Took a trip into town today to send my Leica M9 off to the Doctor in Solms. This was a reluctant move because I have grown very attached to this camera over the past year and a bit. Over the last while I noticed that my M9 was slightly out of focus at close distances, around 1 meter or less. Everything would look fine in the range finder patch, but on closer inspection things were not in focus. After a little experimentation I found that I needed to focus a little further away in order to get what I needed in focus. Obviously this problem was more apparent with the lens wide open and at longer focal lengths. For example, the problem was not that noticeable with my 35mm Summicron but was clearly visible with my 50mm Summilux. Now I’m not talking crazy out of focus, just enough to soften the desired plane of focus and enough to annoy me.
Conns Cameras (www.connscameras.ie/) were very good to me during the whole process of diagnosing and testing out this problem. They were kind enough to lend me a 50mm Summicron and an M8 body to test and have even given me a loan of an M8 while my baby is on holidays in Germany for a little rangefinder calibration (picture taken with M8 and 35mm Summicron, no filter).
Photo taken from the front window of Bewley’s Cafe on Grafton street Dublin. Processed in Aperture 3.2.2 and Photoshop CS5.
Shot details :- ISO 160, 35mm, 0 ev, f/2, 1/500