The world spins. Everything comes around. Eventually we start to get misty-eyed about stuff that seems to have only just left the room. Yes, I’m at that point. I’m about to get nostalgic about digital cameras.
There was a sort of proto age of digital cameras at the start of the millennium, just before DSLRs started to dominate. Back then, digital cameras were possibly at their most varied and most innovative.
A good camera is a good camera, right? That’s how it should be. Of course, in the world of digital cameras where the image making technology is built into the camera, how long ago the camera was made will have an impact on the potential photographic outcome. Newer digital cameras take better photos – at least that’s the line we are sold by the manufacturers. It’s true too, objectively speaking – but with a good few caveats, that idea can, and is increasingly being challenged. Photographers, it seems, are increasingly turning to the vintage digital camera!
The ordeal of buying used via eBay is certainly one to cherish, feel the tension wrack the mind and nerves as you buy into the hype of the sellers monologue about condition and reasons for giving you the chance to own their soon-to-be discarded. The list of cut and pasted facts that were from the brochure… the list goes on.
It’s taken me 3 generations of Sony full frame mirrorless cameras to get used to the things, but I can now quite comfortably say that I’ve found a certain amount of peace with the Sony A7iii. In fact, I’d now go as far to say that it’s possibly one of my favourite cameras…!
This is a tale of my experiences with a Leica M10-D, but my journey with a digital M without a screen didn’t start with this camera. I used a Leica M-D for a while in addition to an analog M for portrait shoots in order to test whether I like the concept of a digital camera without a screen.
