Over the past week there has been a great deal of comment on Macfilos about the new Leica CL in comparison with the Fuji X series cameras. Fuji is the big competitor for Leica in the APS-C sector, mainly because the design and handling of cameras such as the X-Pro2 and X-T2 attracts former Leica users. They see similarities which they like.
But can Fuji be seen as a competitor for the venerable rangefinder M? There is no doubt that it can. I have friends who have been lifelong M users but have now migrated to Fuji for a variety of reasons, including the design, the excellent lenses and the feeling that APS-C is plenty good enough for their way of doing things.
There has been a sea-change in the capabilities of the APS-C sensor, as evidenced by the latest Fujis, Sonys and the Leica TL/CL. Indeed, Leica’s lens design guru Peter Karbe is now said to be increasing in his enthusiasm for APS-C. He is reported to have said that if Bacnack were designing his “miniature” camera in 2017 he would go for APS-C rather than full-frame.
But what we seldom here of, however, is anecdotes of people selling up on Fuji and buying a Leica M digital. Yes is does happen. Indeed, it happened suddenly to Italian photographer Sabino Parente last year. In what could have been a rash decision, he sold out all his Fuji gear and bought a Leica M262, the back-to-essentials version of the M240. As he says:
“It was not a simple choice because I used the Fuji X system for four years and I was completely satisfied. I still think it is one of the best on the market. But there was something missing for me, the full sensor, or full frame. Not only because of the deeper depth and richness of the details, but also because the reduced sensor, APS-C, did not allow me to fully use the vintage lenses that have been adapted, dimming them into their original focal length.”
After a few months of doubt he eventually began to love his Leica. But would he still make the change in the light of what he has learned over the past twelve months:
“If I had to base my judgment on the first three months, I would doubtless say NO!
“I think that for anyone, got used to fully automatic reflex systems, switch to a rangefinder system, it’s almost a self-punishment. In the first months of use I came to hate it, everything seemed unnecessarily difficult and tedious, and the out of focus shots were wasted.
“But once fully learnt, when the mutation occurs, first of all, mental than physical, in conceiving differently the way photography is done, well, I started to really love my Leica M.
After a year Sabino still relishes his M262 which he believes is the perfect tool for street photography. But he has discovered that it isn’t the total solution for him. For other types of photography he is now considering models from Sony and Canon. But the M262 will remain.
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The camera is just a tool it does not take the photographs you do, however the better and easier to use the camera is then never admit to getting bored with it as it is you who should be taking better PICTURES with it.
I switched this year from two Xpro2’s to Leica M10 and LeicaM9 and I don’t regret it either!
Fuji was to easy, I got bored, felt stupid.
Now with leica I have to think again, and don’t get bored anymore.
Its everytime a challenge to get everything right. I use it daily for newspaper press photography
Very interesting, especially that you are using the cameras for press work. If you feel like putting together a little story with some good illustrations I will consider it for publication. Mike
Its funny really, reading this article just a couple of weeks after I have bought an M9 and 35mm Summicron to replace my Fuji X-Pro1s.
Interesting, Paul. Why don’t you write a little article for us — motivation, decision, results, good move or bad. I’m all in favour of simplicity and that’s what all German-made Leicas offer. Even the new CL sticks strongly to the this of simplicity and offers a outer experience.
Thanks for the offer Mike, I may take you up on that once I have had some time to live with the M9. As I say I am only a couple of weeks into ownership but I know I made the right decision. The M240 didn’t tempt me too far away from the simplicity that the M9 offers and the M10 was just too much outlay if I couldn’t get on with the RF. One of my biggest deciders was on a recent trip to Scotland and Skye where I was using my GFX 50S for the main landscape shots and had my 3 X-Pro1s along as the travel kit. The crippler came when my wife and I were hiking up to the Old Man of Storr (challenging at 60 yrs old) so I just had the GFX and 3 lenses in a Billingham Hadley Pro (we travel by motorcycle so my LowePro Whistler had to stay at home) and took one X-Pro1 with the 23mm 1.4 for the grab shots. The shot I most wanted to get of my wife by the Old Man was back focused and I hadn’t realised (I rarely chimp) I figured that would not have happened if I had to MF so it was my deciding point. The next trip we took was to Snowdonia again GFX for serious stuff but this time for travel stuff I took my M9 and a Fuji XT2 with 14, 18-55 and 55-200. All my grab shots were taken with the M( and guess what no missed focus. Happy man. I even made a decent shot of the Lone Tree of Snowdonia with the M9 while we were chatting around the tripod mounted GFX.
Useful information, Paul, and I imagine you have some good shots to support a story (see my separate reply). I’m intrigued by your travelling by motorcycle with a pillion passenger and all that camera gear. I gave up motorcycling about ten years ago and now can’t imagine a bike fitting in with my current photographic needs. I’d be frightened of dropping something. But a bike is a great way to get around and I had a good 40 years of riding almost every bike under the sun — especially during my time as a road tester and feature writer for a motor cycle magazine. Those were the days.
This was the Bike loaded for the Scotland trip, the Billingham takes up the left saddlebag.
http://www.instagram.com/p/BYX2SfhDRIW/?taken-by=topsyrm59
In my mind’s eye I had you on a Honda GW for some reason. That looks like a mean rig, I have to say.
How rude………….. just kidding. I’ve had that FXR for 23 years now and we have been all over Europe on it. This time it was particularly heavily loaded because we too our hiking gear and hired a car on Skye for the 5 days we were there so we could walk away from the car park with an easy mind, we left the bike at our digs..safe and sound. Resulting photos were worth it.
500px.com/photo/227778555/old-man-of-storr-by-topsy?ctx_page=1&from=user&user_id=5545652
500px.com/photo/228054369/neist-point-lighthouse-bay-panorama-by-topsy?ctx_page=1&from=user&user_id=5545652
BTW, how would I submit an article?
Just send the text to me at mike@macfilos.com and I will have a look at it. Supporting pictures can be sent by Dropbox (I can open a folder for you and send a link) or by WeTransfer, which is even easier.
Thanks, as I say once I have some proper shutter time with the M9 I will put something to you.
I replaced a Canon 5D mk III system with an M262, backed up with an Olympus kit. The logic being that I was already shooting Leica on film, and Olympus was being used by my partner on archaeological fieldwork. The Olympus gets used for anything that needs macro (film scanning), telephoto or weather/dust sealing.
My impressions of the M262 after 18 months are still very mixed. For me the M262 does not replicate the experience of shooting with the M7, thanks to differences in size, handling and the clunky shutter. Basic digital functions such as a decent self-cleaning sensor are missing, and the sensor performance lags the best APSC offerings. Using a thumbs-up is pretty essential to the handling thanks to the size and lack of a film-winder, but makes it harder to use an external VF with wider lenses – and there is no live-view as a backup.
The M10 would likely address most of my handling and sensor issues with the M262. But having this year endured a two-month long repair (for a short drop that left the rangefinder misaligned and that cost almost as much as an XPro2!), and also problems with a newly purchased 28mm Summicron that took a month to resolve (infinity focus way off) I struggle to justify spending more money on the system.
I love shooting with a rangefinder and I love the results. But Leica’s service and support seem incompatible with (semi) professional use.
I’ve been a long time reader of Macfilos and not commented before, no real reason, but I really enjoy the site and check it each day. I am a long time Fuji user converted to Leica M. I rented a Leica first, feel in love in the first weekend and sold all the Fuji gear before I even sent the rental back. I love the color, the lenses and the look, but more importantly, I love the rangefinder shooting experience.
Anyway – just my 2 cents and proof (also seen in the already posted comments) is that there seems to be a few of us going the other way. Thanks again for the great site too 🙂
Hi, Mike and welcome to the comments department. I’m glad you like the site and thanks for your kind comments. I am surprised that there has been so much positive comment on this particular article. I wholly agree with you about the rangefinder experience. It’s no use telling those people who are only interested in ticking boxes. They know the price of everything and the value of nothing (to coin a phrase…) and there is no real way of explaining the allure of the rangefinder until you’ve tried it for a few months.
I follow him on IG. He’s been shooting with the SL for the past few months. Personally, I’ve gone the Fuji to Leica route too. Made the switch 2+ years ago and couldn’t be happier (M240P, MM1, Q).
Glad to hear it that, another Leica convert….
To Don M: I admire your thoroughness, and have a particular partisan interest in your comments on the image quality of the X-Vario. I could find it possible to lust after the CL, but if I were only able to get the kit zoom with it, I can’t see an urgent real need to move to the CL, since the X-Vario lens is superb and I prefer a tiltable viewfinder.
I no longer regard an M as my photgraphic Nirvana and certainly think Sabino Parente was hobbling himself going for the M262 rather than starting out with a secondhand M9.
I am tempted to say it is all about horses for courses or each to his or her own but with my having been a very keen Leica user for over sixty years who is in the fortunate position of owning a goodly selection of film and digital Leicas, including a large MP240 outfit and latest lenses as well as a likewise major Fuji X-Pro 2 outfit and a Leica X-Vario plus a T and the various zoom lenses (in addition to a new CL and SLR Canon’s) I do feel qualified to pass comment.
To cut to the quick I too wanted answers, to come off the wall, thin out, and hopefully to go into the future with just one system instead of several so I have spent much of the past year testing all and wherever possible back to back against each other then printing the results off to at least A3, sometimes even right up to A2 as I regard merely seeing them displayed on a computer is nowhere near adequate to make accurate final judgements.
Although I was rapidly able to make my own mind up from the results I then took all of these prints along to my local Photographic society and asked a panel of their members to judge which of each set had the best quality and sharpness etc whilst only I knew which was taken with what so although this could not be considered a scientific test, it was in my view a year long selection of real life photography.
What you might ask were the results? Well not entirely what I expected as for instance I had thought the MP240 and 50mm f1.4 Summilux Aspheric had just, but only just, shaded the vastly cheaper Fuji X-Pro 2 which I did not have a prime for so was fitted fitted with the vastly cheaper f2.8 to f4 kit zoom lens, yet the club members came to the conclusion the Fuji combination was best.
Likewise myself and everyone else highly rated the X-Vario results, and everyone including myself thought the Leica T with its wide zoom was a tad sharper at the edges than the Fuji X-Pro 2 fitted with its superb and very very near equal 10mm to 24mm wide zoom. And unlike me they also much preferred the Fuji’s output colours.
I could go on but what proved most interesting was just how good the mere 16 M/Pixel X-Vario and Leica T plus its convenient zoom lenses managed to equal or best those of the 24 m/pixel Fuji at least in quality terms, though the Fuji proved itself to be far more versatile and much nicer to use, not least due to its built in EVF and more rapid AF and response times.
To get back to horses for courses bit though. Other than accepting I can’t have a zoom lens for my Leica MP240 (And no I do not want to use any old R lens), I have decided yes I do want the convenience of a zoom rather than a half a ton of prime lenses, and that applies for whatever system I continue to use.
For similar reasons I am not much interested in carrying or using M prime lenses on either my Fuji X-Pro 2 or my Leica T, or indeed with my new CL, not least as after a full year of back to back testing I do quite strongly feel Leica are quite correct in claiming the T, TL, TL2 and now CL series zoom lenses truly are indeed rather special, which in turn bodes so well for the future of those lenses alsoon the new 24 mega pixel Cl.
That still is something I am greatly looking forward to find out about in due course, but what about my M system? Well the one big shock or downside of my doing so much testing has been to note just how VERY close the results of the circa £1,852 Fuji X-Pro 2 and its cheapo 18-55mm f2.8 to f4 kit lens came to my expensive, something over £9,000 plus MP240. And believe me it took experts to tell which print came from which camera apart. Food for thought?
Don Morley
I’ll be brief. I have both the X-Pro 2 and M10. They are both superb cameras, even though they are quite different. The X-Pro 2 is the better handling camera and the M10, having a larger sensor, has better image quality, but the differences are not that great. For me, the M10 is a big step forward over the clunky M240.
Since I got the M10, I have not used the X-Pro 2 that much, except for special purposes eg sports with the superb and versatile range of Fujifilm lenses. When the M240 was my most modern Leica M, I much preferred using the X-Pro 2. I am going to use the Fujfilm range for versatility from now on, but for most of my walking about photography the M10 will do quite fine. I sometimes bring a few M lenses with me, but most of the time a 35 Summicron stays on as a body cap.
I had no interest in the Leica TL or SL whatsoever and I don’t have any Leica L lenses. The Fujifilm lens range replaced a lot of older and heavier Nikon lenses in my arsenal with much lighter lenses. As of now, the Leica L range does not give me this range in lightweight lenses, so while the CL will remain an interesting camera to me, it will not be one I would be rushing to buy. Using M lenses on an EVF camera does not give me what I get from using them on an RF camera.
Where I come from, most of the switchers to Fujifilm, Olympus, Lumix and Sony are former Canon and Nikon users. Leica users are rare on this side of the Irish Sea.
If Barnack were alive today, he would probably be working on a smartphone or smart camera for Leica.
William
I too feel I am ‘qualified’ to comment; as a long time Fuji convert I was in love with the system but decided to jump into a Leica M 262 just for kicks. I took it on a trip to Japan as my only camera and struggled with it a bit, I wasn’t sure I enjoyed the experience of using it. However when I got back and reviewed the photos I realized I had done quite well, results wise. I sold off my Fuji gear and went all-in to Leica.
Some months later, I found myself frustrated again when I wanted to just take some low-stress photos of friends in a play. The limitations of the Leica became apparent very quickly (telephoto in a dark auditorium) and I longed for the lens flexibility and EVF of my Fuji. I bought back into the system with an X-T2 and fell in love with the smoothness of the new Xtrans 3 sensor, the joy of having an EVF, flip out screen, etc. After buying a companion X100F, I found I wasn’t using the Leica anymore, so in haste, it was sold off.
Back to Japan the next year with the Fuji system, the shooting went much smoother this time and was fun. Getting back home though, I noticed the images didn’t have the same depth, the rich colors, and lacked the more organic feeling and movement I had seen when I was using the Leica. I shot differently with the Leica, without knowing it. The low-light limitations of using APS-C sensors was apparent too. I got some keepers but I started to analyze my 5 year history with the APS-C sensor Fujis and I could see how flat the images look. The color palette is not to my taste. I bought a Leica Q and all of the sudden things became bright and crisp and look more 3D.
No doubt I am quick to judge and sell off camera gear, it’s a weakness, but I’m now looking more critically at the results and less at the technology. I am not sure I will ever want for an APS-C sensor again, regardless of the benefit of size. I see the difference between APS-C and FF as a threshold, there just seems to be a difference, despite people trying to convince me for years that it is small. I don’t think so anymore. That’s not to say APS-C is bad, it’s not, but there are tradeoffs in choosing one or the other, both have pros/cons.
I am waiting to see more from the Leica CL, I wonder if Leica has been able to push closer to the quality of a FF sensor in a smaller outfit. That would be the best of both worlds.
I never really gelled with the M 240 Mike. I came to it in a rush, I was not a long term Leica owner, but after I started in earnest with an M2 and an OCOLOY, somehow the digital M never felt right.
I love the CL and I love what it does to M lenses (this began of course with the frustrating T), as well as its native zooms (not tried a prime yet), but I will be looking for a nice M film camera at some time in the future when my recent follies have ceased to grate so much on my equilibrium (and the wife’s chagrin).
There is also a rather jarring interview between Eric Kim and the Leica Amsterdam boss, during which the Leica man seems to tell us that the native TL lenses are held to a higher standard of resolution than M lenses and as such, regardless of the sensor size are capable of producing the same technical standard of print. I am not sure whether I understood this correctly.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dy-LKWZ10Zo&t=293s
In the meantime my film fun is being had with the Nikon S2 and its rather good 5cm f/1.4 Nikkor-SC lens, which can be adapted to the M mount for use also with a film M… And the CL.
I think what I am suggesting (rather presumptuously), is that for a full range of photographic options with Leica, you don’t need a digital M, but you do need some sort of APS-C offering, like the CL.
And you do need M lenses and film cameras.
StephenJ