Given all the other stuff that I haul around, I don’t always carry one of my DSLRs. (I know, heresy …) But I always have something, usually this little Canon G9. It produces some amazing images and gives me a level of control virtually unmatched in the point and shoot realm.

But … sometimes it falls flat, as it did this morning. Heading from the car to campus, I glanced up to see these steel gray skies with light clouds floating through. I pulled out the camera, set a few things and fired off a sequence of images. Some horizontals, some verticals. Moved around the parking lot a bit but just couldn’t quite get it right.

Color is off a little, though some more toning would cure that. But the big problem for me is the noise. Even at ISO 200, the tiny chip is at its quality limit. It’s breaking up quite badly.

A friend up north has been emailing me speculation about what will be shown at Photokina in a few weeks. Both of us are hoping for the same thing – a full-frame rangefinder digital camera. He’s already gone through a Leica M8 and it just wasn’t there for him. Given the frames he sent me and that I’ve seen elsewhere, I have to agree – a lot of teething issues in Leica’s first generation digicam. (And both of us have been huge Leica fans for years.)

Possibilities would include a Leica M8-2, probably not an M9; a Bessa/Voightlander/Cosina/Zeiss rangefinder; or, our favorite rumor, a Nikon full-frame rangefinder with that Sony chip that’s in the D3 and D700.

Honestly, I expect to see none of these. But I can hope. Give it 10-12 megapixels, with space to lay them out so they don’t get too small and noisy … some sharp glass … and near silent operation … heaven.

Canon G9, 29 mm, ISO 200, 1/50, f/5.6