SlowDriver wrote:
Canon's focus confirmation (focus guide) is excellent and was already present on the 2018 Canon EOS R.
Just to be clear though, it normally only works for electronically coupled lenses, in the case of the M to RF Shoten adapter it is the adapter itself that features electronic contacts.
I am not sure whether Shoten adapters for other mounts do the same. I don't believe so, but perhaps somebody can confirm.
From what I can see on eBay (seller shotenkobo) the Shoten Leica M to Canon RF adapter is the only Canon RF adapter with electronic contacts.
Contrary to Nikon Z where multiple electronic adapters seem to exist. See also article below: "SHOTEN releases nine types of mount adapters with electronic contacts for Nikon Z mounts". https://en.pronews.com/news/20260330124414664.html
Jun 29, 2026 at 06:01 AM
Steve Spencer Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
SlowDriver wrote:
From what I can see on eBay (seller shotenkobo) the Shoten Leica M to Canon RF adapter is the only Canon RF adapter with electronic contacts.
Contrary to Nikon Z where multiple electronic adapters seem to exist. See also article below: "SHOTEN releases nine types of mount adapters with electronic contacts for Nikon Z mounts". https://en.pronews.com/news/20260330124414664.html
AFAIK, yes the Shoten adapter with electronic contacts is the only way to adapt Leica M mount lenses to Canon RF with the Canon focus aids, but older SLR lenses can also be adopted by using a chipped adapter to Canon EF mount and one of the Canon EF to RF mount adapters. Also all of the Cosina made Zeiss lenses with EF mount can be adapted with one of the Canon EF to RF mount adapters. I am still a big fan of a number of these lenses, but they aren't small like Leica M lenses. One nice thing about them on Canon RF, however, is that they almost gain an aperture ring. You can adapt them with the Canon EF to RF mount adapter with the control ring and control the aperture on the adapter instead of through the camera. Oddly the Nikon F mount versions of these Zeiss lenses lose the function of the aperture rings they have always had (they must be set to the smallest aperture with the aperture control by the camera) when they are adapted to Nikon Z.
I am not sure how many people appreciate the Canon and Nikon focus aids (I know I do quite a bit), but I think that appreciation should tell Leica something important about the EV-2--namely, they might want to have it include PDAF sensors and utilize those PDAF sensors for focus aids. As we see the AF of Leica SL cameras mature with the SL3-P, Leica ought to be able to provide such focus aids and personally I think it would make a big difference for the EV-2 to have them.
R8 is excellent with Canon RF af lenses as a small camera, but using R8 with Shoten vs EV1 or SL3-S or CL, it is much easier to use the Leica cameras for manual focus from my experience... That is similar to using Panasonic S1R II vs SL3-P discussion eg much simpler menu/button approach with Leica... Hopefully, Leica will add more mf confirmation for the EV2... I prefer the non-box method with the pets as they turn their eyes/head so quickly, so Canon mf box blocks the view for me...
Steve Spencer wrote:
I am not sure how many people appreciate the Canon and Nikon focus aids (I know I do quite a bit), but I think that appreciation should tell Leica something important about the EV-2--namely, they might want to have it include PDAF sensors and utilize those PDAF sensors for focus aids. As we see the AF of Leica SL cameras mature with the SL3-P, Leica ought to be able to provide such focus aids and personally I think it would make a big difference for the EV-2 to have them.
Fair point - but I am less optimistic that Leica is going to do it since they want to protect the SL business and avoid in-house competition of the EV series with the SL series. Or in other words: they will continue to have the EV series be worse with focus aids than the SL series. IMO the EV-2 will improve potentially only by having IBIS (I don't think the M12 will receive it!) and some kind of minor focus improvement compared to the actual system.
Steve Spencer wrote:
I am not sure how many people appreciate the Canon and Nikon focus aids (I know I do quite a bit), but I think that appreciation should tell Leica something important about the EV-2--namely, they might want to have it include PDAF sensors and utilize those PDAF sensors for focus aids. As we see the AF of Leica SL cameras mature with the SL3-P, Leica ought to be able to provide such focus aids and personally I think it would make a big difference for the EV-2 to have them.
No disagreement. Focus confirmation is in my opinion more accurate than peaking and a much better user experience than magnification.
FWIW, Hasselblad has it as well since the X2D. It is called focus indicator.
Nifty Fifty wrote:
With which EVF cameras (excluding Nikon and Canon models that feature a focus indicator) is manual focusing easier than with your A1, and why?
My Leica SL2 and SL3 bodies are a lot easier for me to manual focus. In all honesty, I don't know the exact reason other than it is easier for me to see when the shot is in focus than it is with the Sony. I used to shoot Fuji X series and those were great - very easy to manual focus. While it has been a number of years since I shot those, I seem to remember (I could be wrong on this though) that when an image was in focus, it just "shimmered" a bit. Admittedly, I do remember that kind of shimmering, but am not 100% sure if it was the Fuji system or not, but I don't know what else it would have been as I went from Nikon DSLR to Fuji to Leica & Sony. My eyes are not getting any better either though, so part of the ease with the Fuji system may have been that I could see better at the time that I used that system.
I dug out my Shoten M to Canon RF adapter to confirm that it does not show the distance scale with an adapted VM lens mounted on the R5II. As expected.
Perhaps the biggest downside to the Shoten adapter is the button pushing sequences necessary to change between stored lenses in its memory bank.
For this reason, if someone was looking to adapt vintage SLR lenses to Canon RF, converting or adapting those to chipped EF mount (i.e. Leitax) would IMO be preferable. The question though is whether those chips are still readily available.
Regarding the future EV2: as it will be a manual only focusing camera, I can't see why Leica would block it from beneficial manual focus assist improvements, such as those discussed here, simply to protect the SL system, which is first and foremost an AF system. While some adapt M to the SL, I would be surprised if a significant portion of those only used the SL system for manual focus lenses, given one could do the same with mirrorless camera options currently available from other brands that provide 'close enough' sensor stack performance and access to very good AF systems. IMO, if the SL system fails, it won't be because there's an M body with better manual focus assist features. It will be because of the SL's position in the overall mirrorless system market and pressures it faces from the mainstream competition.
rscheffler wrote:
Regarding the future EV2: as it will be a manual only focusing camera, I can't see why Leica would block it from beneficial manual focus assist improvements, such as those discussed here, simply to protect the SL system, which is first and foremost an AF system. While some adapt M to the SL, I would be surprised if a significant portion of those only used the SL system for manual focus lenses, given one could do the same with mirrorless camera options currently available from other brands that provide 'close enough' sensor stack performance and access to very good AF systems. IMO, if the SL system fails, it won't be because there's an M body with better manual focus assist features. It will be because of the SL's position in the overall mirrorless system market and pressures it faces from the mainstream competition. ...Show more →
While it is correct that the main difference between M-EV and SL is AF capability of the SL class (and its larger viewfinder maybe), we should not forget that many Leica SL users often use M-mount lenses with adapter on their SL camera. One reason was simply that the EV-1 wasn't available at the time, so some jumped to the SL for better EVF performance than using a traditional M with external EVF. This number of people likely wouldn't be an issue for potentially jumping back to a newer EV-2 with far improved MF assist improvements if the SL series would sell better on the market. But it doesn't - here I agree that it faces a lot of price pressure from other MLC brands. That's why I am convinced that Leica sees potential in-house competition with the SL and will do everything to avoid it by not implementing too similar looking features.
Biggest uncertainty independent on "crippling" reasons for a M-EV is the new Leica Camera ownership. It is fully unclear what the new strategy might be, but it is not unreasonable to think that cost could be saved by merging M-EV and SL into a smaller camera body form factor - pretty much an EV with electronic SL features, potentially maybe with L- instead of M-mount to allow AF.
The biggest question is if EV1, S9 and Q3 can be one camera as S10 with an evf (L10 FF) or Q4 (CL FF) when Leica charges much more with each Leica model while recycling the parts... FP-L with evf is an alternate, but it is not that small... S9+40mm f2 is more fun than Q3 43 due to macro focusing distances for me...S9 needs an evf...
retrofocus wrote:
Biggest uncertainty independent on "crippling" reasons for a M-EV is the new Leica Camera ownership. It is fully unclear what the new strategy might be, but it is not unreasonable to think that cost could be saved by merging M-EV and SL into a smaller camera body form factor - pretty much an EV with electronic SL features, potentially maybe with L- instead of M-mount to allow AF.
Leica diffentiates products primarily on form factor, AF/MF, and use case. All of Leica's current products use the sam sensor, and the same processor (generation being the only difference). No other manufacturers do this. I don't see Leica crippling the EV-1 line to protect the SL line. Way too many other core differences base on form factor, AF/MF, use cases to make that necessary. That is not Leica's way of doing things.
1bwana1 wrote:
Leica diffentiates products primarily on form factor, AF/MF, and use case. All of Leica's current products use the sam sensor, and the same processor (generation being the only difference). No other manufacturers do this. I don't see Leica crippling the EV-1 line to protect the SL line. Way too many other core differences base on form factor, AF/MF, use cases to make that necessary. That is not Leica's way of doing things.
Doesn't Fujifilm do the same thing? One sensor, one processor for a generation of cameras with the only difference being form factor, dial arrangement, etc?
I'm with you though, it feels weird to limit the EV line based on what the SL is doing. They are radically different form factors/use cases.
1bwana1 wrote:
Leica diffentiates products primarily on form factor, AF/MF, and use case. All of Leica's current products use the sam sensor, and the same processor (generation being the only difference). No other manufacturers do this. I don't see Leica crippling the EV-1 line to protect the SL line. Way too many other core differences base on form factor, AF/MF, use cases to make that necessary. That is not Leica's way of doing things.
It has happened before. Leica M10 is video removed at the same time the video-centric SL was released. Leica early on made sure the SL is a stand-alone in the Leica line and offers something which other cameras don't have. After the Leica CL film camera debacle, Leica makes sure since to avoid in-house competition. Consequently and in the future. Good wish to have all bells and whistles with manual focus assist in the EV-2 or future models but they won't be on the same level as whatever is implemented in the SL series.
RomanMF wrote:
Doesn't Fujifilm do the same thing? One sensor, one processor for a generation of cameras with the only difference being form factor, dial arrangement, etc?
Almost. In the current generation there are a few cameras that use the previous generation 26 MP sensor. Plus there is also the X-H2S which uses a unique stacked 26 MP sensor.
Historically though you are correct that Fuji used the same sensor + processor in a given generation.
retrofocus wrote:
Biggest uncertainty independent on "crippling" reasons for a M-EV is the new Leica Camera ownership. It is fully unclear what the new strategy might be, but it is not unreasonable to think that cost could be saved by merging M-EV and SL into a smaller camera body form factor - pretty much an EV with electronic SL features, potentially maybe with L- instead of M-mount to allow AF.
serhan_ wrote:
The biggest question is if EV1, S9 and Q3 can be one camera as S10 with an evf (L10 FF) or Q4 (CL FF) when Leica charges much more with each Leica model while recycling the parts... FP-L with evf is an alternate, but it is not that small... S9+40mm f2 is more fun than Q3 43 due to macro focusing distances for me...S9 needs an evf...
This is just coming full circle to what I thought would be the 'most logical' future small EVF camera from Leica - one that is closer to Q form, yet with an L mount, if Leica wanted to really push people to the SL system. But we got the M EV1 instead. To me that means Leica doesn't worry that much about M and SL feature overlap and that they might think of the M EV type of camera as the logical manual focus EVF based platform, because of the manual focus M lenses. No adapter needed. If that's the case, then I fully expect the manual focus assist features to improve as Leica improves sensor and processor performance (which was apparently what prevented implementation of more advanced MF aids in the M EV1).
rscheffler wrote:
Let's see in ~4 years when the EV2 is released...
Depending on sales and feedback, maybe the EV version won't be the last model released in the next generation of the M? Just speculating, I have no other source for this than my own brain
joakim wrote:
Depending on sales and feedback, maybe the EV version won't be the last model released in the next generation of the M? Just speculating, I have no other source for this than my own brain
One advantage of the SL over the current EV-1 is the sales price. The SL is the most affordable of all cameras in Leica's line for body with exchangeable lenses. Used versions like the SL2 are even more affordable around $2K. This has to do with demand (which is lower) and pricing pressure from other MLC brands. The EV-1 starting with > $9K for an EVF based camera is over the top IMO. It makes many potentially interested customers shine away from it instantly. A price tag still with expensive Leica brand name of $6K would be a lot more justified. But Leica marketing is trying to squeeze as much as possible with this one here. Will it last? The old ownership was committed to it, but it is possible that the new owners share a different view here.
I suspect if something comes to the chopping board, it will be the SL series but not (yet) the M EV series. Leica Camera could easily sell this whole series to Panasonic/Sigma which might continue with L-mount gear. But this is all speculation at this point and might never happen of course.
Abuttolph wrote:
While it has been a number of years since I shot those, I seem to remember (I could be wrong on this though) that when an image was in focus, it just "shimmered" a bit. Admittedly, I do remember that kind of shimmering, but am not 100% sure if it was the Fuji system or not, but I don't know what else it would have been as I went from Nikon DSLR to Fuji to Leica & Sony.
Ah, okay, then it really seems to be extremely subjective. Flickering as a pseudo-focus indicator would really bother me.
Nifty Fifty wrote:
Ah, okay, then it really seems to be extremely subjective. Flickering as a pseudo-focus indicator would really bother me.
I have seen this shimmering effect in several EVF cameras including Nikon Z7 and Leica M EV1. It only appears on some subjects like fabric with certain textures and small text on bottles. But it's really very handy for determining focus.
bcaslis wrote:
I have seen this shimmering effect in several EVF cameras including Nikon Z7 and Leica M EV1. It only appears on some subjects like fabric with certain textures and small text on bottles. But it's really very handy for determining focus.
I saw this phenomenon in the viewfinder of a colleague's Q3. It occurred with a brick façade, and I found it very distracting.
Nifty Fifty wrote:
Ah, okay, then it really seems to be extremely subjective. Flickering as a pseudo-focus indicator would really bother me.
It’s not flickering, it’s a very minor shimmer of the image at very fine detail frequencies. It’s happened with every EVF I’ve ever used. Maybe the super high res 9m dot EVFs don’t do this, I don’t know, never owned one.
