Leica M6 Summicron Love

It’s been a while since I’ve given some love to my Leica M6.

The Minolta AF-C and Contax TVS point-and-shoot combo has pampered me.

The auto-focus and auto-exposure modes do allow me to get into the flow of things, to the point where I’ve come to think of manual focusing and exposure as distractions to stealth and composition.

So I was worried that I’ve lost touch with the Leica M6 routine.

All images here are from Leica M6, 50mm Summicron Type II lens, on Fuji Superia 400.

A little warm up was needed.

Testing testing. Got to be fast on the double-decker bus as the reflections are flitting past. Yes, I can rhyme pretty well.

A little practice on walls.

No prizes for guessing where this is for HK film photography people: that film lab (Dot-Well Photo Workshop) across the road develops your film in 15 mins during non-rush hours, for the princely sum of HK$20.

The people working there exemplify the HK way of doing things – somehow they manage to be gruff, direct, and friendly at the same time. And all those film cameras piled up in there …

And that building (Champagne Court at Kimberley Road) has a magnetic quality to it, given the vintage film camera shops.

I often go there with the intention of not buying a camera.

The prices could be a tad high, compared with the stalls at Shamshuipo.

But it’s really apples vs oranges, since many of the Champagne Court shops cater to collectors who would then place the cameras in their cabinets, whereas the cameras stalls at Shamshuipo are more for users.

Yes, I was spotted, so I did my silly-tourist-frowning-and-muttering-at-his-camera routine.

If they’re within earshot, I would mutter in my Klingon dialect.

I’m happy I’m still able to capture images the way we look at other people in crowded urban landscapes. We see through glimpses.

We glance at one another so as to be polite.

We learn not to look too directly at people.

For collectors: open edition prints from this post are available here.