Month: April 2024

–CKF Evo 4.0 came in. Stiff action, much improved after hydraulic-pressing down the detent ball.

–Took a ride on the InnerLight to the dog park, ~11 miles. Seemed easy. Super breezy.

–Replaced hearing aid batteries around 7 PM.

–Went to Bel Air for milk, cheese, cream cheese.

–Ordered and picked up a dozen sesame bagels from NY Bagel Cafe.

–Looking for a Leica Q-P. Turns out everyone and his brother is looking as well.

–Took the BMW to S*T Strawberries. Prices are up, but berries are incredible.

–Lunch at Subway Hazel. Not good, won’t be back for a while.

–Watered plants and trimmed around abutilon. The Chinese Pistache tree in back almost completely blocks the sun all day. So much for bird of paradise, satsuma, etc.

–Got the new website wsf.ac set up finally last night.

–Took Grace shopping for birthday presents at Daiso (disappointing) and Target.

–Bought a used Leica Q2 Reporter at Fred Miranda.

–Papa Murphy’s pizza for dinner. Was reminded that it’s my least favorite pizza.

–Big crane truck came this morning to replace leaking skylights across the alley. Knocked off a couple branches from the Chinese Pistache tree.

–For reasons not totally clear, I decided to drop vstat.com and instead set up wsf.ac at Namecheap. After a few failed attempts, got the WordPress journal working. Hoping I can set up the website to be a more useful repository for photos and such.

–Youxin Ye finished CLAing the Leica lens: $455. Crap.

–Tried to buy a new Leica Q2 Reporter from Canada. They don’t ship to the U.S., so I had it sent to a reshipper in Canada. They figured that out and cancelled the sale.

–Grace is in a big snit, since I wasn’t wild about her idea of getting a potato to give to Kenny to pay him back for his potato.

–Picked up the Zeiss Distagon lens. A couple shots suggest it’s nice, but I’m not bowled over yet. [edit] Tested with night shots. Turns out Sony’s 3 and 5 metering options are best at night (Spot Standard and Highlight), with 3 having a little edge. OTOH, the Q2 Hodinkee lens wipes out the Zeiss Distagon wrt focus: On the sign, “Speed Limit” and “MPH” were quite readable with the Q2, totally unreadable with the Zeiss. Same with the red flowers. So much for the “sharper” Zeiss. Seems I haven’t learned that you can’t believe everything you read on the web. So what lens on the Sony? I guess its own 55mm for auto-focus, and Biotar/Contax 85mm etc. for art.

–Took a shower and shave.

–Was going to ride with Tom in El Dorado Hills, but it turned chilly, so we cancelled.

–The Leica Q2 Ghost Hodinkee Edition came in. Accurately billed as new, I didn’t even bother to check with Leica Sync. The little Leica black bags (for example) had the usual knot in the string, and the battery was sealed in cellophane. Magnificent camera.

–Kenny gave us a half-baked potato. Had it for dinner with sausage and leftover barbecued corn. Yum!

–Got the Fellow Ode back together and working. Was not easy. That machine has at least four poorly-designed features that really make it hard to work on. Worse, the first batch of coffee I made with after repair was pretty much tasteless. I did manage to free the ball/spring on the old dial assembly, so we have a spare.

–Rode the InnerLight 14.4 miles total to the Harold Richey Memorial Pedestrian Bridge and back. Return trip was very slow, as I’m old and it was warm.

–Went to the Sunrise framers market. Got satsumas and some of Kathy’s Peach Jalapeno jam (still $8).

–Opened the barbecue season with Bel Air pork chops (good), corn (not yet) and Creole potato salad (not so good).

–Took the BMW to Hooverville Orchards for jam and pastries.

–Finally getting warm. Both patio doors open tonight. I can hear a mourning dove doing its classic call in front.

–Second CKF Evo 4.0 came in. Great action, not the best satin finish.

–Pizza for dinner.

–Leica Safari top cover came in from eBay. Pretty scratched up on top, and the screw looks like it has been used. Good enough to replace the screw on my Safari, though. May have the cover repainted, if I ever hear from the Vietnamese painter or his friend who handles postal logistics.

–Replaced the portafilter gasket on the Cremina. Was hoping it would be thicker, and would not allow the portafilter to rotate so far when tightening. No difference. For some idiotic reason I only bought one gasket–the one in the Maximatic is likely in worse shape than was the old one in the Cremina.

–Rode the Folsom Canal with Tom Elken.

–Made pizza dough (great), then pizza (good).

–Adapter came for Biotar to Sony. Took a good while to figure out how to activate focus magnification, but then one abutilon photo answered all questions. That camera just obliterates Leicas–perfect focus, perfect metering, incredible resolution–and this on a 60-70 year old lens. Now I just need to figure out whether I need a Leica M at all. The 007 will work for sales macros; the Paul Smith should be fun if it ever gets back; but so far it’s on ly night shots that the M shines on (heh heh). If I can figure those out on the Sony, the M’s become true dinosaurs. [edit] As feared: I set the Sony (with its own lens) on spot metering and AUTO FOCUS and took a couple of night shots. One was overexposed, but one was near perfect–and had by far the sharpest fire hydrant and speed limit sign. And minimal flare around the globes. Well, what did I expect–only the Leica could shoot at night? It just boggles the mind how people can worship the M’s. Time to start sellin’…..

–Put the InnerLight on the bike stand in the back patio to check for the “pinging” I heard on my last ride. Didn’t find anything. Decided to lube and tighten the chain. Old lube had dried out, and my pin spanner pins were a little short. Went to Bob’s Bikes for lube (laughably overpriced); they couldn’t help with the tool. Fixed the spanner myself by replacing the pins with a couple of ground-to-fit bolts. That (and an online video) got the chain tightened.

–Was getting ready to buy another Leica 35mm f1.4 Asph FLE lens for ~$3,600, when I saw a reddit comment about how sharp(er) the Zeiss ZM Biogon equivalent was. A nice one on eBay is $1,325. Leica stuff is way way way overpriced, like chain lube. Don’t know if the Zeiss will minimize globe light flare like the FLE, but it’s probably worth checking out.

–Did another night pic test with the Voigtlander, after noticing (and cleaning) some fog off the rear element. Same glare/haze issues around the globe lights.

–Cold, drizzly day.

–Tried once more to flatten some Bel Air pizza dough. Failed. Another Red Baron tonight.

–Windy and cool, but not too cool.

–Took the InnerLight on the ARP, saw lots of mower goats. Was greeted by (perhaps) Mark Solich on the outbound portion of the ride.

–Watered my plants, which are looking pretty good.

–Hot weather.

–Took top off Hodinkee camera and cleaned dust off the rangefinder lens. Worked good.

–Finally heard back from Leica Parts. They won’t sell me a vertical adjuster cap, but rather want me to send the camera to New Jersey.

–Got the Sony out again, and figured out how to do magnified focus. Took photos on front and back patios. Breathtaking sharpness in both auto and manual focus modes. I sort of knew this would happen, given the gorgeous photos I got in La Selva Beach, but still, it sure puts the whammy on Leica M’s. There’s now zero reason to use them, except for nostalgia and snob appeal. I may keep the M-E to kind of “go with” the old Contax and Canon SLR’s; we’ll see. [edit] Well, tried the M-E and the Sony on my night shot. M-E sucked, likely because of the “king of bokeh” lens I had on it. And as it turns out, the Sony–like the Visoflex 2–is almost impossible to focus at night. It might improve with practice, or by focusing on something other than a globe light, but I’m thinking Sony for daytime, many lenses manually focused; and Hodinkee for night. Maybe. [edit 10] Screwed everything up. Tried to put the M10-P silver screw on the Hodinkee. It came off trivially earlier today. Tonight it did that horrible tilt/tighten thing, and would not come off for love or money. Ruined the camera; will toss. The screw on the Hodinkee is JUST passable for sale, I hope. There is no screw on the M10-P Safari. Guess I’ll put a sticker on it for sale. Those screws are awful. Will look (I guess) for an M10-R black, and hope it is vertically aligned.

–Got the rest of my refund back on the Reporter from eBay–in spades. eBay definitely knew this transaction on digree’s part was bogus.

–Went biking with Tom Elken around some of the newer housing developments in El Dorado Hills.

–Went to Costco for muffins, gas ($5.16/gallon), toilet paper. Also got grapes and apples.

–Found a Leica M10-P Reporter on eBay. Put the photos into Lightroom and could not find a single flaw. Almost put a best offer on it, but went riding. Later, while researching it (seeing how much I paid for the first one, etc.), I noticed that the seller had deducted 10% ($1,285) from the refund on the first one. It took me a while to realize what had happened–I’ve never seen this before and didn’t know it was even possible for a seller to refund less than full price. Turns out the asshole claimed I put additional fingerprints on the tape on the inner box, which “greatly devalued” the camera. eBay, almost as if they knew this was bogus, had a large “Open a Case” rectangle nearby. So I opened a case. Seems to me like a no-brainer, but I’ve been outfoxed before on eBay. Oh—it turns out there are two Reporters listed now on eBay, neither by digree. One is at $13k (above), the other at $22k. When I finally compared photos of the cheaper one to the one I bought, I discovered they’re the same camera. Ditto for the $22k one. I repeat: serious manipulation in Lightroom showed zero marks of any kind on the camera. I do believe these pics were taken before someone put that faint rub mark on the top. Dodged a bullet there, and MAY get a full refund.

–Picked up coffee at Black Sails.

–Went shopping at Target for eggs, milk, cream cheese, Zone Perfect bars, deodorant.

–Slow day. Windy, cool. Plants are looking good.

–Took the second “plant picture” with the Hodinkee. Lightroom blowups showed horrible jaggies. Took two more pics, with Hodinkee and M11. Both were much better (bad focus first time?), with the M11 having an edge even though it set ISO at 2000 (Hodinkee was the usual 800). Will likely move to the M11. Forced max ISO to 800, which seems to work on other Ms. Will test with another street photo tonight. [edit] Well, so much for that idea. M11’s first two pics had shutter speeds of 1 and .5 seconds. I ran the max auto ISO back up to 2000 and under-exposed by one full stop. The shutter speed was .25s, but the pic was totally over-exposed: the globe lights blew out everything, and could not be “highlighted” down. It almost HAS to be something I’m doing wrong, but I sure can’t figure out what. I suppose I could go full manual and set shutter speed, but what a pain. [edit 2] Tried again, all manual, same settings as the M10 successful night pic. It was better, but (a) not great, and (b) for some reason, the camera only wrote the jpg correctly–the DNG file was corrupt and showed nothing. I guess I give up on the M11. [edit 17] Tried the Hodinkee again on auto, got a totally good pic. [edit 129] GOT IT! Read up on M11 overexposure at Leica forum. It’s a known issue. Solutions are several, two of which I tried with good success: (1) There’s an exposure setting called Highlight Weighted Metering, which does what its name implies. (2) Use Spot metering and Live View. Aim at the brightest light, half-press the shutter, recompose, and (if LV looks okay) take the picture. Not as automatic as M10, but I really should be using Live View (and/or the EVF) more anyway. No guessing.

–Played with cameras again (duh). Trying to see if I can live with the M-P 240 Safari, since it’s new and green.

–Took Grace to Smiles on Sunrise, then Koreana Plaza. Had lunch there; not bad.

–Pizza for dinner.

–Dark and rainy today.

–2mm ball end hex driver came in from Amazon–two, in fact. (?)

–Bought a Leica M10-P silver (used) at M&K Camera Hong Kong. Good price, hope it’s nice and can replace the Hodinkee. Compared Hodinkee with mt M11 tonight, on the light across the street. Hod took a nice photo. M11 looked like it was horribly over-exposed–I couldn’t even begin to recover the globe light. Turns out Hod was 1/30 ISO 800; M11 was 1/30 ISO 3200. I think I’ve seen that before on the M11. It’s like Leica said “The camera takes great shots at high ISO, so we’ll max out ISO when we can and show Sony a thing or two.” I know the odds are good I’m misusing the M11 (people take great shots with it, after all), but I tried hard to set the cameras up identically. Total bummer, as the M11 feels so good in hand.

–Returned the crappy Leica TL from eBay.

–Tried hard again to like the M-P 240 Safari. Couldn’t. With everything set up identically, the 240 over-exposed the bright leaves in several patio pics; the Hodinkee did not. Minimum Leica: M10. [edit] Took another great night shot with the Hodinkee. Still in a quandary regarding keeping or selling it. Found a shop in Hong Kong with FOUR M10-Ps between $5,100 and $5,400 (U.S. stores/eBay are mostly $7,000+, plus taxes). (The M10-P is the only M10 worth considering, as it’s the only one with a screw cover for vertical alignment). BUT all M10-Ps available today are second hand, may have marks, have unknown shutter count, etc. I guess I just enjoy the Hodinkee and consider a mint Safari if one comes up.

–Was working on the Hodinkee cover screw in the garage. Dropped it. It hit the bench, then went to the floor and COMPLETELY disappeared. Exactly like the Fellow Ode spring a couple days ago. This is simply beyond belief.

–Picked up Nitecore charger for dead Hodinkee original battery. It showed some numbers, later said “Full,” but it was still dead as a doornail. Tried a few more cycles in the Leica and Nitecore chargers, no change. This was supposed to be the “improved” version of the Nitecore, but it’s not worth crap if it flashes some numbers and then calls a dead battery full.

–Leica TL (allegedly Top Mint) finally got here. Also a piece of crap, with scratches dings and chips all over. Started a return at eBay.

–Took a shower and shave.

–Took Grace shopping at Smart & Final.

–Played with cameras. Decided to keep just an M9 for now, so did a showdown of  four of them. No marked differences; will keep the nice anthacite M-E: low shutter count, nice images, very nice body. Re-re-re-learned that one shouldn’t attend to jpg’s from M9s, as they are known to be weird. (I have noticed this myself: in all of my other cameras, jpg’s and DNG’s are identical in XnView. They are starkly different  coming out of M9s, which likely accounts for (a) all the hoopla in forums about M9 colors, and (b) how over-saturated the greens seemed in my early M9 patio pics.) [edit] Okay, hold everything. Tried a night pic of the house across the street with the M-E, as done many times before. With the Voiglander lens at 1.2, the street light just blew everything away, beyond all recovery in Lightroom. Grrrr…..] [edit 2] Dug out the Hodinkee for the 8th time and took two more pics–with Summilux and Voigtlander. Summilux was a little better (less glow around the globe light), but both ere perfectly exposed. Try as I might, I can’t seem to get rid of the Hodinkee. It’s likely any M10 would be as good, but: do I want to make the Black Paint a daily user? Buy a $6k lens for it? Get a new M10 and a $6k lens? Arrggghhhh…]

–P.S. As of yesterday, my back is all of a sudden 90% good. It’s beyond my comprehension: comes in an instant, lasts for a week, two weeks, six weeks, then goes away almost overnight.