I think I know what the "R" means: Reflex or its German equivalent?

What does "M" mean: Measure or Messen?

-- Allison Reese (a_b_reese3@hotmail.com), May 07, 2002

Answers

Messsucher.

-- Bert Keuken (bkkn@wanadoo.nl), May 07, 2002.

M=Money. Lots of it required.

-- Jay (infinitydt@aol.com), May 07, 2002.

It correctly stands for "Messsucher" (however, I don't quite get the 3 "s" in row, at least that wouldn't work in other Germanic lingos)

Mess = to measure Sucher = to seek, to find, to search

in Swedish it is "mätsökare" :-)

cheers,

pat

-- pat (modlabs@yahoo.com), May 07, 2002.

and according to the latest LFI M is suppose to stand for "Manual" as well...

-- pat (modlabs@yahoo.com), May 07, 2002.

To be more precise Pat, the verb is "messen" which translates to "to measure". I don't don't understand why you can't get the triple 's'. There's nothing to get about it, that's the way the Germans write it. Just to add to your confusion, it's also possible to write it as "Meßsucher".

-- Bert Keuken (bkkn@wanadoo.nl), May 07, 2002.

Correct, M stands for Messucher, which is German for Viewfinder. The 3 in M3 was chosen because of the three bright line finders for the 50, 90 and 135 mm lenses. Later the numbers of the M camera's were more or less chosen to follow each other.

-- Lex Bosman (lexb@wanadoo.nl), May 07, 2002.

Meßsucher. It is always correctly written with the ß. There are technically not three "s", rather the ß and one "s" because it is a word constructed by the combining of two precise words. Until the language lords of the German Academy tell us otherwise, that is.

-- Reto (redcavereto@yahoo.com), May 07, 2002.

How do you make the Beta-looking symbol? Do you need a German keyboard? Or do you press control-something? I wanna be correct, if I ever have type this!

-- Bob Fleischman (RFXMAIL@prodigy.net), May 07, 2002.

Bob: The ascii character set has 255 possibilities. You can access all of them by holding down the "alt" key and keying in a number between 1 and 255. I do not recall what gets you the beta symbol. 135=ç I don't use it much, but it is sporting naming a file with these characters. The normal set uses between 1 and 128. The upper numbers give you the alternate characters.

MJ

-- Mark Johnson (logical1@catholic.org), May 08, 2002.

On a Mac the "ß" is option (aka "alt") "s" - which makes sense. Seems like it should be alt-s on Wintels(?)

-- Andy Piper (apidens@denver.infi.net), May 08, 2002.

ALT+0223 produces a 'Ringel-s' (that's what it's called) on a Wintel box.

-- Bert Keuken (bkkn@wanadoo.nl), May 08, 2002.

in Swedish it is "mätsökare" :-)

Wow, that almost sounds like "massacre".

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), May 08, 2002.

A bit of a Mess or ja, messen, to measure (I can't do the double S). I studied German but can't get the double S, or umlauts, on my Mac keyboard. Wie Schade! Sucher is viewfinder (what you look through). Messen is the rangefinder part. Hence the M series is the first Leica combining the rangefinder with the viewfinder, quite an innovation in 1954-55 when the M3 came out. 3 of course means it has three framelines - for 35, 50 and 90 lenses - after that they were a bit arbitrary, though come to think of it the M6 does have six framelines. But the M1, M2, M4, M7? However, unlike some alphanumeric product names, Leica's does actually have some meaning. Viel Spass damit (double S)!

-- dalex@inet.net.nz (dalex@inet.net.nz), May 08, 2002.

Attention, German language lord materialising over the keyboard...

Meßsucher until a few years ago, Messsucher by new German orthograpyhy. (They actually regulate that over here, imagine!) The 'ß' is . No capital letter, btw--If you write a word in that, it's two s.

-- Oliver Schrinner (piraya@hispavista.com), May 08, 2002.

I apologise for the bad html. What was meant: The 'ß' is entered by pressing the 'alt' key and simultaneously entering '225' on the numbers keyboard; at least the university machine in front of me does it. On German keyboards, btw, it's on the second key to the left of the backspace button.

Allison, you're correct about the R. The German word for SLR is Spiegelreflexkamera, which can refer to a TLR as well--so Germans prefer the English abbreviations. They have, however, reflektieren, 'reflect', in both the abstract and the optical sense; and engineers were always happy to adopt foreign terms. R = Reflex or Reflexsystem (cf. 'Leicaflex'). Alles klar?

M3 - 3 framelines; M2 - 2 sets of framelines; M1 - 1 frameline; MD - da is' nix zum Messen drin (coll., "there's no metering system inside") :-) ; M4 - 4 framelines; M5 - the odd one out; M4-2 2nd version of M4; M4-P - M4 Professional; M6 - 6 framelines (as in the M4-P!).

Where the heck did they hide the activator for the seventh frameline on the M7? :-)

-- Oliver Schrinner (piraya@hispavista.com), May 08, 2002.

I'm waitin' fer M ate

-- Michael Kastner (kastner@zedat.fu-berlin.de), May 08, 2002.

"measuring device"

-- Bob Haight (rhaigh5748@aol.com), May 08, 2002.