This isn't the kind of camera one looks at for high ISO. Just like with the M8, the M9 seems to forgo great high ISO for great color and detail, which is fine by me.
douglasf13 wrote:
This isn't the kind of camera one looks at for high ISO. Just like with the M8, the M9 seems to forgo great high ISO for great color and detail, which is fine by me.
That's just the problem: this is _exactly_ "the kind of camera one looks at for high ISO". The M has had to give away one advantage after another over the years, and low-light is an important one. With lenses like the Canon 24 f1.4 mk2 available, and affordable compared to Leica's equivalent, the endless comments about Leica's superior glass are moot IMO.
But it's great that the M is now full-frame, 18Mpixel, doesn't require an IR filter, and has a dedicated iso button. Those are very important steps and this is a much more attractive camera than the M8.
Oh. My. Gawd. The M9 is going to look so good hanging around my neck when I'm not working on my screenplay at Starbucks while wearing a turtle neck sweater and paper thin 'prescription' glasses. Hahahaaa, jk jk.
CCD or CMOS has so very little to do with "colour response" that it borders on nothing. Their photodiode sections are normally absolutely identical - but they do differ in what stages of the pipeline noise is added. CCD's are all quite elongatedly rectangular in shape (which gives some interesting X/Y aliasing problems as well as lower area efficiency in a real application).
What DOES make a difference in colour is how sharp the CFA filter cuts off unwanted wavelengths, sharper cutoffs and wider separated peaks give higher colour separation - but less light to the sensor, which means more noise. No doubt Leica fitted very good filters, sacrificing the noise-values. This has nothing to do with the sensor per se.
Most other companies (except Sony) have gone the other way lately, which is good for midnight shooters and bad for landscapers/studio people. Here's an example of what happened between the 5D and the 5D2 - check the separation/width of the blue and green channels, and take a guess why many landscapers think/thought that the 5D2 had a much lower pixel-to-pixel detail quality, mostly regarding colour...
brainiac wrote:
With lenses like the Canon 24 f1.4 mk2 available
Yes. The problem is that you need a DSLR to mount it on. What's the point of comparing DSLRs to DRF's? If you want a DRF you want a DRF, not a sports camera. The news today is that if you are this person you can either:
- Start studying to be a dentist, or
- Divorce and get an M9.
At least today you have these 2 options, yesterday you had none. Thanks Leica
The most attractive points to the M9, in my opinion, are
- the weight
- the lenses (and the weight thereof)
- and the weak anti-aliasing filter.
As someone who backpacks into the wilderness for landscape photography, I'd love to carry a 1.2 pound (600g?) body and only three or four of the tiny, jewel-like lenses. But aside from the cost, I'd really like to have seen some implementation of live view for critical focusing on a tripod. Perhaps with the M10, or possibly Cosina?
What's next - cameras made in Angola because labor costs are too high in China?
I don't know about Angola, but in 10 to 20 years, that's exactly what I expect to happen. China's rising middle class will demand higher wages and they'll get them for a while, but then manufacturers will begin shifting to other countries - India, VietNam, Singapore, etc. And if African governments (or even Middle-East governments) get their act together, stabilize their countries and eliminate corruption, they could potentially get this business as well.
While Leica customers are an exception, unfortunately, while people complain that manufacturing is disappearing from their country, they are unwilling to pay more to keep the jobs. People want their $45 DVD players and $8 t-shirts. The fact that a company can make a DVD player, ship it around the world and have the manufacturer, the manufacturing company, the distributor and the retailer all still make money is kind of incredulous to me, but they obviously each make so little, it's no mystery why wages are so depressed. On a positive note, it is spreading wealth from richer countries to poorer countries. But on a negative note, a lot of people are getting screwed. Sometimes I have a fantasy where it once again becomes inefficient to ship goods around the world and manufacturers have to return to local manufacturing.
Granted I have not spent too much time examining this camera, but after zipping through this thread, looking at the images, and contemplating the steep asking price I keep thinking of the Tom Hanks movie, Toy Story, where he kept raising his hand to say "I don't get it..."
Spyro P. wrote:
Yes. The problem is that you need a DSLR to mount it on.
I just had a thought.. since the wide angle image quality issues with FF DRF are a product of the rear element being so close to the sensor, why not just adapt retrofocus lenses for use on an M
Ya sure they are hefty by comparison but it might be a solution since with UWA you dont paricularly need coupled focusing -unless you're at 1.4. laser rangefinder anyone? leica has already had laser rangefinders in binoculars for years.
I was dreaming about it the other day - zuiko 21 and 24 adapted to my film RF would be sweet! Zone-focus FTW!
Empire wrote:
.. why not just adapt retrofocus lenses for use on an M
Two problems: the viewfinder would be blocked, and part of the appeal of the rangefinder is the compact size. You certainly could put an SLR WA lens on the M with an adapter: lose accurate focus, viewfinder, and compact size, but it can be done.
The current M wide-angle lenses are retrofocus but not to the extent an SLR WA lens is. Part of the reason the M wide-angle lenses are so expensive is because their design and construction considers rangefinder/viewfinder blockage, thus the use of aspherical surfaces to reduce the size of the lens.
PhotoMaximum wrote:
Granted I have not spent too much time examining this camera, but after zipping through this thread, looking at the images, and contemplating the steep asking price I keep thinking of the Tom Hanks movie, Toy Story, where he kept raising his hand to say "I don't get it..."
That was Big. He was an animated cowboy in Toy Story.
After reviewing the M9 specs, I'm impressed. Bravo, Leica, for a breakthrough product. Even the price is plausible. I wouldn't touch the M8 with a 10-foot barge pole, but the M9 has turned everything around (AA filter excepted). My M4 is certainly going nowhere, but the D300/17-55 rig may need to find a new home.
brainiac wrote:
That's just the problem: this is _exactly_ "the kind of camera one looks at for high ISO".
Yep, that's exactly my thinking, as well, as you wouldn't use the M9 in the studio, don't you...
Anyone knows more about the dynamic range?
Following the examples at depre, it looked quite good.
If the M9 had in body IS I could live with ISO 2500 knowing most of the Leica M glass perform great wide open.
I could see myself with a M9, an ASPH 28/2.8 (or 28/f2 but it is blocking some of the viewfinder image), a 50/2 and a 75/2.
The only thing holding me back is that if I got that set up Brainiac would be complaining about the lack of bokeh and threedee from the Leica lenses, and I can't bear that. I just can't.
I would settle with a m9, CV 20, CV 35, CV 50 and Leica 75 2.5 or ZM 80 2.0.
With f/1.2 and 1.1 at 35 and 50, I could live with iso 1600-2500 being top. But if the conclusion is that the leica is 2 stops behind the d700, and not 1-1.5... well, I dunno
Too me it looks like a decent camera, not made for pixelpeeping though, good enough even for fairly large prints. Too bad that CCD sensors can not employ LiveView
I wouldn't touch the M8 with a 10-foot barge pole, but the M9 has turned everything around (AA filter excepted). My M4 is certainly going nowhere, but the D300/17-55 rig may need to find a new home.