the meter when you recomposed.. defeating the objective...pun intended). And it's rather chunky design is actually quite pleasant to hold.  A lock on the mode dial, which I was constantly moving by accident on my R8, and a nice little frame counter on the top plate. Small things. But they perfected the already pleasant design of the R8. In black of course..

As for lenses, I've settled on a trifecta. A 35mm Sumicron, which a LEICA PERSON knows is an f2 lens.  Then my 50mm Sumicron.. which is simply stunning. And finally an absolutely dense lens, the 80mm summilux f1.4.. a singular portrait lens!  These would by my only lenses.. a perfect numbers. Oh, but wait.. I haven't mentioned my other camera.. the one I didn't sell?  Leica's last fully mechanical SLR, the R6.2. In absolutely perfect condition. But if I'm honest.. I shoot with the R9 more often. The second body is just so I can swap between colour and black and white. Or when I want to be a bit more discrete, as it's profile is about half that of the R9! 

Will this be the end of the story?!  Or will I be tempted by yet more bodies and lenses? If (my) history is anything to go by, if GAS principles hold true, and if the perfect number of anything to own is N+1, with N being the current number owned... then yes, I will most likely indulge in a lens here or there.. My penchant for landscapes means I will eventually need a wider lens. And I quite enjoyed the 135mm focal range in the past, so having another (lighter) portrait lens may be welcome. However those are only desires.. my needs are most assuredly already met by what I have! 

Why I sold the Z7ii.. or how relaxed and learned to love film.. again

Yes.. I've sold my Z7ii.  I know, this may not come as a surprise to you all, considering my last post.. but I have to admit I am more than saddend by it's departure.  I... miss it!  I know I've harped on about all the Z7ii's failings and short-comings, whilst tempering my excitement for it's positives.. It's a dainty camera built to D750 levels with a D850 sensor.. It's mirrorless, and that's new so it's great. What was even greater, and perhaps rather unsung, was it's ability to take lenses from other marques and.. autofocus them.. in may cases better than on the original cameras. And with the focus zoom function, you can really nail focus on the eye. So out I went and purchased every single Canon L lens I'd ever wanted.. and away I went.  By most indications I did shoot quite a bit with it.. A total of 10,000 shots. In 23 months, so just under 2 years.  That may not seem like a lot, but I'm not a big shooter, and though more recently I'm doing more sports shooting, I prefer portraits and landscapes, where spraying and praying is not really required.  Only one other camera averaged the same volume in my stable, and that was the D810.  So notwithstanding all the shortcomings I alluded to in my previous post, this, in fact, was quite a successful camera for me.  Maybe the lack of bulk and weight made me want to take it along more often? Maybe the added joy of using different lenses from different makers made me want to experiement more with it?  Who knows.  I simply have to conclude that it was a great little camera, and more than suited to my requirements.  Who knows.. I may hunt for a used one as a back-up camera :-)

Why I don't like the Nikon Z7ii

 

 

I have been an avid photographer (subtext - amateur) with some forays into professionalism (event photography, product photography) for the better part of 39 years. Wow.. Thats a long time.  I've managed to transition from manual focus to autofocus, and then from film to digital slr's, and now the latest transition, from DSLR's to Mirrorless.  While waiting for Nikon to get it's act together, I experimented with the Sony A7RIII full frame Mirrorless camera, and then just as promptly dumped it, as it wasn't for me.  The philospohy of the two camera makers couldn't be any more different, and my acquired muscle memory of Nikon controls meant that I was constantly fighting with a camera that would simply not co-operate. Plus the colours looked terrible.

Nikon then did the inevitable and caught up with everyone else and released their Z6/Z7 duo, and I was invited by Nikon to one of their launch events in Australia.  I was mightily impressed, although like many I was also perplexed at the glaring omissions to the camera's functionality, like dual card slots.  I voiced my concerns with Nikon, and strangely for once, they seem to have listened, and barely 2 years later released an update, the Z6ii/Z7ii duo.  Or maybe they listened to the tens of thousands of other photographers clamouring for the same things.. I can't be sure. 
Aaaanyway, in the mean time I'd sold off the Sony, and was back to using my Nikon D3s, and really felt the need for a higher megapixel camera capable of using all my plethora of lenses from various mounts.  I finally took the plunge (again!) into mirrorless and bought a Nikon Z7ii.  The camera felt reassuringly similar, yet also strangely different, and this was immediately apparent when I tried to control the camera.  Pro level controls were not present - more "prosumer" controls á la D600 or D750 were in their place.  Strange omissions still continued, like the two-button format option present on just about every Nikon DSLR since time immemorial.. Gone..  I discovered much to my dislike, that they had removed the manual DX lens selection option.  And the final cherry on the cake (not!) was the fact that they'd removed the Picture control option for scanning negatives.  

Now don't get me wrong.. I undestand all about marketing tiers and creating levels of products for customers to oogle at.  That's all fine.  And as Mirrorless stands today, it is clearly positioned by Nikon to be inferior to their pro DSLR offerings (D6, D850 and D500).  Those cameras have a totally different design philosophy and their differentiated controls echo that.  However right now the Nikon Z7ii is MORE expensive than the "equivalent" D850, with which it shares an important attribute, the sensor.  So different controls, different viewfinder, but same image quality, and comparable in price, though with a clear pecking order.  The "cheaper" camera.. is the better camera.  Yes, I know, the D850 is near the end of it's life and hence price is lower, and the Z7ii is at the beginning of it's 2 year product life.  The two cameras have very different Autofocus capabilities, with one sharing the AF of the flagship D6 and the other a newer though (currently) less capable AF technology, Mirrorless.  Nikon WANT you to buy into Mirrorless, however it is still not as good as DSLR in that important category.  Instead of sweetening the deal though, they have arbitrarily taken out features much the same way Canon or Sony have done for centuries.  Well, ok, years..  Once upon a time this would have been anathema for the more engineering oriented Nikon...  Well, I guess we all have to grow up and stop playing with our meccano sets and start selling houses in Monopoly.

You see, to put this all into context, Nikon was the bastion of pro photographers for many many decades, and though Canon and Pentax and Leica and Minolta (now Sony) and many others tried to compete, it was the accepted wisdom that Nikon was the best.  They made camera bodies that were tough as nails, and lenses that could be used through successive generations of bodies.  But times change, and technology changes, and small advantages turn into big differences down the line.  And essentially two big changes destroyed Nikon's dominance in the imaging business.. AutoFocus and Full-Frame digital sensors.  Their delay in adopting and offering viable options in both those areas meant that they went from Nr 1 in the 1970/80's to Nr 3 in the 2020's..  Yes, even consumer electronic giant Sony sells more cameras than them.  

(Arguably a third technology, communications, has dealt all camera makers a blow, as in reality the Nr 1 spot is not Canon, but Apple with it's iPhone...  But let's not muddy the waters and keep it Camera body centric discussion).

Out of all this comes a newer more modern Nikon, finally releasing full frame (FF) Mirrorless cameras to an awaiting public, and trying to recapture some of their past successes.  In so doing though, they have adopted many of the consumer electronic tricks that the older Nikon, the engineering Nikon, the Nikon with a thousand and one accessories for the Pro shooter, would never EVER have considered.  And in so doing, Nikon has become what we hoped it wouldn't.. a Canon or Sony!  Before any fanboys from either brand make any comments about my impartiality, I do have to mention that I have used Canon SLR's and DSLR's EXTENSIVELY before finally moving to Nikon, and I much admired Minolta SLR's and later Sony mirrorless cameras (though disappointed with their A7RIII).  I know my stuff with them. Seriously. Don't try me! 

So whereas the "old" Nikon gave us hit's like the Nikon D3 and D700, the D810 and D500.. and lately the D850.. all great pro-level cameras (not to mention D4, D5 and D6), they are treating Mirrorless like the consumer animal it is.. whilst still charging "full price" for them..  Notwithstanding their "firmware updates" that are improving the sorely lacking AF of Mirrorless, they are not really increasing the usefullness of these cameras as they had implied they would.  And they are really just getting us used to the endless treadmill of two steps forwards one step back upgrade path that Canon and Sony have been practicing for 20 years, and have gotten down to a fine art.  

So to summarise this rant.. I am REALLY UNHAPPY with my Nikon Z7ii.  Notwithstanding the fact that it produces truly spectacular images, the fact that it's framerate is superior to my D3s, the buffer is amazingly deep, there are two card slots making it easy to get images off it, and surprisingly compact and well made.  How could Nikon improve this?  Give us back what you took away!!!! Give us the negative scanning profile, make DX imaging area user controlable and not automatic, give us the quick format option that EVERY Nikon before had.  And this will become a truly great (prosumer) mirrorless camera!

Come on Nikon. Please! It's just firmware!!!!

 

Footnotes:

1) The format card option via button press is a unique feature to Nikon DSLR's! For everyone else it's a menu-dive.

2) The Negative image profile is a feature unique to Nikon DSLR (singular, only the D850 has this option)!

3) The manually selected DX/FX area is NOT unique to Nikon (Sony also allows it), however Nikon DX lenses (unlike Canon, for example) mount on all Nikon F mount cameras and adapters (FTZ) and some DX lenses have imaging circles that cover the FX sensor in some or most situations.  I was on safari some years back and had just ruined a 80-400 lens, and my ONLY option was a loaner 18-200 DX lens on my D700 full frame camera. I was able to manually select FX image area and used the lens at infinity and actually created a competition-winning image.  There IS a usefulness to having that sort of manual control of your camera. WHY did you remove it Nikon.. Why?!

4) MF lenses are supported with a 20 bank memory that are user controlable EXCEPT for the focal length, which are pre-fixed to Nikon specific focal lengths.. You cannot manually select 90mm for example (eg. using a Leica M mount lens).. it either goes to 85mm or 105mm!  How idiotic!!!

And an afterwards... after checking with an Internet Luminary who shall remain nameless (Hi Thom).. apparently all the above items are well known and have been discussed ad infinitum amongst Nikonians/Nikonistas/Nikophiles... So I am just late to the party is all...

GAS

No, not that kind of gas!  In fact not any type of gas you may normally associate with the word GAS.. Gas in this case stands for.. wait for it..

Gear

Acquisition

Syndrome

Most comonly suffered by the male of the homo sapiens sapiens species, although the females have their own version (shop therapy, shoe acquisition syndrome etc).  Oh, and before my female readers get their knickers in a knot.. SATIRE ALERT!

GAS normally relates to technological items of a complicated and convoluted sort, something that takes us males ages to understand and make work properly, and once we've mastered how they work.. we turn to the next item on our G.A.S. list..  GAS items normally include cars, cameras and lenses, complicated pocket-knives, watches (normally of the expensive swiss kind) and, strangely, bags.  Something in common with our female folk.

 

If you have been bitten by GAS you will know exactly what I'm talking about.  If you haven't or are female then let me explain.  The male mind (and yes, generic gender generalizations will be the feature of this "article") revels in complicated dials and switches, mechanical movements made by the hands of "man" (in case you think me a misogynist, check out pictures of a Nikon factory in Japan.. mostly women!) for the hands of man to control.  However our minds are on a constant search for the perfect complication.  Be that the nice mechanical click sound the latest camera makes, to the imperceptible high-frequency beat of a mechanical watch that sounds like an old fire-engine on steroids, albeit very very far away.  If you've ever paused to LISTEN to your watch more than once, you my friend have GAS.

Now GAS can range from the relatively harmless to divorce level material, insofar as it interferes with one's ability to connect with one's better half (again generic gender stereotype, as how could one half be better than the other?!).  However it does allow man's desire for infidelity to find a relatively innocuous release, especially when viewed by our spouses.  Think for a moment which your wife or partner would prefer.. you going out with the latest model blond bombshell... or swapping the merc for a bmw?!

GAS also allows for the male mind's desire for total and complete control of something rather complicated.  Seeing as we are unable to manage to control our spouses in any discernable way, or indeed to understand them, we concentrate our attentions on an inanimate object that must follow the immutable laws of physics as well as the less clearly defined rules of logic.. depending on who's logic was used to create the item in question.  This has brought the western male mind into contact with ZEN thinking that is the basis of Japanese design, as well as the art of the needless complication as exemplified by Swiss watch manufacturers.

And how has GAS affected me?  Well I suffer from multiple manifestations of GAS driven in part by the fall of film camera prices, the almost instant availability via platforms like EBAY and the ability to dispose of some of my income indiscriminately.  My kids are still young so planning for university fees hasn't quite hit me yet. Or that's what I'll tell then when they come asking for money and I peer above my mountain of used cameras and lenses...

GAS can get out of control, and in this day and age of the internet where access is but a click away you can lose a lot of time window-shopping and selecting bid or buy.  Back in the day you'd have to search out your favourite camera store, the monthly nic-nack market, or wait for the weekly autotrader mag to see what vintage model soft-tops there were.. or whatever forum there was for your GAS item of desire...  But today the acceleration of GAS is given by the almost always on internet shopping possibilities, as well as being able to go to far-flung corners of the world to find stuff.  I mean I got a bit of camera stuff from LATVIA the other day.. posted to Australia.. and now on it's way to Mozambique.  The power of online shopping, fast shipping and willing mules has made my GAS explode exponentially.  But now my wife is starting to wonder if I am wed to her, or to a camera store.

My GAS takes other forms as well.. sadly of the even more expensive kind.. Watches.  Although here there is a practical aspect limiting my purchasing, and that is that I have only 2 arms on which to wear my watches. And because they are all mecchanical, it takes a lot of time every day to keep them all ticking along.  One could make the same argument about my cameras, i.e. only having two eyes, but I find that putting 2 cameras to my face slightly (note I said only slightly) ridiculous, and in fact the different cameas I have serve different purposes and indeed take different film formats which changes their characters completely.  At least that's what I tell myself.  My wife can't tell the difference between a photo taken with one camera or another...or with my smartphone for that matter.  And.. neither can most photographers.

With lenses the equation changes substantially.  There I can go wild.  I'm told the average photographer owns 2.2 lenses.  The poor bugger with the .2 of a lens must be really be pissed off! However the reality is that most people buy an SLR with one consumer zoom lens and live happily ever after.  Then there are the GAS guys (invariably guys!) who have to absolutely cover every focal length from here to infinity and struggle with bags of 8 or 9 lenses.  I make sure the average stays up!

And where will this take us, this GAS?  Well, have you ever heard of an estate sale?!  Rarely does one's offspring take as much care or interest in the things that we took so long and worked so hard to amass.  In fact they probably have an aversion to those things, seeing them as useless baubles, or things that took their parent's time away from them.. And so many end up on the auctioneer's block.  Or worse Cash Crusaders.  Guess where I'm headed next?!

Xefina Revisited (Again)

Some of you may (or may not!) know that in 2008 I published a photobook via Blurb called "Xefina Island".  That book was made using photos shot over a two year period, from 2007 and 2008.  I had been visiting this small sandbank of an island for much longer than that,  and have managed a few trips back since my book, although the last was in early 2017...  What could more that 3 years do to an island already ravaged by the forces of nature?  A lot, as I learned this past weekend!  

However the island continues to live in an eerie calm, just perched at almost walking distance from the Costa do Sol beaches of Maputo.  Although it maintains it's mystery for most Maputans, except for a few intrepid kiteboarders, it is a habitual haunt for a significant number of fishermen that use it's beach as a launching point for their expeditions.  A small village is home to some of the poorest people in Mozambique, though rich in pride and humility.  I was fortunate to have had had a nice interaction with some of them while taking these photographs.

I have to confess that the impetus for this trip were a photographer friend, Nii Obadia, as well as my wife.  Through the former's insistance and latter's organisation, we were able to make it onto the island.  Here are some pictures from yesterday's trip.  Hope you enjoy.

 

 

Fisherman on structure

 

Wait, am I in your photo?

 

New beach structures

 

Claw

 

Monolith

 

 

Fishermen and structures

 

Differing horizon lines

 

My favourite structure

 

Local fishermen with their catch of oysters

 

The long walk back to our boat

 

 

For the technically minded these photographs were taken with a Canon 1Ds mark III, which was released about the time I started photographing this island (2007!).  Coupled with this camera were two Nikon (!) lenses, a 17-35 f2.8 and an 85mm f2.8 Tilt and Shift lens.  Other photographs (not shown yet) were taken with a Hasselblad 500CM with a 50mm f4 Zeiss lens on Kodak Plus X 125 asa film.  Oh, and for the record, I used the Gitzo tripod I saved from oblivion as reported in this blog page.

Fixing a Gitzo GT1541OT

 Photo by Cavell from Facebook - used with permission

So today's post is about one of my pet likes.. fixing things.  I was browsing Facebook's marketplace when I chanced upon an advert for a Gitzo tripod for $80!  Intrigued, I read on, although the pictures explained exactly why the tripod was going for so little.  A tripod that in it's day (+/- 2009) retailed for 800 POUNDS!  The guy who I eventually bought it from said he paid over AUD 1000.. still a big chunk of change.  As I am living away from my trusty Giotto tripod (Chinese clone of Gitzos), and still waiting for my Peak Design travel tripod, I was in need of some stability.. so to speak.  So I met up with the seller and after a bit of haggling bought the tripod and head for a measely AUD60..  However the scars were deep and they were many.  The centre column has completely crushed in the middle and was disintegrating at every attempt to raise or lower it into a position, where it could be tightened and put to good use.  The leg joints were completely loose and 2 legs had lost their original bolts and were held together by your bog standard galvanised bolts, all rusty and not really doing the job.  Still, could be worse...

 Photos by Cavell from Facebook - used with permission

And indeed, when I got home, on looking closely at one of the legs, it too had been wacked, although thankfully the scar seemed mostly superficial.

Note to self, bring my reading glasses when examining photo equipment!  

The most pressing problem was the centre column, which in it's present state was totally unusable, as the legs did in fact work, though in a wobbly fashion.   So I immediately set about dismantling the legs..  Priorities!  What I found both disheartened and delighted me.  At some point this tripod had sat in the back of a car driving across Australia.. Only that could explain how everything had gotten loose and in some cases lost.  Washers were missing, bolts replaced..  Anything that was a screw had some issue with it!  Someone though had tried putting the legs back together at some point, and where there was once brass, we now had either a galvanised washer or none.  Eventually I managed to get everything off, cleaned and then re-assembled the legs using the original parts to complete 2 of them, with all the "spare parts" used to complete the third leg - two perfectly working with all the right parts.. and one.. sadly a frankenstein.  A quick visit to the "net" revealed that Gitzo, 10 years after releasing this tripod, still stocked spares!!  I was totally amazed.  Not only that, they had an exploded diagram of my tripod with all the spares marked.. You could practically build a new tripod out of parts!!!

Gitzo parts manual for GT1541OT

However Gitzo is not cheap, and the centre column and leg bolt set would set me back US165.. Not a huge amount in the grand scheme of things, but I thought I could do better.  Also, I wanted to use this tripod NOW, not wait for the vagueries of Christmas time shipping!  So I started searching for suppliers of bolts and washers in Brisbane, Australia (I'm here now) and found a few, one just 10 minutes away.  So at 2pm on a Friday afternoon I shot off down the road to try my luck..

Items required:

2 stainless steel button hex bolts M8 15mm long
2 brass washers 6.7x15x1.5mm
2 stainless washers

After 10 minutes the pregnant storekeeper handed me a little bag with part that approximated my need, but weren't exactly the right size.  Note to self.. next time bring along a caliper.   Total spend AUD 1.18.   Well at least I wasn't too too out of pocket!

So as that hadn't gone quite as I hoped, with the hex bolt heads being a bit too small for the tripod, I headed to Bunnings Warehouse, where low prices are just the beginning..

While there I found larger philips head bolts.. not the most elegant solution nor as easy to tighten, however a much better fit for the tripod leg connection.. more brass washers just in case the first lot weren't perfect and then.. well, what about the tripod column?! Yes, I'd need to deal with that, so some glue, sandpaper and gaffer tape..  You'll find out just after the break..

Before we continue with the rebuild though, I thought I'd talk a little about this tripod, which doesn't have much in the way of literature about it.  A long and almost fruitless Google search did however provide a few pointers.. I finally found one video with barely 15 likes that talks about how this tripod is built, which at only 4:44 is definitely worth a watch.  If you don't have time, let me summarise.. Stainless steel parts so tripod can be used in the sea with salt water.. aptly called Ocean Traveller (the OT part of the GT1541OT model number).  So this is a Gitzo traveller tripod, one of the first with reverse storage legs to make it smaller when packed, but almost as large as normal tripods when opened up and extended.  I'm not a fan of tripods with big centre columns as they tend to sway in anything but a whisper of wind.  Not this tripod apparently.  The load rating is low at 4kg, but I believe that to be conservative.. Maybe not for large format, but medium format should definitely balance on top.

So back to the rebuild of this Ocean traveller.. The centre column.. Well, in it's present state it was all but useless..however I'd read somewhere about shortening broken carbon fibre tubes, and so set about doing just that.  After a tap test (tapping the tube to hear changes in sound) I worked out that roughly half of the tube was damaged.  I then proceded to wrap the gaffer tape around the tube along where I wanted to cut, and just next to that with scotchtape, leaving just a thin sliver where I would cut along.  This would help prevent spintering as I cut through the fibres.  I did a test cut into the broken tube first to understand how my handsaw would react with the carbon, and proceded to make a huge amount of dust as I cut into the tube.  So if you're doing this at home, then make sure you wear a dust mask, have a cloth or piece of paper underneath.  The cut was almost perfect, with very little splintering.  The tapes were doing their job.  I then cut into the channel I'd left uncovered between the 2 tapes and with bated breath proceded to make another almost perfect cut.  Now I had little less than half a perfect carbon tube.. However the open end would be at risk and would need to be stoppered, so I took the off-cut end and removed the metal stopper, and then glued that with epoxy glue into the open end of the good part of the tube..  Perfect connection!  And you can hardly see any glue.  Wow, I must be getting good at this after years of model planes :-)

So we are done!  Perfectly working tripod with a shorter centre column, ready and waiting for my camera to go take some pictures.  But wait.. there's more..

Because I'm a bit particular about these things, the AUD1.18 bolts were not doing it for me, and so I decided to splurge on the Gitzo bolts and washers, which in actual fact were a bit wider and held the leg more securely, so off I went to their website, ordered the parts, and 2 weeks later they arrived, right in the middle of the Christmas rush! Well, Christmas came early for me, as the parts were spot on, and now I have a perfectly working, perfectly looking (short) Gitzo tripod.

With Gitzo spare parts, and the other consumables I ended up spending $60, and with the tripod at $60, a total of AUD120, or for those inclined to use greenbacks, around USD80.. Not bad for one of the highest quality tripods I've ever seen in my life.

And one last word about this ST version.  The stainless steel used in this tripod is a special cast type which is non-porous and therefore even more rust resistant than ordinary stainless steel, and therefore weathers the elements perfectly.  This tripod is 10 years old and not a spot of rust on it!  Obviously this process must have been very expensive because Gitzo (now made by Manfrotto in Italy, after it's UK holding company closed the French factory down) no longer manufacture this type of steel.  All their tripods have their standard greyish laquer paint, which is nowhere near as resistant to chips and bangs and marks, and eventually rust.   Sad.  You will not see a more beautiful tripod around than this one..