Because otherwise I'd be a coward or a troll (whatever that means).
That's a really nice choice of words.
Dropping a camera off a mountain will most likely result at best in the mount being killed, which makes your camera useless; letting it be run over by a tank will not do it much good either.
My experience and that of a lot of my colleagues is that internal parts break or fail to work and need expensive repair, same for Hasselblad. One of my friends left Hasselblad alone because of that. He has never had a single failure with his Nikon F-series cameras, nor have I (not a single failure that is). All that needed to be done was adjusting the shutter after about half a million cycles. So that is anecdotic evidence.
You are right when it comes to stating that Leicas are generally more fragile is not backed up by evidence. That's right, because to my knowledge there's no survey or statistics available for it.
There would be more Leicas in use than cameras from other brands. That, my friend is simply not true, because Nikons and Canons are being mass produced (that in itself is most of the time a guarantee for reliability - the Toyota Corolla is the world's most sold car and is also considered o be the most reiliable one). Do you know how many Nikon FM, FE-2, FM2, FM2N, FM3A, FG, FA, F2, F3, F4, F5, Nikkormats, etc. Canon A-1, AE-1, F1, etc, etc. are out there?
And now the main part of my reply:
I never said I was a good photographer. Besides, who's to decide about that, you, of all people?
I only have a degree in photography and I am proud of that. A course I took in another language than my mother tongue (not Dutch, nor English). You know what that means?
Besides the fact that you have to invest yourself to obtain such a degree( three years of study, every single day, I can for instance develop every single kind of film around, I can use studiolights and work with medium and large format cameras, and so on and so on), it also implies I was considered to be good enough to make a living out of photography, and by chance they were not wrong.
Being a photographer doesn't mean anything over here? I know lots of amateurs who would like to be professional photographers. I for one, was an amateur myself, and instead of considering myself up to par with the pros (which often have far less time to deliver decent work) I visited an exposition at the Brussels town hall and having seen the work of the students, I was overwhelmed by the sheer quality of the pictures. I stood really in awe. Wow, I thought, if they can teach me to make pictures like that, why not sign up and try to become a professional photographer and I did. I have never looked down upon amateurs, I only look up to people and try to learn from them and share my knowledge with them.
I am most certainly not the person you think I am. I am an educated man who does not deliberately want to offend anyone. There's too many good thngs in life - Leica is certainly one of them as HCB has sufficiently proven - to waste time on negative things. Photography should be fun and no one should consider him or herself offended by my post. I even tried to be humorous when replying to Dana and ended the post with 'Have fun taking pictures'.
My main concern with Leica is its price. It is too high, certainly when compared to a D200 for instance. I have never said Leica does not have its place and virtues.
Please try not to take all this too personal. Photography is a great hobby - no matter what gear you are using -, it still is for me (especially night photography).
So, best regards!
Guy FRANCOIS
