No question here. I'm a big fan of the Leica SL series cameras and especially the SL2. High resolution, beautiful color and beautiful industrial design. Besides the price, what's not to love?
I just became aware that Leica updated the firmware in the camera from 4.1 to 5.0. In doing so they added an internal perspective control feature, which I think is really great for all those architectural shooters out there, but what they added for me that put a big smile on my face is the ability to pair an old manual (non-Leica) lens with the camera's really good image stabilization.
Previously the camera would look at whatever lens you put on it to see if it was: A. A native L mount lens from one of the three participants in that lens family. B. An R Rom lens mounted to the camera with a Leica R to L adapter. C. A coded Leica M lens mounted to the camera with a Leica M to L adapter. If you had Leica lenses that were not equipped with coding or rom you could look in the lens profiles and choose your Leica lens. There was no option to just key in the focal length of a non-profiled lens and take advantage of the in-body I.S.
Sure, you could cheat and select a lens from one of the Leica lens on the profile lists and make due but the profile for, say, the 50mm R Summilux, includes more than just the focal length. The engineers built profiles that take into consideration things like color shifts across the frame and those are different from lens to lens. Same with distortion characteristics and vignetting. Using an included profile not specific to your actual lens might give you I.S. but it might also provide you with a host of unwanted issues as well.
With the update to 5.0 you can now go into the menu and select a specific focal length for a "mystery" lens and the camera will use the information for the purposes of stabilization without messing up other parameters of the lens's imaging. It's really nice to have.
The update to 5.0 also enhances the performance of other makers's L mount lenses (Think: Sigma and Panasonic) when used on the Leica SL2. I'd conjecture that we'll see greater battery life and more responsive AF performance as a result.
This and the previous major firmware update (4.0) both added to the camera's depth, performance and video chops. It's a continuous transformation of an already great product.
But I have a pressing question.
Why is it that the world's "largest" digital camera review site made no mention of such an important upgrade on a current, production camera? Has DPR given up reporting on Leica products altogether or are they too busy noting what's in Chris Nichols's backpack when he goes out on a canoe ride to bother reporting major camera upgrades from a company that is both a legend in the industry and the most profitable (per unit) camera maker in the world?
I guess when Barney left we ended up depending on DPR's "B" team for timely info only to see laid bare that their real focus is on.......only contemporaneous, mainstream product launches and leaky articles about technology on which they have a very shaky grip. Caveat Emptor.
https://leica-camera.com/en-US/photography/cameras/sl/sl2-black/firmware
19 comments:
Kirk, why don't you tell us what you really think about that review site? LOL
Dick, The VSL censors prevent a full throated review of that site's shortcomings...
If Sony added grackle detect AF to one of their cameras the media storm would be relentless and infinitely detailed. Might even find a first year photographer to write a stirring article about how it changed his or her photographic life. With samples!
Man, if they could just train the AI in a camera to distinguish between a grackle and a crow ...
Robert, it's all about Grackle/Crow Equivalence...
A flock of crows are called a "murder". A flock of grackles are called a "plague". It's all bad with those birds... not a good choice to name AF after...
Yes, but with full frame, f2.8 is only equivalent to f5.6 on micro 43! LOL
Word.
But talking about existing cameras is so ... non monetize-able.
And me? I do a lot of work in the agriculture sector and am holding out for the first manufacturer to offer accurate bovine-detect AF.
Will be a "game changer".
Grackles. (derisive snort goes here).
Well, you mentioned the B team. Perfect for the big D review site's reader base? (Oops,I meant photographers who've risen above cheating on the ISO, equivalence, pixels, and stabilized f/0.95 zoom lenses?.)
To be fair, manually plugging in focal length for ibis has been a feature of many cameras for some time. I don't know that I've ever heard it mentioned in a review. But I agree, it's a very useful feature for folks like us who like playing with vintage glass.
Ronman, Certainly. And it's easy with Lumix cameras. When you mount a non-connecting lens on a GH6 for example and turn on the camera a menu pops up to ask if you want to assign a focal length. It's just that Leica only had automatic settings for L mount glass and your only option with non-L glass was to spoof the camera with one of the canned Leica lens profiles. And those profiles contain more than just focal length info.
I could say I'm glad that Leica finally caught up but I think I'll just be happy I can use the camera and my lenses the way I always wanted to.
kodachromeguy, We have graciously received aperture equivalency from the B team. But where is our shutter speed equivalency. So sad to miss out on Information about such an important concept.
Well, really, most of us don't give a hoot about the red dot. And as far as A-team and B-team goes, Check it out.....most pro photogs are using Nikon, Canon etc and it's the B-team that's using Leica.
And the top selling "car" in America is the Ford F-150 pick-up truck. The number one restaurant in the world, by popularity, is McDonalds. What's your point? Other than the idea that no one should be interested in cameras unless they are very popular with mainstream buyers.
And, "cough" "cough" Leica users are the B-team? That's rich.
Where did you sample the camera use of "pro" photographers? Would love to see the actual numbers; not including reviewers for DPR...
When I found out that my dentist wasn't using the latest turbine drill I fired him on the spot. Too bad, he really did nice work.
R.A.
“ With the update to 5.0 you can now go into the menu and select a specific focal length for a "mystery" lens and the camera will use the information for the purposes of stabilization without messing up other parameters of the lens's imaging. It's really nice to have.“
Unfortunately, my experience with the new firmware addition is not living up to my hopes, or my experience with similar capabilities from Panasonic. I tried using the new firmware last night with a couple of my Voightlander lenses on the Leica M-adapter. I mounted the lenses, set the focal length, and the camera went nuts. The EVF started twitching, and the menu would pop up with the statement “Unknown Lens”. Resetting the focal length did not help, nor did selecting from the Leica lens menu, or turning the lens detect off.
I think my situation may be caused by the lens mounts on both lenses I tried. Both of them are worn to the point that there is a ring of brass around the mount rather than chrome. Plus, the situation persisted after removing both lenses and remounting an uncoded Leica lens.
Your experience may be different than mine.
Good Luck!
PaulB
sorry to hear it Paul. I'm only using "dumb" adapters but I'm not experiencing any issues yet. I currently have a 50mm Canon FD lens on a dumb adapter and it's complying. I hope you get it sorted out.
Kirk
This is an update to my earlier post.
It appears that the suspected cause for my experience was correct. I just cleaned a significant amount of grunge off of my Leica M-adapter and now my uncoded M lenses work fine. The exposed brass on the other lens mounts must be playing a roll in how the optical code reader reacts to a mounted lens, the chunky bits of grunge probably didn’t help either.
Personally, I like dumb adapters. I have one for F-mount and R-mount lenses that work fine. M-mount seems to be where dumb adapters can be hit or miss, regardless of price. After trying two that had issues of tilt or swing, I decided that the smart money was just getting the Leica adapter.
Plus, I have had pleasing results using the Sigma EF-mount adapter; though auto-focus might be considered slow. So don’t over look any bargains in EF mount.
PaulB
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