Leica Camera AG I Oskar-Barnack-Strasse 11 I 35606 SOLMS I GERMANY Phone +49 (0)6442 208 0 I Fax +49 (0)6442 208 333 I www.leica-camera.com LEICA M MONOCHROM The fascination of digital black-and-white photography.
CONTENTS LEICA CAMERA AG 04 The future of black-and-white photography. LEICA REPORTAGE 06 Emotions within black and white. LEICA M MONOCHROM The fascination of monochrome photography enters the digital age. Sharpness redefined. The ultimate in rangefinder precision meets cutting-edge digital technology. Technical details. 12 14 16 18 20 LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. Sharp from corner to corner. 22 24 LEICA MONOCHROM PRINTS 25 Anything but a standard lens.
LEICA CAMERA AG The future of black-and-white photography. Henri Cartier-Bresson photographed by his Magnum colleague Dennis Stock on the roof of the Magnum building in Manhattan, 1961. Copyright Dennis Stock, Magnum Photos. ‘Only black and white reveals emotion’ – so said Henri Cartier-Bresson, perhaps the greatest black-and-white photographer of the 20th century. He certainly counts as one of the most important in the history of photography.
LEICA REPORTAGE LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH., ISO 800, f/4.
LEICA REPORTAGE Emotions within black and white. The Yaroslavsky Railway Station stands proudly on Komsomolskaya Square in Moscow, a little way outside the historical city centre. It is one of the busiest railway stations in Moscow. More than 300 trains depart daily from here to destinations in the north. One of them is a particularly significant train. Every other day, ‘Train No. 2’ leaves the station on the start of its six-day journey to Vladivostok and the Pacific Ocean, 9,000 km away.
LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH., ISO 320, f/8, 1/180 s The idea for the ‘Trans-Siberian Railway Project’ was born in his home town of Copenhagen, as a photographic project in which a train becomes the central theme of a story about people who live in very different worlds, yet have much in common. A story that could be told in compelling detail through a journey on the Trans-Siberian and Trans-Mongolian. An added attraction: Sobol himself had never visited any of the countries along the route.
LEICA M MONOCHROM LEICA SUMMICRON-M 35 mm f/2 ASPH.
LEICA M MONOCHROM The fascination of monochrome photography enters the digital age. 4 9 3 5 10 8 6 1 M Monochrom, full-size view, black chrome finish. 7 The newest camera in the Leica M-System builds on the tradition of its legendary predecessors, which have written history with their groundbreaking innovations: the Leica M Monochrom is the world’s first digital black-and-white camera in 35 mm format.
LEICA M MONOCHROM Sharpness redefined. 1 UNCOMPROMISING IMAGE QUALITY The M Monochrom features a new full-frame, 35 mm format sensor developed especially for black-and-white photography. In contrast to conventional sensors, it has no need for colour filters for individual pixels, and therefore requires no interpolation for the calculation of luminance values. This means that raw data and even JPEG image files from the M Monochrom can be used directly and without any further processing.
LEICA M MONOCHROM The ultimate in rangefinder precision meets cutting-edge digital technology. 10 7/8 9 I LEICA M MONOCHROM The CCD image sensor specifically designed and developed for the Leica M Monochrom offers full 35 mm film format without compromise. All M-Lenses mounted on the M Monochrom offer the angle of view they had when using film and are therefore used to optimum effect.
LEICA M MONOCHROM Technical details. COLOUR AND MONOCHROME SENSORS – A COMPARISON BLACK-AND-WHITE WORKFLOW Colour filter Sensor pixel Leica M Monochrom customers can take advantage of a free download of the digital work flow solution Adobe® Photoshop® Lightroom® 4. To allow an image sensor to ‘see in colour’, colour filters in the basic colours – red, green and blue – are allocated to individual pixels.
LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. Anything but a standard lens. The enormous speed of developments in the field of digital photography in recent years has brought cameras with ever increasing resolution and, correspondingly, constantly increasing demands on lens quality. This is particularly true in the case of the Leica M Monochrom and its ability to resolve even the finest details with extreme sharpness.
LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. Sharp from corner to corner. MTF CURVES FOR APERTURE f/2, INFINITY % Sharp 100 Detail contrast 80 60 Detail sharpness 40 Leica M Monochrom prints have the same features as analogue baryte prints. 20 Unsharp 0 0 3 6 9 Centre 12 15 18 21 Distance to centre of image [mm] Corner The MTF curves of the Leica APO-Summicron-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. clearly show that the lens achieves outstanding values for both contrast and resolution of details.
TECHNICAL DATA LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH.
LEICA M MONOCHROM AND LEICA APO-SUMMICRON-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. Technical data. Product Leica M Monochrom Order no. 10 760. Camera type Compact digital rangefinder system camera with a dedicated black-and-white image sensor. Correspondence between the viewfinder and the actual image At a focusing distance of 1 metre, the size of the bright-line frame corresponds precisely to the sensor size of approx. 23.9 × 35.8 mm.
Product Leica APO-Summicron-M 50 mm f/2 ASPH. Order no. 11 141 Angle of view (diagonal/horizontal/vertical) 47°/40°/27°. Optical design Number of elements/groups 8/5. Distance of front lens from the bayonet flange 24.4 mm. Distance settings Focusing range 0.7 m to ∞. Distance scales Combined, feet/metres. Smallest object field Approx. 271 × 407 mm. Largest reproduction ratio Approx. 1:11.3. Aperture Setting/function Preselection with click stops at half stops. Smallest aperture 16.