Leica T

Andy90

Andy90

Andy90

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Joined
5 Feb 2008
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Leica have announced a new camera to celebrate 100 years of Camera production - the Leica T.

Few posts can be found at

http://www.bjp-online.com/2014/04/leica-announces-new-t-camera-system/

DPreview has a number of articles, including

Construction shots

Leica Official Announcement

First impressions

It looks like an interesting design, being milled from a solid block of aluminium no doubt gives it a solid feel. Touchscreen on the rear looks nice too.

Not sure about the lack of a rubberised grip on the front - wouldn't want to fumble and drop it considering the body is £1350 with the lenses around £1300 each.

Does it bring anything new to the table? I don't think so, but as a design exercise its a nice clean looking camera (that is until you stick the viewfinder on the top!!)
 
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Not as outrageously stupid as I was first thinking but still a little out there.
The body price is actually lower than I was expecting, not value for money but affordable for a Leica. It is when you look at the lenses that I shudder, who honestly wants to pay £1250 for a 18-56mm f/3.5-5.6 zoom?

If I by a leica body it would be to use the real Lecia glass, not overprices glorified kit lenses

I would much rather pick up a Sony A7 (likely non R due to better focusing and speed) and FE 24-70mm f4 with a good chunk of money saved over the Leica to put towards the FE 70-200mm f4. Much better image quality.


As for the milled alu body. I'm really not a fan of these things, same with the mac pro chassis. People seem to think milling out of a solid block give the chassis special properties - it doesn't beyond being heavier. It is actually much easier to mill from a solid block as it can all be automated. Creating separate components that have to get screwed together requires greater assembly costs. The advantage of separate parts is that you have more freedom to construct shapes and joints that aren't possible from milling alone. I also prefer a good mix of polycarbonate with the chassis - it is stronger than equivalent thickness alu and is more robust to impact and thermal expansion. You see this with the mac pros - drop them and you get a big dent that cannot be repaired, drop a thinkpad or such like and nothing happens.
Adding good plastics would have reduced the leica body weight and improved strength overall if done correctly.

WRT to the body, yeah, sweaty hands or using it in the rain and the camera will slip right out without some rubber. I'm sure 3rd party glue on grips will appear (otherwise take an angle grinder to that alu...)


Still, I'm actually pleasantly surprised by the release, not as stupid as I thought it would be (like those retarded Hasselblad's that are just sony Nex bodies in fancy wood)
 
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Quite agree about the lenses - quite a large amount of cash for a slow lens.

would I splash out £2600 for it? No, at that sort of cash I think I'd probably go with the Sony R1XR - full frame 24mp with a 35mm f/2.0 lens. There are quite a few 4/3rd cameras out there that would do the job nicely too and less than half the price, such as the Fuji X-T1 or the Olympus OM-D.
 
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It's carrying the full Leica brand name so will be more expensive than a Sony which will work on different economies of scale. A Leica kit lens isn't your average kit lens though and hopefully the attention to detail is there which it should be for the price. The modern Leica glass is good no matter what format it is on, so hopefully this is no different. Good to see it isn't priced at Hasselblad Lunar levels.
 
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