Hi dear all. I've planned to buy a Leica M and a couple of nice (used) lenses, so far nothing wrong... but, I'm left eye dominant, so I wonder if I'm going to have problems with the left viewfinder position of the Leica M camera, i.e. squashing my nose into the back of the camera while shooting. That's it. Thank you in advance for your responses -- Marco.

-- Marco Maria Colombo (mcolombo@iol.it), September 25, 2001

Answers

Right-eyed or left-eyed people both get squashed noses with SLRs. THe M6 left-eyed is no worse in that respect, plus compared to a manual-winding SLR the viewfinder is farther to the left meaning you can still have room to get a hold of the body with your right hand. Just be careful not to stick your right thumb in your right eye.

-- Jay (infinitydt@aol.com), September 25, 2001.

Marco--

I was also left-eyed until getting a rangefinder camera, and I found that with a little practice I could sight thru the right eye. So give it a try! It really does work better with the right eye, but your left will work just fine.

-- Douglas Kinnear (douglas.kinnear@colostate.edu), September 25, 2001.

The shutter winding lever will be awkward to use without removing the camera from your eye. Left eyed M users really appreciate this accessory:

http://www.rapidwinder.com/

I am right eyed but I love my Rapidwinder.

Cheers,

-- John Collier (jbcollier@powersurfr.com), September 25, 2001.

I am also left eye dominate, and have only encountered one problem. Back when I was using M3 cameras, which had near life-sized finder magnification, the big benefit of that camera was that if you viewed with your right eye, and kept your left eye open, you could view the world as a three dimensional scene, and the frame lines would float in space. I tried and tried, but I couldn't train my right eye to work, so I just gave up and squashed my nose into the camera back and got on with my left eye. With the advent on reduced finder magnifications, this advantage of two eyed viewing might no be as big... unless you can merge two dissimilar sized subjects into a single view.

Being left eye dominate has also caused me to adopt the right side (looking from behind the camera) down position when I shoot vertical compositions. This allows my nose to sit next to the top of the camera which is now facing inward. This is of course personal, but for me it was arrived at after much experimentation. While the SLR is essentially a periscope, and any grip is fine as long as the eyepiece and lens' front element are free of obstruction, the rangefinder camera requires not only those two surfaces, but also the rangefinder and viewfinder windows to remain unencumbered by the support hand. To that end, as a left eyed shooter, this vertical position works best for me.

I am sure someone will say that the opposite hold is better. It is as I said personal.

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), September 25, 2001.

Being left eye dominate has also caused me to adopt the right side (looking from behind the camera) down position when I shoot vertical compositions.

From my SLR days I have the habit of rotating the camera right side down; but I find right side up much easier- as is suggested in the user manual. My nose runs into the flash shoe otherwise.

Sigh. That is the lot of the left-eyed...

-- Tse-Sung (tsesung@yahoo.com), September 25, 2001.

If you can use any camera at all, you'll find the Leica M cameras the best for left-eyed people. The eyepiece is farther away from the winding lever than ANY SLR made. I'm left-eyed, and it's never been a bit of a problem.

-- Michael Darnton (mdarnton@hotmail.com), September 25, 2001.

I'll bet the new magnifier would provide enough eye relief, or standoff from the camera, to ease the nose-squashing problem. It was just discussed a couple of days ago, and the link is in a recent post.

-- Bob Fleischman (RFXMAIL@prodigy.net), September 25, 2001.

Marco, I say take shots anyway you can but if you can work on using your right eye I find two additional advantages over those already mentioned: 1.When wearing glasses, (which eventually comes to most of us) I can get a better eye position which gives me a more inclusive view of the 35 & 28 framelines (on the M6/72.) 2. When taking candid shots of people, they can see much more of your face. You can move the camera a few inches to the right and it (the camera)is almost out of the equasion. People interact more with you the person and are less distracted the camera = more natural and personal shots. (Mind you it could be argued that with a face like mine the more they see of the camera the better).

-- Tim Gee (twg@optushome.com.au), September 25, 2001.

Be thankful most of you have 2 eyes ! Hymm maybe appropraite also to be extra thankful ff you still have one eye because then you don't have to agonise more about which eye to use on your leica M.

I am left eye dominant but found I could be comfortable using my right eye too. Sometimes I get confused and find myself using the left eye again especially if the subject is pretty !

I suppose e left eye dominant diehards can turn the camera upside down or take more vertical shots if their nose is extra big :-)

-- Yip (koklok@krdl.org.sg), September 25, 2001.

I second John on the rapidwinder suggestion. On another note, although being a right eye dominant myself, I have noticed that (even with M6 viewfinders at lower magnifications than the M3's) it is helpful to keep the left eye open in order to focus more intuitively and quickly! I found it especially helpful with longer lenses and less structured subjects when it becomes hard to guess which puzzle piece of the composition an off-focus rangefinder patch is proposing... Don't know why - but it helps, try it for yourself. And I guess this technique might help lefties, too.

-- Lutz Konermann (lutz@konermann.net), September 26, 2001.

Marco,

I'm left eyed as well and I have no problem with my new M6 because of that. With practice I believe I can switch to tight eyed, but I'm unsure of the benefits that brings me. For critical focussing I still switch to my left eye and then for composition I bring it to my right eye, just to get used to it. But even as a 100% left eye user you will be able to work with it fine. Good Luck

-- Bas Wip (bas@baswip.com), September 26, 2001.

It's pretty late (my answer) and not much help (this news) but left eye dominance here seems to be of absolutely no essence. My right eye is almost blind and my left eye also needs the glasses I've been wearing for the last 20 years (whereby my glasses still have to get renewed every few years). I have never had any problems with my M6 TTL's viewfinder and/or with my 21mm's mirror viewfinder either. Maybe it has something to do with Leica.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 26, 2001.

I have always used my left eye while focusing and shooting. The only time I realised that maybe you should focus with your right is when I looked at mt cmaera manual. The woman was focusing with her right eye and looking out with the left. How many of you do this? Initially I found it quite difficult to use as the left eye can distract the right eye's ability to focus clearly and in solitary. So I still focus with my left eye as i find that my right eye cant see anything but the camera back, which leaves my left to concentrate fully on composition and focusing. Are the advantages of viewing with the right eye such that the left can see what is 'out there' beyond the viewfinder of the right eye? enlighten me please all ye right eyers

-- sparkie (sparkie@mailcity.com), September 26, 2001.

Sparkie's question causes me to coment:

Don't be too quick to conclude that you are right or left eye dominant and that is that. It's amazing what you can train yourself to do. I speak from past experience with infantry weapons rather than cameras. The sights on an SLR (Self loading rifle) are designed to let you see not only what you are aiming at but what is around it (this has obvious advantages in the field). At first it seems distracting but you get used to it. Then you get used to leaving your left eye open while sighting with the right. Few can do this at first but with practice it becomes second nature. You educate your eyes.

So I guess I'm saying you are not necessarily condemned to your present experience. It's good to experiment and persevere with new techniques. You just might gain some new perspectives (literally!)

-- Tim Gee (twg@optushome.com.au), September 26, 2001.

I must be in the minority - I prefer left-eye viewing, as it allows me to leave my right eye open rather than scrunching it closed. This reduces eye fatigue considerably - such that the last time I picked up my SLR (it's been a while since I bought a Mamiya 7) I hated the central viewfinder location because I had no choice but to close one eye or the other. As for nose-squashing - I've never noticed it (maybe I have a very small nose!)

-- Bernard Schneider (schneider@photonicsensor.com), September 26, 2001.

Marco:

I am 'left eyed' AND I wear glasses. I have no trouble using the viewfinder of the M6. But I find it difficult to see the entire 35mm framelines unless I am "squashing my nose into the back of the camera while shooting" too! It is not a major problem, and you will get used to it quickly....................

-- Muhammad Chishty (applemac97@aol.com), September 26, 2001.

If you are left-eye dominant you can use a camera right-eyed with almost no problem as long as you keep your left eye closed. This is of course assuming the sight in your right eye is not compromised.

-- Jay (infinitydt@aol.com), September 26, 2001.

I'm left-eyed and use the Leica M left-eyed most of the time with no problems.

-- Jack Flesher (jbflesher@msn.com), September 26, 2001.

Are the advantages of viewing with the right eye such that the left can see what is 'out there' beyond the viewfinder of the right eye? enlighten me please all ye right eyers -- sparkie

One of the best features of the Leica or any RF, IMHO, is lost by using the left eye -- the fact that using the right eye uncovers most of your face and leaves it visible to your subjects, engendering trust. I think this is a more important reason why the RF is a good 'people' camera, even more than compactness or shutter noise.

I suppose left eye dominant diehards can turn the camera upside down or take more vertical shots if their nose is extra big -- Yip

Walter Heun, Leica's U.S. rep in the 70s, used to recommend, in lectures, shooting upside-down in order to brace the back of the camera against the forehead for long exposures.

"Of course," he's say with a wink, "Dis means dat your pictures vill be UPSIDE DOWN! But dat ve can easily fix. Before you make your prints, juzt turn your ENLARGER around 180 degrees!"

[HTML fixed. - moderator]

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 26, 2001.

Dooooh! HTML strikes again. I was responding to the last sentences in Yip and Sparkie's comments, and quoted their sentences, obvious with bewitched quote marks. Imagne their words to appear between the angle brackets.

Sheeesh!

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 26, 2001.

I´m a left eye photographer, even I have a better sigth with the rigth eye, and leicas M have always been comfortable to me, better than any other I have used, although not many.

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), September 26, 2001.

While no doubt there's something to be said for that, Andy, I think trust is mainly engendered by just being nice overall. I think even a modern AF SLR can be used completely intimately if the person using it gives off good vibes to his subjects. James Nachtwey is a case in point, of course (he doesn't just do war snaps). I generally spend far more time chatting with people, eating with them (often with dire effects on my stomach) and hanging around watching TV than I spend actually taking pictures. Of course the whole premise is that I'm there for that one reason, but then when I do start snapping, I'm already totally accepted in that situation. But it takes time and time is money!

I'm also left eyed - very strongly, also due to stronger astigmatism in my right eye - and frankly i never notice the camera at all when I'm taking pictures. And my nose seems to be OK!

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), September 27, 2001.

Rob: No argument. If there is any such effect, it is just a piece of a larger whole - anadded benefit, if you will.

I do find, though, that I've generally been able to get much closer to people I've never met before with RFs than I used to with SLRs - but maybe the Leica just turned me into a kinder, gentler guy. 8^)

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 27, 2001.

Andy, no argument? Oh well...

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), September 27, 2001.

Okay, nobody has said it here (and if they have, then it's my eyes which can't read what's on the my PC's screen) but I'm saying it here and now just because you might possibly not already know it: if you love zonal focusing and shoot everything (well, okay, many things) from the hip or tummy region -- especially with a 35mm and absolutely with a 21mm -- then the eye and nose region will remain untouched.

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), September 27, 2001.

I'm left-eyed, but right-handed, and am just starting to use a IIIc. It's actually pretty good for left-eyed use: the knob winder means you don't have to move the camera away from my eye to advance the film, and holding the camera more centrally seems to make it easier to hold steadily. Using the RF on this model is probably a bit trickier with the left eye, as you need to get pretty close to see a clear image, but perhaps nose grease will help to preserve the vulcanite!

The discussion about a subject's reactions to a left-eyed Leica user reminded me of Feininger's famous portrait ('The Photojournalist') of Dennis Stock:

http://www.gallerym.com/pixs/photogs/fa/faphotojournalist.jpg

It would be interesting to see what sort of reaction you'd get if you actually walked around like that - Perhaps there's something to be said for right-eyed use after all :-)

For extra credit, can anyone identify all the equipment in the photograph?

-- Richard Williams (richardw@icr.ac.uk), September 27, 2001.

W.A.G. - IIIc, Summarit (no, it looks collapsible - SUMMAR!), and a SOOEY or BOSSY or HORSY or some other such barnyard name for the finder 8^)

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), September 28, 2001.

Bresson is left-eyed, enough said.

-- Matt Rainey (mvrainey@att.net), September 28, 2001.