The May/June issue of Leica Fotografie International is out and Lenny Kravitz is featured because of his limited edition Leica camera and some of the images that he has taken with Leica cameras. I especially like the work by featured photographer José Luis Carrillo. They are portraits taken with a Leica M240 with a 50mm APO Summicron. The exposures were taken with gelled lights and are moody. I’m not particularly fond of the work by Kravitz. It is mostly professional models and celebrity snaps that get attention only because of the celebrity being photographed or because of the celebrity photographer. Also the North Korea propaganda photos at the beginning look like Stalinist Russia photos. They do nothing for me.
As far as gear goes the the issue covers the Kravitz camera and the limited edition Leica CL Bauhaus edition. Also there is a nice introduction to the Leica FOTOS app that allows transfer of images to smartphones and iPads.
Subscribers of the LFI magazine now get access to digital back issues of the magazine. Not all issues are available but this helps justify the price of the subscription. They are also offering yearly subscriptions to just the digital edition that previously one could only purchase one issue at a time.
I always look forward to seeing what user images are chosen each month. Some are better than the images from the magazines featured photographers and this month is no exception. Like most amateur images I feel that some of the images are over processed.
For many years I felt that the LFI magazine was a glorified travel magazine with little serious coverage of the cameras and lenses of technique. The last few years there is a more technical angle to the magazine which I feel most readers these days appreciate. It seems like every couple of months another magazine prints its last issue. I hope the LFI magazine is published for many more years.