Leica S2, Quick Flirt.

I’m not for a minute going to claim I know anything about medium format cameras, let alone digital MF stuff. What I do know is that the Leica S2 is an awesome camera!

I was given the opportunity by the Leica distributor in Australia to give the S2 a “test drive” so to speak. I booked a nice sunny day and headed to the beach. :)

Now I know the dynamic range on medium format is meant to be good but wow this is from another world! Even shooting at the slow 1/125 shutter speed I was not clipping on the highlights where I would have with my Canon 1DS MKII.

I was advised the body was weather sealed as well! It handled quite nice, kind of like a 5D/D700/K7 on steroids. Taller and wider!

The LCD is not the best but still better than what I am used to! (1.8″ LCD on my 1DS MKII). The S2 I was loaned only came with a 70mm lens which I initially was not too sure about but due to being MF, it did give me a nice DoF even at f/16!

The viewfinder is huge and bright! I had no issues looking through it :D

The whole camera is as if a minimalist junkie was let loose on this thing, there’s not much labelling on it besides the shutter speeds on the dial and the Leica badging. There are 4 main buttons on the back of the body with nothing to indicate what they do. A tiny LCD sits next to the shutter speed dial and that’s about it.

I didn’t even setup the camera, just told the handler what settings I needed and it was handed to me ready to shoot. Now if only my assistants could do that too! haha.

One interesting note is the center only focusing point in the S2. Shoot and recompose is ok at f/16 but I dare say that shooting wide open would require the user to get focus and then a quick tweak of the focusing ring before firing the shutter.

This is my first taste of digital medium format cameras and frankly it’s left me hanging for more! Now if only I had goose that laid golden eggs for me.

 

Comments