Shutter Dial
The M5 has the largest M shutter speed dial. It is coaxial with the shutter button and overhangs the top plate, making for very comfortable and quick manipulation, adjustable without taking the camera from your eye. This ergonomic feature is often cited as one of the M5's paradigmatic advantages, and a non-coaxial variant was later reintroduced as of the M6 TTL (1998). The M5 is the only full-size M with shutter speeds visible in the finder. It allows reliable, linear intermediate speeds between full click stops from the 1/1000 through to the 1/2 second setting. The speed dial is additionally engraved with "B" (Bulb) speeds from 1 to 30 seconds. These settings are coupled with the light meter, but the exposure time must be manually implemented using a cable release. The camera's internal exposure timing mechanism disengages below the 1/2 second setting. The shutter release button is threaded for a standard cable release. The M5 is capable of making double exposures.
Famous quotes containing the words shutter and/or dial:
“The rays which stream through the shutter will be no longer remembered when the shutter is wholly removed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Although I will inherit darkness
I will keep dialing left to right.
I will struggle like a surgeon.
I will call quickly for the glare of the moon.
I will even dial milk.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)