There is a lot of espectation about this new body, my questin is, do you think this M7 can be as fast in the auto mode as a regular one talking about shutter delay?

-- r watson (al1231234@hotmail.com), February 23, 2002

Answers

there really shouldn't be any lag at all - the M7 isn't cutting edge, if a nikon f3 is right on the button in auto mode, there is no reason why the M7 shouldn't be the same. actually when Nikon brought out the F3 prices for the mechanical F2 went up as photographers didn't trust the new fangled auto mode... this was 1980 though...

B http://www.briandavidstevens.com

-- briandavidstevens (briandavidstevens@talk21.com), February 23, 2002.

Another question: Can you freeze the light metering in AE mode and then recompose?

-- Peter Mackay (pm@novonordisk.com), February 23, 2002.

"Another question: Can you freeze the light metering in AE mode and then recompose?"

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Yes, because the M6TTL already has AE lock, it just doesn't have AE! On the M6TTL if you take a meter reading and apply a bit more pressure to the release (but not enough to trip the shutter) then shift the camera to a darker or lighter scene, you'll see that the reading doesn't shift. It's locked.

A friend of mine had the M7 in his hands earlier today and confirmed the AE lock, adding that there's a little red LED dot in the viewfinder that lights next to the shutter speed when you have locked AE.

BTW, the hotshoe on the M7 has four additional terminals besides the central flash trigger rather than the three on the R8/M6TTL. The additional terminal is probably for the High Speed sync feature, meaning that it's not backwards compatible with the M6TTL, not that anyone expected it to be.

-- Robert Schneider (rolopix@yahoo.com), February 23, 2002.

Depends on what you call "cutting edge." I call cutting edge (for this format,) "the best possible 35mm photo reproduction possible." Which of course, for me, places Leica at the pinnacle of cutting edge.

-- Glenn Travis (leicaddict@hotmail.com), February 23, 2002.

> the hotshoe on the M7 has four additional terminals besides

>the central flash trigger rather than the three on the R8/M6TTL.

I don't think so. And by the way, the third one on the R8/M6TTL was not used.

-- Lucien (lucien_vd@yahoo.fr), February 23, 2002.

Look at the second picture.

-- Lucien (lucien_vd@yahoo.fr), February 23, 2002.

That's pretty conclusive evidence in my book. My friend must have meant four TOTAL contacts and I misunderstood. So, will the High Speed flash sync be backwards compatible with the M6TTL/R8? Or does this new function now take advantage of that unused contact?

I can't imagine that Leica would have made this function backwards compatible, as that would further limit the attraction of the new camera.

-- Robert Schneider (rolopix@yahoo.com), February 23, 2002.

Please just wait another day till we all start going crazy on facts, rather than speculation and assumption like this.

-- Kristian (leicashot@hotmail.com), February 24, 2002.

Why wait a day. It's been confirmed that the High Speed sync only works with the new camera. What hasn't been confirmed clearly yet is whether HSS is a TTL function.

-- Robert Schneider (rolopix@yahoo.com), February 24, 2002.

According to Erwin, HSS is not a TTL function and works only at shutter speeds 1/250, 1/500 & 1/1000 sec. TTL flash works at 1/50 sec. or slower, as with the M6TTL.

Regarding R. Watson's original question, Erwin says the shutter delay is about the same as, or slightly less than, the M6. This makes sense to me, since there is no reason for the M7 to be any slower.

-- Ray Moth (ray_moth@yahoo.com), February 24, 2002.