I bought my Leica M8 used in 2012. After dabbling in all sorts of digital cameras – Nikon, Fuji, and Olympus — I was looking to replicate the joy of my old Leica M4-2 so I finally mustered up the courage (and the money) to buy the M8. I had never spend so much money in one go on photography gear till that day. Things did not start off smoothly. After a few months with the M8 the shutter failed.
The Leica M8 was the first digital Leica I’ve ever shot with, and was also the most film-like digital camera I’ve ever used. I fell in love with a camera for the first time, and a year later, it also broke my heart. These photos are from a few of my most memorable experiences with this camera.
I am honored to be a guest blogger on 35mmc – a blog/webpage that I have been reading for quite some time. When I got the question if I could make a post, I thought of what I should write about. 5 pictures is the theme – but what five pictures? Then it struck me, I have had five Leicas. What about if I post one picture of each camera, and write something about what a Leica camera means to me.
It’s 10 years since I bought my first Leica – the M8. As anyone who knows this camera will testify, it’s a strange beast, albeit one which still manages to deliver excellent results if used correctly. It was certainly a steep learning curve after coming to Leica from a Nikon.
Released a decade ago, the M8 was Leica’s first digital rangefinder. By the standards of most people, this thing is now old technology; it’s long in the tooth, many times superseded. Yet in the context of this blog – where I’ve been known to talk about cameras from the 1930’s as still being relevant today – it could be considered a relatively new camera. So which is it? Is it old and not worth the time of day, or can and should the Leica M8 simply be regarded as a perfectly useable second hand camera in the same way most of the kit I talk about can?
