Marriage with the Leica Monochrom by Leonardo Perugini
Dear Steve,
My name is Leonardo Perugini and I am a professional photographer. I work with my colleague in a photo studio in the outskirts of Florence, www.spbstudio.it .
I often read your website, that is full of many interesting information and at the same is very funny and enjoyable. Recently I replaced my beloved old Leica M9 with a Leica MM and I started using it for working purposes together with my reflex.
The first time that I tested it, I was at a wedding and it was really amazing: I felt like a child, it was even more fun than usual!
Then, when I went back to my studio, I took a good look at the files and I verified that their quality is amazing, also because you can use great lens with that camera.
I send you some pictures attached: they are all taken with Canon 50 0,95 and Zeiss 35 f/2.
I hope this might be helpful to anyone interested in working with more than one camera.
I really think that for wedding reportage and fashion shoots, Leica MM can add something to the way one takes pictures.
Best regards!
Leonardo Perugini
Lovely set pictures. I must add that they are well composed too. Thanks for sharing.
Very nicely composed and great capture…but the highlights just look blown to me . Sorry, i wouldn’t have guessed in a million years they were shot with the Leica Mono by a seasoned pro.
Stunning work on your website! your colour work and some baby portraits on your website – absolutely top notch.
The photos on this post look too overcooked.
Great wedding pictures, especially number 2! Very beautiful. I really like the depth of the 50 and 35. It’s a nice change from the usual portrait-lens wedding photos that are always so flat (to my eye, anyway). I would love to see these type of shots in color on an M 240.
Moment captured beautifully. Well done.
The pictures are great but if I was shooting for a client I would have the m9 or m240 instead as there are chances that my clients would want to see some colours in their wedding..
I think it’s the photographer as it once was with the film which opportunity to choose either color or black and white the right choice to use. I think you should always decide whether an image should be in color or black and white.
#3 & #4 are outstanding, I bet the bride was very happy with those!
Beautiful work Leonardo!! You have real empathy for your subjects.
I agree.
Well thank you, Tifch, for your peasant-rude manners in reply to my comment about sharpness.
“Photography is about emotion”. I was unaware of that as the guiding light; is it a cardinal rule, or something you dreamed up?
Please list any other areas where we might be falling down, but perhaps uncritical acceptance of ‘anything goes’ should be omitted. 🙂
so glad i am not a self-anointed photography expert and can just enjoy these photos. i suspect the customers will love them. they capture romance and joy and a beautiful bride – what i suspect is the hope and expectation of the bride and groom when hiring a wedding photographer. thanks for sharing.
Ciao Leonardo,
Some great pictures !
For those who “complain” about pictures “not being sharp”, in order of priority, “light”, “mood”, “composition” and “moment” (should) have a higher priority then “sharpness”.
Depending the subject !
Leonardo, I would suggest to leave the clarity slider in the middle, don’t use it !!
It will provide you “dirty” skin and HDR situations.
Great #4 and 5 !!
These images have fantastic composition, really love it — but the definition slider in LIghtroom has been cranked up WAY too much! The result looks awful IMO. Maybe this was done because of the softness in the images, but I think sharpening would have been a better solution (or just using a smaller aperture to begin with). I would love to see more natural versions of these photos!
It’s remarkable how many otherwise great photos we see on Steve’s website that have been destroyed by excessive PP. And in almost all cases the cause is the dreadful definition slider … I really wonder what the fascination is about that!?
Hi guys!
First of all, thanks for all your comments. Both critics and compliments are all very welcome.
When I chose the PP for the pictures that I sent to Steve (thanks again, Steve!) I decided to overdo a little, in order to show the MONOCHROME potential and what one can do with its files. The effect recalls the hdr effect that I hate so much, but I did not use any plug-ins of that sort. None of these images has been modified through photoshop (just for resizing), I used Lightroom and sometimes SilverEfex.
MM files hide a richness of details and an amazing grayscale with such a richness in grays that one can really do anything postproducing them (if the pictures themselves are good, of course 🙂 )
For those who asked me about the filters, I used the yellow one and sometimes the red.
Thanks again for publishing my post! Keep writing about it, I’ll be glad to read all your comments.
Greetings from Italy to all the people that, just like me, are so mad about photography.
Leonardo Perugini
Good time of the day!
Those photographs are among the best in this genre I’ve seen by date.
Hi guys!
First of all, thanks for all your comments. Both critics and compliments are all very welcome.
When I chose the PP for the pictures that I sent to Steve (thanks again, Steve!) I decided to overdo a little, in order to show the MONOCHROME potential and what one can do with its files. The effect recalls the hdr effect that I hate so much, but I did not use any plug-ins of that sort. None of these images has been modified through photoshop (just for resizing), I used Lightroom and sometimes SilverEfex.
MM files hide a richness of details and an amazing grayscale with such a richness in grays that one can really do anything postproducing them (if the pictures themselves are good, of course 🙂 )
For those who asked me about the filters, I used the yellow one and sometimes the red.
Thanks again for publishing my post! Keep writing about it, I’ll be glad to read all your comments.
Greetings from Italy to all the people that, just like me, are so mad about photography.
Please don’t apologize, these photos are fantastic and employ great artistry. Bozos critiquing these pics are jealous Monday quarterbacks. Emotions are captured and the clients must be thrilled.
I agree with Marty, some gorgeous emotive shots.
These are very nice, and although some are soft I love the mood to these. Lots of armchair photographers on there 30″ screen playing teacher here making comments and criticizing his work, take a chill pill and just enjoy the work, if you have any criticism contact him privately, he did not ask for advice!
Keep sharing
The only criteria for a successful image is if it works. All of these images work. It’s a terrific effort by the photographer. I’ll leave the armchair critics to contemplate what will disappoint, and therefore pleasure them next..
Not a fan of the HDR filter effectbut thats what all the Nikon and Canon photographers do these days.
Lovely shots, nice classic rendering from the canon lens….
thanks for sharing! they are lovely!
I’d be very disappointed if I’d taken these shots. As others have written, they are strikingly (and distractingly) soft. Nothing wrong with the compositions, though.
What’s with no.5? The black splodges ruin the shot.
Well, photography is about emotion, not sharpness, ignorant!
Thank you Leonardo for sharing, it’s beautiful!
I agree, in these photos emotion is what counts. “Pixel peeper” here miss the point!
Great work… #4 is really amazing… A fantastic whimsical feel to it. Shooting weddings with a Monochrom, even if as a second camera, is brave… I would be worried a bride or groom would come back asking for a color version of a shot! 🙂
What happened with the pictures? a little over saturated too much hdr
it is MM with Canon – it is magic ! It is not HDR, if you want sharp, brillant photos you have to go for the Lux 50
Excellent poses and compositions, but the images suffer from HDR effect.
Go back to the raw and convert them and post produce them as “real” B&W images, like they were shot on film (extended tonality and subtly) and you will get a much, much better final and “real” look.
@ picture #4 ….. dat fifty 😐 DAMN! Gorgeous images.
Looks romantic. But there is something strange about the people’s skins in the second shot. A kind of oily airbrushed look. Could this have come from post processing or lighting?
Monochrom and Canon Dream Lens: one of the most magical combo, but this series shows a great photographic vision! Excellent work, Leonardo!
Beautiful work with beautiful tones!
Not sure it’s permissible to write this, but images 2, 3 & 4 (counting from the top) look a little over-Photoshopped. This happens to me in Camera RAW (CS6) if I’ve turned the Clarity up a little too much. Otherwise the subjects in the photos look very nice.
This was exactly my reaction as well. PP is overdone. But framing and composition is great with these. So it comes down to personal preference ( taste) and what the customer wanted.
I agree with you 110%. If the customer was happy with the work, that’s all that matters.
Not sure what’s happening there but either he missed focus in those or shutter speed was too slow…
Pretty much what I was going to say…many of these look quite soft…..but he captured some interesting moments.
Maybe it’s the 50 0.95. That depth of field is difficult to get correct.
Beautiful photos Leonardo. I am curious whether you used a color filter on the lenses with the MM. Also, what type of lighting or flash works best with this camera?
The MM gives me that same ‘feel’ as shooting film, I tend to use a B+W Orange filter to increase that celluloid film, I’m loving manual focus only, and using my legs as a zoom! Almost a return to my university shooting! If I was to use a flash then it is the small Leica 240 (I think). YOu can see some of my limited range via Blipfoto.
What’s your Blipfoto name Stewart?
Love the images, especially number four.