Good discussion points Roger.
While the ship has sailed, and any further points about CCD are most certainly moot, I still wonder if Leica prematurely abandoned the CCD uniqueness that separated it from other CMOS solutions. BTW, I fear they will do the same with the next S camera.
While I agree that above ISO 800 (or maybe 1000 if you have your shooting/PP skills honed), the M9 can start getting jinky ... I also wonder if the CCD technology had been fully explored, and whether a 1.3x CMOS gain in higher ISO demonstrated in Read's comparison was really all that impossible with CCD.
I say this because I experienced how Hasselblad had improved CCD ISO performance to provide a 40 meg sensor with an ISO 1600 performance visibly better than the 800 that proceeded it ... which BTW, clearly outperforms the S2 at ISO 1250 by a good margin.
To date I'm not a big fan of ANY CMOS camera above 1600, so if Leica can tweak the new M to perform at 2000 to 3200, they will have something. It will remain all in the eye of the beholder.
In addition to the DMR with its Imacon solution, I also herald back to the Contax N Digital which used a 6 meg full-frame Phillips CCD and produced spectacular color and tonal depth. Both these camera suffered horrible power issues, which with modern Lithiums would NOT be such an issue today. Same with highly tweaked PP profiles we have now.
Basically, I see this new M as having been driven to provide versatility in using SLR lenses and shooting video ... neither of which I have any interest in with a rangefinder. Hopefully, the only advantage with the clip-on EVF is that it can be improved without replacing the camera.
-Marc
While the ship has sailed, and any further points about CCD are most certainly moot, I still wonder if Leica prematurely abandoned the CCD uniqueness that separated it from other CMOS solutions. BTW, I fear they will do the same with the next S camera.
While I agree that above ISO 800 (or maybe 1000 if you have your shooting/PP skills honed), the M9 can start getting jinky ... I also wonder if the CCD technology had been fully explored, and whether a 1.3x CMOS gain in higher ISO demonstrated in Read's comparison was really all that impossible with CCD.
I say this because I experienced how Hasselblad had improved CCD ISO performance to provide a 40 meg sensor with an ISO 1600 performance visibly better than the 800 that proceeded it ... which BTW, clearly outperforms the S2 at ISO 1250 by a good margin.
To date I'm not a big fan of ANY CMOS camera above 1600, so if Leica can tweak the new M to perform at 2000 to 3200, they will have something. It will remain all in the eye of the beholder.
In addition to the DMR with its Imacon solution, I also herald back to the Contax N Digital which used a 6 meg full-frame Phillips CCD and produced spectacular color and tonal depth. Both these camera suffered horrible power issues, which with modern Lithiums would NOT be such an issue today. Same with highly tweaked PP profiles we have now.
Basically, I see this new M as having been driven to provide versatility in using SLR lenses and shooting video ... neither of which I have any interest in with a rangefinder. Hopefully, the only advantage with the clip-on EVF is that it can be improved without replacing the camera.
-Marc