Conventional internet wisdom states that the Leica M8 is a better camera than the M9 for B&W file conversion — True or False?

The answer:  True… but barely.

My old B&W conversions with the M8 were more pleasing than the ones I subsequently obtained with my M9/M-E, but now I realize that the less pleasing M9/M-E conversions were mostly secondary to my use of Silver Efex Pro.  Lately I’ve been doing straight de-saturation of my M9/M-E files, and they look more natural and almost as good as my M8 files.  The M8 still wins because of its greater IR sensitivity — this allows for slightly better B&W output.

For all practical purposes, however, the M8 and M9 sensors behave almost identically (for both B&W and colour).  This shouldn’t be too surprising, given how the sensor in the latter evolved from the former.

Which makes me want to re-state something I’ve been saying for years:  the M8 was the most under-appreciated and underestimated digital camera ever.

If there’s anyone from the original Kodak KAF-10500 (APS-H 10.3-megapixel) CCD sensor development team reading this, I sincerely thank you for your fine work.

—Peter.

[Upcoming Insight:  Film vs. Digital].