Shooters.

The Leica has always been the dream camera for many. Even if the German manufacturer started out slowly into the digital photography era and went through hard financial times, it stands on both feet again and delivers high quality digital cameras that make some of us invest their private pension funds. I’m far away from being able to invest so much money into a camera, but am lucky enough to get them to shoot with from time to time.

This weekend has been a real bliss to me, since I had a Leica X1, a M8 and a M9 to use and enjoy. I’ll let you know a couple of my findings in the next days.

Today I’d like to start with a crazy quick comparison of the image quality of the M9 and the X1. They aren’t really comparable in other aspects. The X1 has a fixed lens, autofocus and is rather a large-sensor compact camera and not a rangefinder like the M8 or the M9. The X1 costs about 1.600,– Euros, while the M9 sells for about 5.500,– Euros. But – as the M9 – the X1 delivers digital images. So how good are they compared to the M9? (Read on after the break!) weiter lesen

Since so many visitors come from countries, where German is hardly on the fringes, I decided to give you guys an english version of some of my blog entries. Let me apologise for my English first – I know there will be a lot of mistakes, since it’s not my motherlanguage, but I figured, it might be better than those often funny google translations.

I’d like to start with this real world comparison of these three small competent cameras: The brand new Sony Nex-3, the Olympus E-PL1 and the Leica X1.

Why are they milestones among cameras? Because they are reasonably compact and still have a large Sensor in them, that promises image quality similar to DSLRs.
The choice between those Smaccs gets larger and larger. Photokina is coming in September and a lot of rumors tell us, there might be new models being introduced in the upcoming months.

I wanted to know, which one of the small competent cameras – let’s call them Smaccs from now on – suits my needs and my likings the best? I wanted to do a comparison in a real world setting and not in a Lab. I appreciate technical reviews but figured that only the realworld reviews available on the net from great guys like Steve Huff and others eventually influence my choice making process.
So this comparison isn’t meant to deliver scientific charts, but everyday experience to give you a feeling for the cameras. Technical data on paper and using these cameras are totally different stories.

The contestants

I made a choice of three different brands and three different concepts:

• The new Sony Nex-3 with the 18-55/3.5-5.6 OSS kit lens
• The Olympus E-PL1, which has been on the market for a couple of months and prooved to be a great camera.
• And the Leica X1, being the most expensive among Smaccs right now. I’d like to thank my friend René, who gave his camera to me for a weekend (www.digitalcameragraz.at)

weiter lesen