Ted::Blogs(): Photo::Buying a Leica M7

April 2006

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Death Valley 2006

During the Easter weekend, I took a long-deserved photo trip to my favorite place in the world, Death Valley. For the past couple of months, we've been having too much rain and it was great to get out in the sun again. I've been to Death Valley a couple of times before, and this time I tried to visit new places. This time I visited: Rhyolite, Stonepipe Wells, The Dunes (I can't remember the name right now), Golden Canyon, Artist's Pallette, Devil's Golf Course, Badwater, and Zabrieskie's Point. I took two bodies - Hasselblad 503CW (with 3 lenses) and Hasselblad SWC/M. I used Kodak TMX for 503CW with a tripod and Kodak TMY for the SWC/M handheld.

I have always been fascinated by selective focusing and shallow depth of field. To me, it is an explicit way to express the most important part of the image. For the same reason, I enjoy using vignetting as a visual effect. The series of pictures here are taken from various places including italy and california. Obviously, they are grouped as a series as they share the same type of visual effects, not because they share the same subject or geographic location.

I was born in the year of the horse. Maybe that's why I am fascinated with horses. When I started photography, I was very inspired by Keith Carter (another reason why I am so obsessed with selective focusing). After buying his book, "Ezekiel's Horse", I always wanted to have a chance to take pictures of this beautiful creature. Last year, I went to Vegas with my friends, and instead of playing golf, I drove out to Death Valley. I had the slightest idea that I would have an encounter these beautiful horses.

As I've said in my previous post, I've been looking for an M7 body to substitute my M6 (which I sold in two days). In doing the research, I've learned a few things about buying an M7 and I thought there would be many people who'd like to hear what I've learned.

Two versions of the viewfinder

First, the original viewfinder for the M7 had the same 'white-out' problem that the M6 has. When you are pointing to a bright scene, your focusing patch turns white (bright) which makes it impossible to focus at all. Leica fixed the problem by installing the MP finder some time around 2003 and they've been providing upgrade at varying cost (I was recently offered to upgrade free of charge).

I've been trying to find out how I can tell whether a M7 body has an MP finder or not, and there are many different theories. One thing for sure is that you can't really tell by just looking at the body from the outside. Some people say if the body has a serial number higher than 288xxx, it is an upgraded version, but there are conflicting proofs. In fact, when I asked the seller this question, he made a call to Leica and was told that there is no way to know this just by looking at the serial number. Another theory is that the MP finder has different coating with different colorcast (orange or purple), which also has conflicting reports so its useless. Therefore, the best way to find this out is to look into the viewfinder and see if it whites out. I've got a tip from Dennis Cheng, who says you can find this out by doing the following:

If you don't know what finder flare is, the easiest way to figure it out is to have both MP and M6 to compare with. Put a light bulb to the left of a dark area. Pointing the M6 to that dark area, you can see focusing area being white out. Point a MP to the same area, you don't see the white out area.

Special versions: Flag models and the "Betriebsk" edition

There are perhaps many other models, but these two special models caught my attention because they were available in the market and were sometimes quite affordable. The flag versions have a national flag on top of the camera. They come in different countries with different availability. 100 US version is said to have been sold to the public and it is relatively easy to get. They were meant to be used as a demo unit, but apparantly some dealers wanted to promote them as collector's items. I learned, through the hard way, that they don't come with the MP finder. The US version has the "Test Camera USA" engraving above the flag.

The Betriebsk edition was also produced as the demo unit for dealers, and has the word "Betriebsk" on the top plate. I don't know how they are different from the regular versions, but I heard that there is a good chance that it comes with a MP finder. Here is what B&H says about the Betriebsk.

This camera is the special edition "Betriebsk." version. The term Betriebsk. refers to a test camera or factory camera. In the past, Betriebsk. cameras were highly sought after by collectors because of the very limited number of cameras available with this designation. Produced in a very limited quantity, this camera is brand new, unused, with full warranty.

Here are some links to the discussions related to this model: Photo.net Leica Forum

After all the research, I've decided to get a 'standard' version with MP finder. I don't know if I'm gonna have any real problem with the original finder, but I know that it will affect the resale price. I just felt 'safe' to buy what every one else is buying, I guess.

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