Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Medium Format / Film / Digital Backs – and Large Sensor Photography => Topic started by: geesbert on August 24, 2009, 08:38:41 am
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I actually thought I wouldn't make this public, but too many promises were broken and I was obviously taken for a ride, so here is my story:
I am commercial food and people photographer with international clients. For exemple I am shooting the Burge King campaigns for many European countries. I was happily shooting my Canon 1dsmk3 setup with tse lenses, but never stopped looking at large format cameras. last Photokina I went round to check all the manufacturers out and finally went for Linhof. they told me the adapterplate was ready to ship within 2 weeks of photokina. I managed to acquire a 679 at a really good price. Got a bunch of Rodenstock and Schneider lenses for it, was ready to get started.
after checking out all MF backs I decided to go for Leaf. My main reason was the least pathetic live view, the biggest screen (which still sucks, btw.) and that there was no need for a wake-up cable.
I intended to buy it with a RZ, my favourite MF camera to date, but my Leaf dealer persuaded me to go for the AFI, which me stupid idiot did. I signed the Leasing contract (the first leasing I took up, every piece of equipment before that I bought with cash) and thought i ould be up and running in a couple of days. unfortunately the camera wasn't available for a couple of weeks, but that didn't bother me. when it came, the FW cable was broken, which took me days to find out, as the dealer wasn't available.
then I found out that the adapterplate wasn't ready at all, once they even told me there wouldn't be a plate for the AFI. at that time this wasn't the biggest concern for me, I had the AFI camera to shoot with. very quickly I realised my computer hardware wasn't up to the task, as was my data capacity, so a quick 5000€ investment solved that. anyway shortly before christmas i finally got the plate and was ready to roll
I did a few weeks of testing to find out, that my keeper rate was close to zero. Available light handheld could only be done it broad daylight, anything below f5.6 and 1/125 was mostly unusable. cranking up the iso wasn't an option. then suddenly there appeard a lot of strange noise on the images, so the camera went back to leaf, I got a loaner. A few weeks later the camera came back. Using Lightroom for Leaf files was extremely slow, their own software felt like KX Spectrum. the life view really sucked, my food stylists really hated it.
I nearly blew one job, because of the araund 400 pictures we shot only about 5 had the plane of focus where we wanted it. thanks god we had shot a few frames with my canon, so we could save the day.
My main problem was focus. I gave up on AF pretty quickly. I bought a Splitscreen and the prism (together 1200€), but things didn't improve. I built a test setup an discovered that the camera was backfocusing by about 5cm to a meter. so the camera went back to leaf and was returned only to find out that the problem was persisting.
it was march by then, about half a year after photokina. I kept on paying my leasing rates...
I nearly stopped being friendly, but up to then I had the feeling everyone involved really tried to solve the problem.
One day Leaf send someone from Belgium to my studio here in Munich to get this resolved one and for all. I showed him the problem and he confirmed. we tried it with his camera (an AFI-7-2) and found the same problem. he was showing this camera around Europe for a few weeks and nonone had seen it. Sensor and focus screen was apparently not on the same plane. and it was not only my camera showing this.
unfortunaltely he couldn't take the camera back with him, as this was a colaboration between Leaf, Kodak, Schneider and F&H, so he first had to figure out who is to blame.
My dealer kept on telling me that he had sold many of these systems an non had developed any of these problems. I had estimated maybe 100 cameras sold, but then he slipped that mine was number 7!
After a couple of days Leaf offered me to upgrade to the AFI-7/2 for free or fully refund my purchase price. I went for the refund.
The one thing they didn't tell me that they would refund the price to my leasing company, not to me. The leasing company (ABC-Finance) couldn't care less, once I even saw am Email about me being stupid enough not to read the contract properly and therefore I could stand on my head and wouldn't get anything back.
a side note: a few weeks ago ABC-Finance sent me a happy grinning birthday greeting card, looking forward doing business again...
Mr. Karatchian of Leaf promised me personally in my face I'd get my money back, but a couple of thousand Euros is still unpaid.
Emails were unanswered, calls dismissed. only once when I called from a friend's number I reached him. a few more promises then nothing.
meanwhile leaf went belly up, you know the story. I sold most of the stuff at much lower prices than what i paid for. alltogether this experience had cost me close to 10.000€, plus estimated 30 working days and nearly a client.
my conclusion: I was very stupid.
Stupidity no. 1: I definitely didn't need MF Digital. the Quality gain is too small to deal with all the hassle. Canon 1dsMK3 files are way big enough for any CMYK needs, even 18/1 posters can be done easily.
Stupidity no.2: dont believe delivery promises. only buy what is really available.
Stupidity no. 3: don't lease. I am kind of glad I got out of my leasing contract with only a couple of thousand short. otherwise I would still pay a lot of money for the next three years for an obsolete system.
Stupidity no.4: Don't be so nice if people fuck you up. If you deal with contract-pushing finance monkey, only communicate in written form, signed for. A spoken word doesn't mean a lot to them.
DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE; ONLY BELIEVE WHAT YOU SEE.
P.S.: I still have a bag-full of aftermarket batteries for the Leaf, an really small aftermarket charger and a sync-cable. I'll swap it for a nice, decorative print of your work, whatever....preferably taken with a digital back.
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Sounds like you are the one to make some serious mistakes here. It also sounds like Leaf did their part offering to replace or refund, something they didn't have to do. My question would be why did you buy into such an expensive system if you were unaware of it's capabilities and limitations? Next time do your homework first.
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why do you think they didn't have to repair their obviously faulty product? And then, after going back to them twice and still not working properly they offered a refund, which never showed up at my door. Don't you think I can expect a camera to focus if I spend that much money?
if you reread my post I am not blaming Leaf for not trying, rather for not keeping their promises. And mostly I blame myself for being so stupid.
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Bigalbest, do you not think that the ability to focus should be assumed when purchasing a $15,000 camera? Sheesh.
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Sounds like you are the one to make some serious mistakes here. It also sounds like Leaf did their part offering to replace or refund, something they didn't have to do. My question would be why did you buy into such an expensive system if you were unaware of it's capabilities and limitations? Next time do your homework first.
How could anyone read the story above and think for a quarter of a second that the buyer is at fault?
Cheers,
Bernard
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Thanks Geesbert, very informative.
Reminds me how much I like my 1DsIII, and the files it produces.
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Interesting story--I have some painful experiences waiting for (and buying alternatives to) a promised Phase P45+ on Hy6 for a year and a half.
Similar cash paid and lost, only to wake up and realize "it ain't comin', stupid".
Now, if I can't buy it, it doesn't exist.
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Not that it matters now, but, I had the Hy6 for a time, and I did not have any problems with the AF. It's slow and noisy compared to Canon but the AF did work well for me...
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Interesting, and painful cautionary tale, in the very least.
I can only say, it's not the first time I've heard focus issues on that system, and, well, "fatal" ones. I've know a few people who've gone to the hassey system as a result...
This makes a strong case for a rental "try before you buy", IMO. When I was at EPL we would really push that- and refund a major part of the rental regardless of what the customer ended up buying, unless of course he bought it elsewhere. Very often, the camera drives well in the shop, but on a job it's a different story. I never felt like I could really say I knew a camera until I shot with it on a job. (thus, our "shoot diary" segments on the site...)
It also makes a case for working with a great dealer... I'm going back to re-read, but it sounds like your dealer should have stepped in and busted a few heads- and also that they didn't take care to make sure it was the right fit for you- always the best policy, but especially important on a pricetag like that.
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My main problem was focus. I gave up on AF pretty quickly. I bought a Splitscreen and the prism (together 1200€), but things didn't improve. I built a test setup an discovered that the camera was backfocusing by about 5cm to a meter. so the camera went back to leaf and was returned only to find out that the problem was persisting.
I have owned 2 Leaf backs, handled several, and love my AFi II 7. Never, ever, had to sharpen in post.
David
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I have owned 2 Leaf backs, handled several, and love my AFi II 7. Never, ever, had to sharpen in post.
David
if the image is back- or front- focused the best sharpening technique won't save the file.
I tried five different focus screens, with waist level finder and with prism, when focused manually with life view, the viewfinder would show it as off, when I then started AF it would focus on a totally different distance.
David: have you tried AF at f2,8 at a distance of a metre or so? I would accept 1 or maybe 2 cm focus error, but i had up to 10, sometimes more, sometimes less
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David: have you tried AF at f2,8 at a distance of a metre or so? I would accept 1 or maybe 2 cm focus error, but i had up to 10, sometimes more, sometimes less
When I said said I never used sharpening in post it was because focus is dead-nuts on. I'll try your scenario and post an un-enhanced JPEG later.
David
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sad to read this story...
I tried five different focus screens, with waist level finder and with prism, when focused manually with life view, the viewfinder would show it as off, when I then started AF it would focus on a totally different distance.
As to focus plane alignement tolerances I can add that all the 4 Phase backs that were ever attatched to my 2 Contax and 1 Cambo bodies were all aligned the same way: resulting in backfocus.
Good thing is: appearently the Phase-Contax-Backs are aligned accurate within their specs.
The bad thing is: I don't belive that 2 Contax bodies and 1 Cambo body are by accident misaligned in exactly the same way.
I use splitimage screens in my Contax bodies and I have lifted the screens with shims so that the splitimage and the capture match. That works pretty accurate for me. The question is: do you have to lower (in case of frontfocus) or lift (in case of backfocus) the screen so much, that AF isn't working anymore. In my case AF is still (fairly) within the tolerances of the AF... but I don't use AF at all so I don't care.
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I tried shimming the screen too, but that didn't help, as AF and live view focus wouldn't match.
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Sorry to hear your story, and I think you posted part of this story earlier as I remember reading about the focus issues. But I haven't read that many other complaints about focus on the Hy6/AFi? Anyone else had problems with AF focus accuracy on the AFi/Hy6? When Rollei came out with the digital bundle 6008/p20 there were lots of reports that came out about focus trouble and problems calibrating - however my understanding is that these issues were related to the manufacture problems with the focusing screens themselves - many were made by a third party and were dished instead of flat. This made it impossible to calibrate accurately. I spoke to a guy that was bidding on the contract to make all the focus screens for the AFi and he was aware of that problem with the 6008AF digital bundle and so I think that F&H/Leaf knew about this earlier problem and would not repeat it?
Also I'm sure you know that if you focus using the center points and then recompose you will have focusing errors? I'm not suggesting this was your problem, but wanted to make sure as this is a common problem moving from DSLR to MF? In any case this for me is one of the shortcoming of MF - its rare that I compose the picture with the primary subject dead center so until MF cameras get multipoint AF like your 1DsIII the AF is mostly worthless. The focus/recompose problem may be more of an issue with close up work like product photography since the DOF is thin at short subject distances using MF.
Regards,
Eric
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All I can say is that sucks. I'd be pissed if I spent the kind of money that you did and got lousy results. There's just no excuse at that level.
The only mistake that I see you made was to not adequately test the equipment before you made the purchase. If you could have tested a setup that worked, then at least you could have had something to point to. If it didn't work during your tests, you probably wouldn't have gotten into the mess to begin with. Better luck next time!
John
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Sorry to hear about this. Focus problems are definitely a bugbear.
I had problems with my Aptus 75 back with back focusing and sensor uniformity. Fortunately Leaf in the form of Yair Shahar (sadly no longer with the company since Phase gobbled them up) sorted everything out for me. I am now a lucky owner of a perfect A75 with its lease paid off.
Really, should emphasise that with MF... don't pay until you have tested the product in all your desired uses. This is difficult to achieve, but make sure that when buying you get on paper what its supposed to do.
I have to say that for many purposes a 1DsIII and TS lenses are the bees knees. But just when I sometimes feel like giving up on the A75 I shoot a comparison shot with the 5DII and the file quality of the Leaf/Schneider lenses just blows the SLR files out of the water.
It can be a terrible tough journey to get MF workflow to work for you, but when it does, boy its worth it.
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I did test it with the rep at hand, at no pressure in my studio. everything seemed fine then. and then there wasn't a feature missing, it was a faulty camera, maybe even a faulty system, which couldn't be tested in the first place.
nowhere in the world could I have imagined having thiose kind of problems.
another reason for me to go with leaf was that I would have one manufacturer to talk to if problems occured, not at least two which would have been the case if I went with phase. when i shop for one kit, all pieces being labeled as one company, I kind of expect those pieces work together.
it was definitely not a problem of focus and recompose, rather AF, focus screen and sensor plane wasn't in sync.
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... and you cannot say that I had not warned you, many times and for months, Brad!
All the best,
Thierry
Interesting story--I have some painful experiences waiting for (and buying alternatives to) a promised Phase P45+ on Hy6 for a year and a half.
Similar cash paid and lost, only to wake up and realize "it ain't comin', stupid".
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Don't tell me I didn't try to get informed. How would you test a camera thoroughly when it is not available for rent anywhere? I thought having a rep coming over to shoot a typical setup for a couple of hours should suffice. My MF digital on a job experience was with phase one on a Hasselblad H, which helped me to decide that I hated the H. that is the only available option for rent around here. Hasselblad would force me to use their cameras, which wasn't an option for me.
Additionally I had tested a p30+ with a mamiya afd and a RZ, loaned from the local P1 dealer at a job. main reason not to go for that was the pathetic live view. another reason was the way P1 handled the version 4 launch. for years they promised something which never came and they had left me in the cold with my Canon for too long. that felt like a company taking the piss of its customers.
then I got the sinar rep over, its terrible software would keep on crashing on the rep's computer during the demonstration to the point that nothing would work anymore, so we installed it on my computer, which still was a very wobbly experience. the screen and the live view was pathetic too and by then their hardware looked so out of date that I was shure the company would fold within half a year.
one sidenote: 18 months ago I rented a 1dsmk3 and 15minutes into the job I called my dealer and bought the camera. I must have 100000 exposures on it by now and it never gave me the slightest problems. none of my clients ever complained that the files werent good enough and I do have some really demanding clients.
it was just my stupid Ego shouting I would need the most expensive toy on the block. the whole bullshit of how MF slows you down so you could become a better photographer. it did slow me down, even after half a year of trying I still hadn't got a decent picture with it. and then the 3D-ishnes crap.
the idea of not being able to afford an really equivalent backup with an MF back is a frightening one. for my ds I have a 5dMK2 as a backup, but never ever needed it up to now. but I can afford it easily. it just sits in my bag, being paid for and not requiring big monthly payments.
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I feel very fortunate that my H2/P30+ system is flawless.
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I feel very fortunate that my H2/P30+ system is flawless.
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Well it is quite interesting. At the same time you bought your system, I was thinking about buying one as well. I really liked the AFi and the new leaf backs. After some testing with quite a few different solutions. I went with Phase and can only say I'm extremely happy. The service is fantastic. It is nice to have a real Phase dealer near Munich and not to deal with a larger store which carries all types of cameras.
It is sad what happened to Leaf, but I can understand you, I nearly bought a similar system from them. Perhaps I just was a little luckier ;-)
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thanks for sharing sorry to hear that
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I am so glad that Calumet never answered me back when I asked for the account number where to make the transfer for the Leaf back. I went with Hasselblad and never regretted it, even though that system can have its moments as well.
The only current thing is that I no longer have a dealer. Mine went bankrupt The only other option seems to be Calumet which I categorically refuse.
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I went with Phase and can only say I'm extremely happy. The service is fantastic.
don't think that all Phase products are flawless.
But, yes, I agree: in my experience the service is very well. If there is something... there will be exchange or any solution and they are always very helpful.
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it was just my stupid Ego shouting I would need the most expensive toy on the block. the whole bullshit of how MF slows you down so you could become a better photographer.
More sage words were never spoken.
Sounds like you did everything right. Of course, that doesn't make the experience any easier.
John
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Sounds terrible, but did you ever use the back on your view camera? All this talk about autofocus, I wasn't sure if you indicated that you tried it with the view camera or not. If the AFi was giving you problems, surely you can shoot with the view camera, even though you've already thrown money away on the AFi.
Also... I guess your dealer didn't know that the Leaf AFi-mount back can be used on an RZ67 with a Leaf adapter. So you could've bought a used RZ for $400 and been shooting away with no problems at all, except that you paid for an expensive Leaf AFi body that doesn't work correctly...
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I would go back to the dealer and Leaf (Phaseone ) and take no other answer but a full refund. I personally think its worth a small claims case to recover what they promised. Did you deliver the return to the dealer? If so, it would seem like they are on the hook for the refund.
Since Phaseone bought Leaf has anyone even bought a Leaf back?
I also went through hell when I purchased my Aptus 75. I did a full test with a back sent to me by Leaf. Everything worked great, when I got my back I found out the test was shot with a back that had a prototype chip and everything went down hill from there.
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don't think that all Phase products are flawless.
But, yes, I agree: in my experience the service is very well. If there is something... there will be exchange or any solution and they are always very helpful.
I'm not claiming everything is perfect, I had my problems with a lens and a back, but the service just was great. Brand new replacements and fast service, that is how I expect it when spending that much money.
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I can't go back to my dealer to ask for my money: As I leased the camera kit through a finance company I never owned it, I just leased it from them. with the first problem arising I should have told them their camera wasn't working and they should sort it out, or at least tell them I would sort it out.
what I did was talking with the dealer, but leagelly I wasn't in the position to do so. The owner of the camera would have be the only one who could reverse the contract, but they wouldn't know and didn't care less when I told them. I kind of had to thank them to let me out of the contract before the 36months ware up.
I returned the camera to the dealer, the dealer returned the full anmount to the finance company, only I was shit out of luck, ABCFinance pocketed everything I paid them up to then and terminated the lease.
Again, I am a stupid idiot for being so naive and believing when people were promising things. but then: if someone promises you you will get everything back down to the last penny, why shouldn't you belive them?
no one really to blame but me... maybe only leaf for promising me to get my money back, which never happend
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What a mess. Seems like three different problems:
- financial arrangements: getting out was through the lease company, and not satisfactory. That's a customer issue, not Leaf or the Hy6
- focus issue - probably either a camera or camera/back problem. Should be fixable, but boy, you had a heck of problem. Not acceptable at that level of camera or back.
- system limitations for hand held shooting - this is not the problem of the maufacturer, but more a user interface with MFDB. Seems to be a built in limitation, rarely discussed, but a limiting factor. I've seen some amazing hand held shots with the Hy6 (Nicolas Claris shooting a sailing boat from a helicopter in daylight), but I've also experienced these limitations of low light myself, although I'm about 3 centuries behind you in gear.
But each of these problems has its own causes, and separate solutions. Its too bad they all converged on you. Good will from either dealer, Leaf or F/H (both gone now) wouldn't be enough to fix all three.
Geoff
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I can't go back to my dealer to ask for my money. As I leased the cameras kit through a finance company I never owned it, I just leased it from them. with the first problem arising I should have told them their camera wasn't working and they should sort it out.
what I did was talking with the dealer and so the owner of the camera woulöd have be the only one who could reverse the contract, but they wouldn't know and didn't care less when I told them. I kind of had to thank them to let me out of the contract before the 36months ware up.
I returned the camera to the dealer, the dealer returned the full anmount to the finance company, only I was shit out of luck, they pocketed everything I paid them up to then and terminated the lease.
Again I am a stupid idiot for being so naive and believing when people were promising things. no one really to blame but me....and maybe leaf for promising me to get my money back, which never happend
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Sorry, I'm a bit confused
You think Leaf should have paid you back instead of the leasing company?
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Sorry, I'm a bit confused
You think Leaf should have paid you back instead of the leasing company?
If I am not mistaken, I don't believe he is saying this.
"I returned the camera to the dealer, the dealer returned the full amount to the finance company, only I was shit out of luck, ABCFinance pocketed everything I paid them up to then and terminated the lease."
If I understand this correctly, he is saying that given these facts:
- The camera was returned to the dealer.
- The dealer returned the full amount for the camera to the finance company.
- He had paid a certain number of installments against the lease for the camera, but apparently not the full amount yet, otherwise he would have owned the camera himself, which he did not since it was still under lease at the time.
So he is saying that if the camera is back with the dealer, and the full amount is back with the finance company, why can they (the finance company) not return if not 100% then perhaps a large percentage of what he had paid into the lease up till that point. Instead, the finance company did not lose any money from the camera, and they even gained profit (from his already paid installments) for a transaction that got cancelled.
I.e., unfair that the finance company got their money back yet still they kept the lease installments paid already.
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Ok, that makes sense
The leasing company I'm dealing with are a bunch of weasels. Another extremely long story ...
I had a problem with a new MF camera that didn't focus, couldn't get 5 bodies in a row to focus properly.
My dealer couldn't get it to work either and took it back without question. I still can't believe people buy this camera.
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If I am not mistaken, I don't believe he is saying this.
"I returned the camera to the dealer, the dealer returned the full amount to the finance company, only I was shit out of luck, ABCFinance pocketed everything I paid them up to then and terminated the lease."
If I understand this correctly, he is saying that given these facts:
- The camera was returned to the dealer.
- The dealer returned the full amount for the camera to the finance company.
- He had paid a certain number of installments against the lease for the camera, but apparently not the full amount yet, otherwise he would have owned the camera himself, which he did not since it was still under lease at the time.
So he is saying that if the camera is back with the dealer, and the full amount is back with the finance company, why can they (the finance company) not return if not 100% then perhaps a large percentage of what he had paid into the lease up till that point. Instead, the finance company did not lose any money from the camera, and they even gained profit (from his already paid installments) for a transaction that got cancelled.
I.e., unfair that the finance company got their money back yet still they kept the lease installments paid already.
this is eyactly what happend, thanks for translation my babbeling...only that both leaf and the dealer had promised I would get back my paid leasing rates, which didn't happen...
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This is a painful story to read. I have a 5DII being delivered for the the past six months myself, so I know how frustrated you must be.
this is eyactly what happend, thanks for translation my babbeling...only that both leaf and the dealer had promised I would get back my paid leasing rates, which didn't happen...
You were wasting your time talking to your dealer or Leaf about money. The camera belongs to the leasing company. It's unclear whether you got out of the contract already. In case you didn't, here goes:
As a finance monkey myself* having dealt with these kinds of cases, you have to talk to them on the terms they understand. Money. Tally up how much you have paid them already. Add up how much they received from the refund, if they received one. The difference between the two is how much he made without lifting a finger (minus overhead and some misc costs).
Say to him "You've made X euro off me in Y months, most of it pure margin. [then the bit which matters:] The next time I purchase a big ticket camera system why would I use your leasing company if you don't reason with me now, and let me out of the contract. Win-win." Reason with him on his terms: revenue and margin.
If reasoning doesn't help, mention small claims court or whatever you have in Germany for these cases, but don't threaten - just say that that is an option you might need to take to protect your business. A finance monkey knows that the margins he's made from you will quickly disappear down the maws of trained attack lawyers, no matter what the outcome of the court case, and wastes his time he would be better off making new contracts.
Alternatively, go back to your leasing contract. Read it over carefully. There are rules on how you can get out of the contract - they are probably quite unfavorable to you, but there are certainly contractual ways. If there isn't an acceptable method, contact the German trade association for such companies for advice.
* this is not professional advice, usual disclaimers, IANAL etc. don't sue me please
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I'm guessing that you need a lawyer to sort this out. The leasing company doesn't owe you all the money you paid them since they are entitled to keep the interest on the money that they paid out. The fact that the product was faulty isn't their responsibility. As far as Leaf working to get your money back from the leasing company, that's a joke. They have no clout nor ability to make that happen. Their offer to help you was probably just lip service to get you off their back.
Leaf owes you the money that you paid out to leasing company as damages arising from their faulty product. Of course, their purchase agreement may have language that excludes an incidental damages such as the amounts you paid for the lease.
Basically, you're out of luck. If you want any hope of getting your money back, you'll need a lawyer. For the amount of money involved, it may be worth it.
John
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I'm guessing that you need a lawyer to sort this out. The leasing company doesn't owe you all the money you paid them since they are entitled to keep the interest on the money that they paid out. The fact that the product was faulty isn't their responsibility. As far as Leaf working to get your money back from the leasing company, that's a joke. They have no clout nor ability to make that happen. Their offer to help you was probably just lip service to get you off their back.
Leaf owes you the money that you paid out to leasing company as damages arising from their faulty product. Of course, their purchase agreement may have language that excludes an incidental damages such as the amounts you paid for the lease.
Basically, you're out of luck. If you want any hope of getting your money back, you'll need a lawyer. For the amount of money involved, it may be worth it.
John
John,
The way I know Leaf is not that they try to get people of their back, I find them more than helpful in their service.
The problem here is that the camera was leased.
I don't know how it works in other countries but over here leasing is like renting, in other words if you use the camera for a few months/week you are paying money for that.
If the camera does not work as is the case here the LEASING company should have been more flexible, 100% true.
But I really don't see how you can blame leaf for this or even the dealer.
If the dealer has contacts with the leasing company and does more with them it would be a good idea to get them to contact the lease company and work it out.
I think the lease company will be of the opinion that they had their costs in the form of insurance, interest, bookkeeping etc.
Again I don't know for 100% how it works over there but I know there are leasing companies that will let you pay a fine if you stop the lease before the end of the contract.
We never lease so I don't have all the information but I find the attack to Leaf uncalled for, they made sure the dealer got his money back, as I see from the story that's all they can do.
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I disagree with Frank, the problem was never that the camera was leased. The problem was that Leaf did not hold up to their end of the deal, the camera was simply not functioning. Had they done their part to begin with none of this misery would have occurred.
It has been said before. It should not be asking for too much to have equipment that pretends to be top-notch functioning according to its price level. I have already seen way too many disasters to dismiss these as unfortunate single incidents.
You should indeed use a lawyer to sort this out and even than your chances are slim. I agree your experience is total disaster. You just better move on and concentrate on making images and money.
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You just better move on and concentrate on making images and money.
Actually this is what I am doing now. even if I went the legal way, the gain is not big enough for the hassle.
I learned a lot form this experience, would have prefered it to be cheaper and less time consuming.
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@Dustbak,
What I meant is that Leaf had nothing to do with the lease construction, they refunded the money for the camera so I think the rest is up to the dealer or the lease company.
But than again I'm no laywer of course.
I just found it harsch that leaf was attacked so hard.
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@Dustbak,
What I meant is that Leaf had nothing to do with the lease construction, they refunded the money for the camera so I think the rest is up to the dealer or the lease company.
But than again I'm no laywer of course.
I just found it harsch that leaf was attacked so hard.
I had an accountant here in the UK explain about lease agreements. She pointed out that if for some reason you missed payments the Lease company could come and take the gear but you would still be liable to pay for the term of the Lease, the value of the equipment is not deducted. So you could be in a situation of no gear, no means to make money and the debt for the equipment that you don't have any longer. I no longer do a lease, the reason here in the UK lease has become popular is because HP agreements favoured the purchaser with their rights, so companies pushed the lease option with lots of claims of tax benefits which are not as good as they would have you believe. I would go the Hire Purchase route if I had to, the last thing I bought I did with 9 months interest free and paid off at the 9 months, if you go over the 9 months by a minute the penalties and interest are so severe it will often cost you double. Over 9 months means the full amount paid, paying 99% is not enough for you to miss the penalties or added interest. Also with HP you have the right to cancel within 14 days, they call it the cooling off period, so when you realise you have been sold more than you need next morning when you wake it's not to late for sanity to gain control again.
These people will take everything that is due to them and anything else they can get their hands on with the small print.
Kevin.
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@Dustbak,
What I meant is that Leaf had nothing to do with the lease construction, they refunded the money for the camera so I think the rest is up to the dealer or the lease company.
But than again I'm no laywer of course.
I just found it harsch that leaf was attacked so hard.
The reason I attacked Leaf was that they didn't keep promises they made.
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I tried shimming the screen too, but that didn't help, as AF and live view focus wouldn't match.
I had a Hy6 for a weekend last winter and had similar issues. I couldn't get it focusing properly. I complained about it to the dealer and said nice camera but my H1 is much much better at focusing.
Dealer said the camera had old firmware and was now ok. I newer had a chance to re try the kit.