Are you concerned that going digital, even with the M9, will adversely affect your standards, letting you slack off on making sure the image is the one you want before pressing the shutter? I also notice you do a lot of what they call "chimping" at the LCD screen, presumably to make sure you got the shot; doesn't that take away from your shooting time? I seem to recall you mentioning that as a downside to shooting with with a DSLR.

nice work!

Excellent essay. Well done all around.

chris i've never shot a rangefinder....would you let me borrow one of yours?

good comercial

Excelente viejo. . . Estoy camino a hacer lo que tú haces. Blesses

This *Rocks!!
You *Rock!!

Awesome Stuff. Thanks so much....

Thank you very much.

Extremely well done but I have to say a great deal of credit for that has to go to the 5DMK2. Any and all of the captured B/W scenes could have been captured with the FF Canon along with brilliant video. While I would not disagree with the skills of a talented street photographer, I believe a street photographer shooting still and video with a 5DMK2 would be just as successful if not more. It seemed somewhat pretentious and arrogant to emphasize the need for a Leica M whatever to accomplish good street photography.

I can only agree with Paul Aguilar that this seems like a long commercial for Leica. Is this deliberately? Either way it's a very interesting and inspiring film.

The video does seem like an ad for the Leica M9, which was a turn off and made it difficult to continue watching halfway through the second interview. I almost stopped watching but forced myself to continue so I could see what the video had to offer. And we still posted it on our blog.

I do not think that a person needs to shoot with a Leica though, to get beautiful shots (which is the vibe this video gives). Many of us continue to shoot with our large and noisy Canon SLRs and do just fine and have the portfolios to back it up.

An exceptional photographer could work with any camera and obtain great pictures because it's not about the gear, but the skill of the person. Personally, I would never own or shoot with a rangefinder—I can't stand them, actually. I do like their compact size though compared to an SLR. But either way, they're both cameras and people are going to notice that you're holding a camera and pointing it at them whether it's a rangefinder or an SLR.

It was amusing to see that one photographer towards the end of the video miss the opportunity to photograph the large man in the wheel chair because he was chimping.

Yes, it did feel like a "stealthy" ad for Leica, however there is something to be said for a camera which is so simple (shutter speed, aperture and exposure). A Rangefinder can bring out something very special due to the "uncluttered relationship" with the camera and the subject matter and the photographer, something that SLR´s have to be forced to do. I mean in all honesty how many (D)SLR users work in manual mode in the street?

For me, for this reason, I even prefer an M6 to an M9 for casual photography (and at a quarter of the cost!)

Really amazing, truly loving watching this series. Taking my time over each as I don't want them to be over.

I really love the pureness of street photography. Capturing beauty in the mundane. There is a lot of street photography going around at the moment of people walking straight up into peoples faces and snapping. Whether that's good or not isn't for me to say, but I don't particularly enjoy looking at photos after photos of people with nothing but frowns on their faces.

I do, however, love looking at your photography. The composition and moments you capture are really staggering.

I would love to start attempting to capture moments like you do, if only I could get over the shyness of photographing people on the street!

ps.. are you on twitter?

Just realized I had an old dusty Argus C-3 rangefinder in my room! Cleaning it now - thanks for the inspiration!