Leica Q

[dk]

So I've using my iPhone 7 plus as my main camera for a while, I never use my DSLR stuff any more, can't be arsed lugging it around, which is a shame as I have some decent stuff.

So I've been looking for a decent compact, looked at some of the higher end sonys, panasics etc but every review says the Leica Q is the ultimate compact for picture quality.

So I thought I'd treat myself, see if it's all it's cracked up to be. It's a very high quality product, the box is lovely, the camera is first class German engineering and just oozes quality.

It's fixed 28mm f1.7, im used to zooms, but I think the Iphone is also around 28mm. Lots of people say you get used to it and it's worth it, encourages you to be more creative, and it's deemed as the ultimate street photography camera.

I'm off to Florida in a few weeks, so that will be it's first test, just be nice to take what's hopefully a decent camera, but not having to lug a big bag of kit around.

 

[Stay Puft]

£3k?! Madness.

Looks like you put film in it, but I'm sure (hope) it's decent for the money!

 

[botfch]

In fairness isn't the lense worth almost 3k alone, in that respect its good value.

 

[Rob]

The big question I have is how is that any more practical than a dslr with a flexible lens?

I.e it's not going to fit in your pocket so it's still a poxy inconvenience around your neck or in your bag... exactly as a dslr would be?

 

[Ben]

Looks lovely mate, you got any example photographs you've taken with it?

 

[Ay Ay Ron]

Why didn't you just buy a Canon/Sigma/ other prime for your dlsr?
I've got the sigma 1.4 50mm on my 6d. Perfect for walking around, not too heavy.

I think that's a massively overpriced bit of kit for what you'll get from it - i don't think there will be much of a difference between this and the high end Fuji at half the price.

I looked for months for a walkabout replacement for my Canon. Ended up spending on a Lumix and instantly regretted it. It's much lighter but absolutely nothing in image comparison.

 

[dk]

In fairness isn't the lense worth almost 3k alone, in that respect its good value.

I believe it's worth more than that, it's said to be a free body when you buy the lens effectively.

 

[McGherkin]

Can you use other lenses with it?

 

[dk]

The big question I have is how is that any more practical than a dslr with a flexible lens?

I.e it's not going to fit in your pocket so it's still a poxy inconvenience around your neck or in your bag... exactly as a dslr would be?

It's a lot smaller than my 7D, and I wouldn't be able to take the 7D with a single lens on holiday with me, this forces me to, plus I'm hoping the quality out of this is going to be better than just using a 50mm canon lens.

This is a quality package, so well made, the menu and operation is so easy, plus it's got better video than my 7D (auto focus too), image stabilisation, plus it's got a full size sensor.

 

[dk]

Looks lovely mate, you got any example photographs you've taken with it?

Only received it yesterday, weather hasn't been great, I'm in Liverpool docks this week so should get some trial shots there.

 

[dk]

Why didn't you just buy a Canon/Sigma/ other prime for your dlsr?
I've got the sigma 1.4 50mm on my 6d. Perfect for walking around, not too heavy.

I think that's a massively overpriced bit of kit for what you'll get from it - i don't think there will be much of a difference between this and the high end Fuji at half the price.

I looked for months for a walkabout replacement for my Canon. Ended up spending on a Lumix and instantly regretted it. It's much lighter but absolutely nothing in image comparison.

This should provide a better image than my 7D and a canon lens, it doesn't get much better than these optics. I have the 50mm 1.8 for my canon and never really liked it.

 

[dk]

Can you use other lenses with it?

No it's fixed

 

[dk]

ok, so i've had my first outing with the camera, was between 6:30 and 7, so was dusk moving into night, using family high ISOs, but I'm seriously impressed, it fecking good, so easy to use, so quick, was event spitting with rain and had spots of rain on the lens, the pictures are so clear its ridiculous, unfortunately Facebook does lessen the quality, but here are the first batch of pics from Liverpool.

not bad i dont think considering, its my first time using it, and the light conditions were bad, and it was raining, very pleased.

 

[AdDaMan]

Great shots.

 

[Niall]

Lovely bit of kit that. A mate of mine has one as his daily carry around sort of camera.

You'll get much more from the images if you edit them too, digital images as shot are always a little underwhelming tone wise no matter what you use.

 

[McGherkin]

Any full-res shots? Looks nice, although it's something I'd never really get much use out of personally due to always being far from what I'm shooting.

 

[mattf4r]

Lovely bit of kit but it does carry a hefty price tag (Leica scene tax)

Imagine it has nice ISO performance when not uploaded to facebook.

Would be the perfect camera for street photography

 

[dk]

WOW, just WOW, this camera is immense.

Took it to Florida and took around 3500 pics, first time I've ever used RAW too, and when comparing the RAW and the JPGs, i'll be shooting in RAW from now on, although that does mean running everything through lightroom first. Got a 90 day lightroom and photoshop license with the camera, its bloody expensive to purchase monthly though!

The low light ability of the camera is insane, no flash is needed, the shots i got without a tripod i couldnt have imagined were possible at the speed i was taking them.

The 28mm fixed was a slight challenge, I'm used to decent zoom with my 70-200 f4 L lens on my Canon 7d, but the camera is so versatile, you really not worry about not being able to zoom in as the focus is so fast and accurate and the end result is so good that zooming in, like really zooming in is not an issue at all when cropping.

Im slowly going through the pics, but so far i am very impressed, literally count the throwaways from over 1000 pics on my fingers.

Once I've been through them ill post up some examples, but it was worth every penny!

Ive been watching the Sky Arts Master of Photography show too, and i think every one of the contestants on there has a Q and uses it in nearly every challenge.

 

[Ay Ay Ron]

I thought you would have shot RAW for a while tbh seeing as you've had a decent camera for so long. The Antarctica(?) trip that you went on would have massively benefitted from shooting RAW. Anything does.

Lightroom is hardly expensive, I pay £8 or 9 p/m for that and Photoshop CC but I use LR a few times a week so it's worth every penny. It's constantly updated too.

I'm interested to see the shots you've got though. I'm also interested in what your keep rate is with the 7d/70-200 combo compared to the one of the Q.

 

[dk]

It's £10.10 a month, so £121 a year, I've never paid that much for software before.

I'd say the keep rate the dslr combo was about 70%, with the Leica it seems to be more like 90%.

I'm really impressed with how well they've turned out considering the only prep I had was the trip to Liverpool above, but then all those shots came out too with no real duds.

Working with the canon 50mm and the low aperture was always an issue for me, I could never get it right, lots of out of focus shots. With the Leica though, even though I was shooting at f2 a lot of the time it's pin sharp. And a lot of the photos were of my nieces, and they are constantly on the move and never stay still for you, so it was a challenge.

The photos just seem to have a special look to them, I keep reading about the 'Leica' look and I can see what they mean now.

And the reason I've never shot raw before is because of all the extra work involved. Plus the massive file sizes. I took 2x64gb sd cards to Florida and ran out of space. The last 300 photos had to be shot in jpg. In hindsight I wished I'd bout another card while I was out there. I'll be shooting raw from now on though.

 

[Ay Ay Ron]

It's gone up in price then, I imagine I'll have a price increase soon enough.
It's more than worth it imo for the pair, it's pretty hard to get a cracked photoshop now (with my limited knowledge of cracking software) and to but it would cost hundreds and it would be out of date fairly soon. Light room is still fairly easy to obtain I think.

When I went to Skye last year I used nearly 200gb of storage I think but I was shooting a lot of time lapse in raw which bumped up the file numbers. They were 25mb or so files. Some of the new ones are ridiculous, I think the new Sony is near 50mb!

Looking forward to seeing the shots. I couldn't justify spending that much on a fixed lens camera though, no matter how good the images are.

 

[TheEvilGiraffe]

Can always go left-field and use 'The GiMP' which IIRC is basically open source PS ! Or there are plenty of other RAW editors out there...

 

[McGherkin]

Can't edit raw images in GiMP directly, AFAIK. I use it for everything else though.