atanabe
Member
Justin Staley from Leica NJ is in town for the LHSA convention here in Seattle and he was demoing the X1 and S2 at Glazers Camera.
My first impressions of the S2 was WOW! It is about the size of the R9 and had great ergonomics, the hand grip had a rubber finish that formed nicely to my hands, controls minimal and well placed. Weight of the camera was about the Nikon D1X range, heavy, but well balanced. The viewfinder was bright and clear, the diopter adjustment ring LARGE and easy to see. The mounted lens, 70 mm f2.5 Summarit had very fast autofocus and focused down to a 4"x6" area.
The shutter was quiet, and the mirror very well damped for such a large mirror surface. I could not feel any recoil from the shutter or mirror "slap" if you can even call it that. The shutter cocking was whisper quiet as well. I can easily see hand holding this camera with no worries of camera vibration induced motion. A lot of thought went into the design of this camera, down to the little things such as battery release is two part, actuate the lever once and the battery drops down actuate again for it to drop out. Important as there is no door to the battery compartment. The buttons for control of the camera were very sparse, just four on the back and a control dial near the right thumb. You select the function with one of the four buttons and then use the thumb wheel to select the option, easy. Such a welcome change from the rest of the herd with a bazilliion buttons all over the place. I am anxious to see how well this camera performs shooting outside of the studio.
Okay now for the bad part, kidneys only go for $10,000 US and that would not be enough for half an S2 body.
The X1 was also there and not to be foreshadowed by it's bigger brother. The X1 has a clean design reminiscent of the original Leica and the latter O camera. It felt sturdy in my hands and the only gripe that I had was the need to have my arms out to frame and focus the darned thing. This camera will really need to have the optional optical finder for my use.
I could envision a great kit, the S2 with 35, 70 and 180 and the X1, should handle most needs and also drain the budget of a small city :talk028:.
Cheers,
Al
My first impressions of the S2 was WOW! It is about the size of the R9 and had great ergonomics, the hand grip had a rubber finish that formed nicely to my hands, controls minimal and well placed. Weight of the camera was about the Nikon D1X range, heavy, but well balanced. The viewfinder was bright and clear, the diopter adjustment ring LARGE and easy to see. The mounted lens, 70 mm f2.5 Summarit had very fast autofocus and focused down to a 4"x6" area.
The shutter was quiet, and the mirror very well damped for such a large mirror surface. I could not feel any recoil from the shutter or mirror "slap" if you can even call it that. The shutter cocking was whisper quiet as well. I can easily see hand holding this camera with no worries of camera vibration induced motion. A lot of thought went into the design of this camera, down to the little things such as battery release is two part, actuate the lever once and the battery drops down actuate again for it to drop out. Important as there is no door to the battery compartment. The buttons for control of the camera were very sparse, just four on the back and a control dial near the right thumb. You select the function with one of the four buttons and then use the thumb wheel to select the option, easy. Such a welcome change from the rest of the herd with a bazilliion buttons all over the place. I am anxious to see how well this camera performs shooting outside of the studio.
Okay now for the bad part, kidneys only go for $10,000 US and that would not be enough for half an S2 body.
The X1 was also there and not to be foreshadowed by it's bigger brother. The X1 has a clean design reminiscent of the original Leica and the latter O camera. It felt sturdy in my hands and the only gripe that I had was the need to have my arms out to frame and focus the darned thing. This camera will really need to have the optional optical finder for my use.
I could envision a great kit, the S2 with 35, 70 and 180 and the X1, should handle most needs and also drain the budget of a small city :talk028:.
Cheers,
Al