Leica M

While that is undoubtedly true, Leica never really catered to the 'I could do with a dedicated camera' crowd, but rather to the 'I am passionate about photography and am reasonably well-heeled' or 'I am obscenely rich and would like to show off' crowd. That, and presumably a lot of their revenue is from licencing their brand name to all sorts of phone manufacturers. I wouldn't be surprised if their own rangefinder line (which is what I believe most people into photography associate with the Leica brand) was at best breaking even - it is merely a means to maintain the cachet of the brand, methinks. YMMV. (Said as a longtime Leica enthusiast, but the digital Ms are out of my (comfortable) reach - when out shooting rangefinders, it is mostly a Leica M4 (1968) or a Cosina/Zeiss Ikon ZM (2005-ish, methinks)

> For what I would like to use it, I believe it would be ethical (as for what's considered ethical among street photographers and concerning street photography laws where I live). Define "street photographer" because I am embarrassed to be confused with the likes of you given I'm perfectly satisfied with my Leica M6 and Contax G2.

Agree with bokeh: This was taken with a Leica m9 using f0.95 50mm noctilux lens: https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/rennlist.com-vbulletin/2000x133...

I love my SL66, but it’s so (relatively) big and heavy. My Leica MP is small and light enough that it never annoys me being around my neck.

I've used modern Fujifilm (X-Pro 1-2-3, XT-1-2-3-4, X100 series), Sony (A7s3), Nikon (Z7) and other mirrorless cameras and I still hate the experience. Battery life is not great. I don't need or want exposure preview. The refresh rate will never match a SLR. With every camera there was a feeling of being detached from the scene and subject because of the EVF and almost every EVF gives me a headache after a few minutes of using it. The user experience on the whole has been more frustrating and less reliable than something like a Nikon D3 which just kind of gets out of the way when I am making images. The accurate autofocus is nice but I would rather have an older flagship DSLR than any modern mirrorless camera. The only exception I might make is for a more recent Leica M camera, but that's only because I've sold one and would like to use those nice tiny little lenses again.

Same reason someone would buy that ridiculous Ferrari watch that showed up the other day, imho. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32046036 I used to have a Leica M6. It was a lovely camera, but I actually really prefer to shoot with my Nikon FE2 to the Leica, and so I sold the M6. Hope it ended up in the hands of someone who enjoys it.

Not really, photography was temporarily destroyed with the rise of digital. Everything that happened between the early 2000s to about mid 2010s was a step back compared to film in term of resolution and dynamic range. Even back in the 50s we had pretty good film and lenses already. I shot this on a 1955 leica m3 with the lens it came out of the factory with on a fairly low quality consumer film: https://i.imgur.com/3VKMtra.jpg

Fuji and Sony's latest cameras are pretty amazing, feature full cameras at cheap prices. I bought and used the Fuji line for the last year, always hoping it would replace my desire for a Leica. But in the end I use my Leica M. For the simple reason that it is a camera that allows me to manually control it without compromise. I can focus it faster than any autofocus, I can feel the exposure and set it before I raise it to my eye, and the lenses look like butter. Yes, their price is about double of the equivalent of my Canon SLR and lens, but that's a small premium to pay for a camera that melds manual controls with my mind. For many buying a Leica is like buying a Louis Vuitton bag, but it is still the best working camera out there for it's specialized purpose. Source, I'm a working photojournalist based in Egypt: www.DavidDegner.com

Not IT, but I think Leica has the best camera design. At around the Leica M6 they decided that the design was done, and every future M camera is essentially an M6 clone.

Mostly, but they made mistakes too. Just look at the M5 vs the M6 vs the M7. The original M6 came out in 1984 and it is still the preferred model to this day in terms of film cameras. The M5 was too large and the M7 was too «electronic». People preferred the cameras that stuck closer to the original DNA. M6 cameras still fetch a pretty penny today. (So much so that Leica made a reissue a few years ago).

Good design should be timeless. For example, I like wat Leica did for their M serie cameras. At a certain point they decided that the design was done, and stopped messing around. For that you need leadership with good taste, because designers will always design.

The Leica M 50/1.4 is still around 300g and a great lens. But indeed, as the sensor resolution of 35mm cameras exceeds many classic medium format cameras, the best lenses have grown accordingly to serve that resolution. To me, the Leica M system stayed mostly true to the 35mm cameras of the film age. The other alternative in my eyes is mFT which offers great "digital" lenses in the size of small classic 35mm lenses.

Pirsig's notion of quality led me to an essay in a magazine that I haven't found again on particularly good pieces of engineering that have that Quality Without A Name: the ARM CPU, the Technics SL1200, the Leica M3, the HP-12C and some others.