I've owned a Leica Q2 and Q3 and the former was what finally got me to ditch my phone's camera and get back into photography. Leica's color science is some of the best out there, even if their technology stance is a bit like Apple's in that they're not the first to do anything but often the first to do it right.
That said, I outgrew the Q3, sold it for pretty much what I'd paid for it and bought two Sony cameras and some lenses. I got tired of "zooming with my feet" and the Sony 70-200mm GM II shoots like it's from the future.
a7iv + 70-200 GM II shooter myself too, I feel you! Even in my day to day travel photography with my partner I'll still drag that combo with me. It's the one range that you just can't easily replicate with a phone and it looks totally magical, whereas things like wide angle photo and your regular 35mm are "close enough" that often I'll just use my phone instead.
Sure they make good cameras, but I think the real blessing they give the photography world is the way they function as a sponge, soaking up a lot of money so it's not going around and inflating the price of the other vintage camera stuff I want to buy.
I'm in a position where I could get a Leica camera, but I'd much rather stick to Fujifilm who make great optics, have great in-camera film simulation, and require very little editing work outside the camera. Leica's revenue seems to me like people just wanting the luxury version of something? I just haven't seen the results to justify the cost.
DSLR quality has been a buzzword for phone cameras for a while now. And in some cases it is. But when comparing photos across a range of conditions from my phone to a full frame DSLR with a good lens one is clearly better. As one example, simulated bokeh isn't as nice looking at the real thing. The resulting photo difference is more pronounced in long telephoto portraits.
The software, convenience, and always with you aspect ensure phones will probably always be dominant. But as Leica is showing there is still a hunger for photos that look better.
With photography, optimizing hardware (sensor, glass) is going to yield more results than optimizing software. Sensor size has an impact on the resulting photo.
Pretty amazing... the market overall for consumer digital cameras has crashed over the last decade due of course to smartphones making a dedicated camera kind of redundant for the majority of consumers. But Leica shows that even in a crashing market there is room for some to succeed! Btw., it was Leica that popularized the 35mm format for photographic film.
While that is undoubtedly true, Leica never really catered to the 'I could do with a dedicated camera' crowd, but rather to the 'I am passionate about photography and am reasonably well-heeled' or 'I am obscenely rich and would like to show off' crowd.
That, and presumably a lot of their revenue is from licencing their brand name to all sorts of phone manufacturers.
I wouldn't be surprised if their own rangefinder line (which is what I believe most people into photography associate with the Leica brand) was at best breaking even - it is merely a means to maintain the cachet of the brand, methinks. YMMV.
(Said as a longtime Leica enthusiast, but the digital Ms are out of my (comfortable) reach - when out shooting rangefinders, it is mostly a Leica M4 (1968) or a Cosina/Zeiss Ikon ZM (2005-ish, methinks)
> 'I am obscenely rich and would like to show off' crowd.
The usual joke is "for dentists who want to take some family snapshots" (which is a slur at dentists, not at Leica. I've used two of their cameras, the Q and the SL2, and both are very pleasant experiences).
I've owned a Leica Q2 and Q3 and the former was what finally got me to ditch my phone's camera and get back into photography. Leica's color science is some of the best out there, even if their technology stance is a bit like Apple's in that they're not the first to do anything but often the first to do it right.
That said, I outgrew the Q3, sold it for pretty much what I'd paid for it and bought two Sony cameras and some lenses. I got tired of "zooming with my feet" and the Sony 70-200mm GM II shoots like it's from the future.
a7iv + 70-200 GM II shooter myself too, I feel you! Even in my day to day travel photography with my partner I'll still drag that combo with me. It's the one range that you just can't easily replicate with a phone and it looks totally magical, whereas things like wide angle photo and your regular 35mm are "close enough" that often I'll just use my phone instead.
Thank goodness for Leica.
Sure they make good cameras, but I think the real blessing they give the photography world is the way they function as a sponge, soaking up a lot of money so it's not going around and inflating the price of the other vintage camera stuff I want to buy.
I'm in a position where I could get a Leica camera, but I'd much rather stick to Fujifilm who make great optics, have great in-camera film simulation, and require very little editing work outside the camera. Leica's revenue seems to me like people just wanting the luxury version of something? I just haven't seen the results to justify the cost.
DSLR quality has been a buzzword for phone cameras for a while now. And in some cases it is. But when comparing photos across a range of conditions from my phone to a full frame DSLR with a good lens one is clearly better. As one example, simulated bokeh isn't as nice looking at the real thing. The resulting photo difference is more pronounced in long telephoto portraits.
The software, convenience, and always with you aspect ensure phones will probably always be dominant. But as Leica is showing there is still a hunger for photos that look better.
With photography, optimizing hardware (sensor, glass) is going to yield more results than optimizing software. Sensor size has an impact on the resulting photo.
Pretty amazing... the market overall for consumer digital cameras has crashed over the last decade due of course to smartphones making a dedicated camera kind of redundant for the majority of consumers. But Leica shows that even in a crashing market there is room for some to succeed! Btw., it was Leica that popularized the 35mm format for photographic film.
While that is undoubtedly true, Leica never really catered to the 'I could do with a dedicated camera' crowd, but rather to the 'I am passionate about photography and am reasonably well-heeled' or 'I am obscenely rich and would like to show off' crowd.
That, and presumably a lot of their revenue is from licencing their brand name to all sorts of phone manufacturers.
I wouldn't be surprised if their own rangefinder line (which is what I believe most people into photography associate with the Leica brand) was at best breaking even - it is merely a means to maintain the cachet of the brand, methinks. YMMV.
(Said as a longtime Leica enthusiast, but the digital Ms are out of my (comfortable) reach - when out shooting rangefinders, it is mostly a Leica M4 (1968) or a Cosina/Zeiss Ikon ZM (2005-ish, methinks)
> 'I am obscenely rich and would like to show off' crowd.
The usual joke is "for dentists who want to take some family snapshots" (which is a slur at dentists, not at Leica. I've used two of their cameras, the Q and the SL2, and both are very pleasant experiences).
How much did Xiaomi pay for Leica tech/branding.
isn't that basically a given for any company when comparing numbers that have not been adjusted for inflation?
Kodak might say otherwise