10 October 2018

Leica 3D-printed ISO hotshoe covers

Never forget which ISO film you've loaded again.

By In Make, Photography 2 min read

Shooting film has been quite enjoyable so far, but there’s one little thing that has been nagging me. If I shoot half a roll and put the camera away, I often have no idea at all what film is in there when I pick it up again a few weeks later! And since my Leica is a fully manual camera, not knowing what ISO film is in there means I have no idea what all my other settings should look like.

The Leica does actually have a dial on the back to remind you of your ISO, but the camera is so old the dial only goes up to ISO 200 – the highest ISO at the time – which is a far cry from modern films that can go up to 3200.

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And that’s why I 3D-modeled this set of ISO film speed hotshoe covers. They’re based on a blank Leica-compatible cover by gcardinal and I just added all the standard ISO speeds on top. Once you’ve 3d-printed these, load your camera with a roll of film and slide the cover with the matching speed into your shoe – you’ll always know how to dial in your settings! They should fit most standard hotshoes, not just Leica.

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I figured it’s a super simple but effective solution to a problem that’s not huge, but annoying enough it was worth fixing. Of course, once the photography blogs picked this up (e.g. Petapixel, DPReview) the floodgates opened for the trolls to tell me how I’m everything that is wrong with this world, but meh. Haters gonna hate. If you like it, print and use it!

What do you think?