By Patrick Avenell
If you’re a hipster ironist who’s recently come into an inheritance, put down that Rubik’s Cube, turn down the volume on your MiniDisc, put on a pair of thick rimmed glasses with no prescription and take a look at Leica’s incredibly old school, incredibly expensive new M9P cameras.
There are two models available – black and silver – in this new camera, with both units retailing for RRP $9,599. And that’s just for the body. A few thousand dollars more will also buy you a lens to actually take some photos. Of course, you could affix one of your old M Mount lenses as well. According to Ryan Williams, product manager for Leica at distributor Adeal, 99 per cent of Leica lenses from the 1950s onwards are compatible.
So is there really a market for these German-made, 18-megapixel cameras with sapphire crystal LCD screens? Williams says there is.
“Worldwide, this has been Leica’s most successful year, both in terms of units sold and value generated,” he said from Leica’s stand at PMA.
And for the record, when we asked Williams if hipsters were Leica’s target market, he laughed saying the cameras were primarily for users who want to take extremely high quality images of inert targets. He said the cameras were especially popular with close-up photographers and wedding shooters.
The new M9P in silver monochrome and black.
Adeal product manager for Leica Ryan Williams.