[wilfredo]

Originally Posted by Karlumix

My experience with the 14-150 has been very positive. Since buying it from B&H last summer, I have gotten great results on my L1. 11x17 prints of antique cars sharply detail radiator honeycombs, wheel spokes, and leather stitching.

Field testing the 14-150 against the 14-50 kit lens and the Olympus 70-300 shows no difference between the two Leica lenses in sharpness (center or edge), color rendition, fringing, or vignetting. Sometimes, it seems that there is more flare when shooting into a bright light source with the 14-150, but I have not been able to demonstrate that by comparison testing.

The Olympus 70-300 is not in the same league as the Leica 14-150 at 70, 100 or 150 mm. The decreased contrast and sharpness are readily apparent by comparing jpeg files. Shooting raw appears to decrease those differences, but I don't understand why. I did find it important to turn off the image stabilization on the 14-150 and 14-50 when using a tripod. Otherwise, the images are notably degraded.

The 14-150 has effectively retired the 14-50 f/2.8 that came with the camera. The 14-150 is slightly shorter at the 14 mm setting and is built using black-anodized aluminum instead of plastic for the lens body as in the 14-50 kit lens. The 1/2 stop in additional lens speed is not worth the extra carrying weight.

This sounds like a good honest evaluation.