An iconic camera becomes (almost) affordable.

Rarely is perfection achieved. But Leica cameras…well, put it this way: Henri Cartier-Bresson, the godfather of modern photojournalism, was obsessed with his. So was Alfred Eisenstaedt, who used his beloved Leica to shoot that sailor kissing a nurse in Times Square on V-J Day, 1945. Indeed, for the past 50 years, the venerated M series known for its super-compact chassis, top-shelf optics, and supremely silent shutter has accompanied some of the biggest names in the photo business (Sebastiao Salgado, Ralph Gibson, countless National Geographic Photographers).

Imagine the excitement then, when the first digital iteration of the series, the M8, debuted in 2006. Camera connoisseurs went wild over its intuitive controls and ubercrisp images produced by a 10.3-megapixel sensor, but most of us just gasped at the price ($5,500, body only; leica-camera.com).In January a fledgling line of “budget” lenses called the Summarit-M hit store, shaving about a grand off the camera kit. The new 35mm, for example, costs $1,500, compared with $2,600 for its cheapest predecessor. All for Summarits- 35mm, 50mm, 75mm and 90mm are still handcrafted in Germany, but they are slightly slower, with the fastest f-stop at 2.5. You might prefer the the original 2.0, but that’s a price worth paying to get your hands on greatness. Take a look at the product page.

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