3,5 months with my D-Lux 109

[monokul]

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Hi to all of you,

 

I have a D-lux 109 from 29th of May 2015 so here is my experience with it so far.

  After a couple of experiments in street photography I have discovered that I need fixed vario-lens camera. I wanted Leica badly. I've had Panasonic LX7 and it was time to spend the money for the red dot. The silent shutter, fixed vario-lens, fast manual controls, good integrated viewfinder and the red dot at a fairly acceptable price for first Leica made me spend the bucks.

  Since I'm still developing my style I try to shoot at 35mm, but sometimes I use 50 and even 75mm for the street shooting. The great thing is that I don't have to change lenses. I don't like the shape of the camera with the extended lens but I just have to accept it. The silent shutter (it makes virtually no sound) helps me fool the people that I'm not shooting yet while I can take 2-3 shots before they're out of the frame. The 3 options for autofocus speed is a brilliant idea, I use the slowest since I feel it should be the most accurate one. The camera uses contrast to autofocus and some times it is hard to trick it to focus where I want it to, but for that kind of situations there is a manual focus whit peaking option – works great for me but not on the street. I've discovered lately that the camera have troubles autofocusing moving water with light reflections but maybe this is the case with other cameras too, I have no experience.

   I'm a neck strap user so I have no concerns of dropping the camera. However I've made myself a metal case covered with jeans fabric and I've put a hand grip bump plus a thumb bump. The fabric gives me extra traction so I feel the camera very stable i my hand. The case is “no chimping” that means I've covered the display so that I can't check my pictures immediately. For that reason I have no observations on the display behavior. To save battery life the display is always off, and speaking of it I have two batteries and one of them is good for between 400 and 600 shots the second one is not a Leica battery.

  I don't use stabilization of the lens since it decreases the picture quality. I shoot mostly in daylight and I put the setting as follows speed 1/2000, f 4 and auto ISO. I try to keep the ISO at the native 200, so in the shadows I'm switching to f 2,8 and between 1/500 and 1/1000 depending on the amount of the light. The camera handles higher ISO very well, but this is in a fairly well lit situations. I don't do night shots with the Leica. I'm using the camera for my instagram but today I've picked 10 prints of my work in size of 40x60 cm. (about 16x20”) and I'm more than pleased from the results. I shoot RAW+JPEG so I keep the good RAWs and I throw away the bad ones, but I keep all the JPEGs to track my progress as a street photographer.

  I can't realy speak about the IQ (image quality) of the camera since I always use ACR (Adobe raw converter) to alter the images in the way I want. I process them a lot in the ACR and then I publish them on instagram. For the prints I did an extra sharpening in the Photoshop, because of the interpolation I've done to blow them up to the sizes they were printed. And having in mind that I crop them if needed sometimes they drop to 7-8 megapixels. Still very pleased with the print results.

  One thing many people are complaining is the lens fairing and I can't say it is so bad that you cant shoot with a low sun in the lens. It makes small light spots (usually one) that can be easily removed in Photoshop. So my general conclusion is that I'm very happy with the camera and I'm going to use it for many years I hope. The only serious problem for me is that after about the second month it started to suck dust on the sensor. From Leica offered a cleaning and assured me that the D-Lux 109 is not very susceptible to dust but from what I've learned about the extendable fixed lens cameras it is probably going to be permanent issue with different intensity. However I'm not planing to give up on the 109 and I'm slowly working my way around the issues since every camera has some.

  If some of you are interested of the work I've done with the Leica 109 you can check my Instagram profile @monokul. Since the 7^th frame of my “50 strangers project” and all of the “Vertical August project” are shot with the Leica. Some of the frames are made from the chest, so the camera have done a great job focusing fast enough to make the shot since I was not stopping to shoot my subjects. In Vertical August the case is different since I can't make descent vertical composition without looking trough the viewfinder, plus the idea was to grow guts and start pick up my camera in the peoples faces. O, there is a small lag in the switching between the display and the viewfinder is what I've discovered and this was one of the reasons I turned off the monitor. Now whenever I introduce the camera in front of my eye it is already showing the image in the viewfinder.

  I don't care about menu systems since I shoot professionally with Canon, I have Panasonic GX1 plus I shoot film on purely manual cameras so I just learn the menus and once I set the camera it's shooting time. I've programed a custom style and I see BW trough the viewfinder so it is easy for me to judge the contrast and the lines in the composition. If one wishes there is a filter effects that are applicable for the JPEGs only so if you shoot RAW+JPEG you have the freedom to change your mind later.

  I use no higher speed than 1/2000 because that's the last mechanical speed of the shutter and after that it's electronic which may distort moving objects in the shots.

  So this is all for now, If you have some questions feel free to ask. Happy shooting and good luck to all of you

[rhe]

Hi monokul,

 

Thank you for describing your experience with the D-Lux 109. I am an LX-7 shooter as you have been. I am thinking about trading up to an LX100 or D-Lux 109. What do you like best about the D-Lux 109 over the LX-7 now that you have switched?

 

Can you attach a few of your favourite D-Lux shots so we can see how things are going with you?  

 

 

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[monokul]

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[Hunebed]

nr. 2 is my favourite by far with the old chap in jeans and ty. Good to see you fair well with the 109 and a big thank you. Your post is inspiring and of relevance for a d-lux 6 user as well. 

[monokul]

Ok so a quick paralel between the Panasonic LX7 and the Leica D-Lux 109. I like the quick manual controls with the Leica the LX only have the aperture ring. The integrated viewfinder is huge, I was usin external EVF with the LX but it's not the same plus the external EVF was laging even in daylight durin camera rotation and movement. The manual focur ring of the 109 is a real pleasure comparing the left/right button of the LX. The 2,8 extra megapixels are useful in the 109. And last but not least the bigger sensor gives me the shalow depth of field and shooting at 35 mm at f 2,8 realy smuges the infinity, something nearly impossible with the LX unless you focus something at a short distance. The exposure compensation dial is probably huge for some users but I think it is not working in auto ISO, so I'm not using it but it' handy to have it as a direct manual control. Again about the IQ I can't tell anithing worthy since I shoot RAW and PP all my images, but the bigger sensor gives me more room to torture the files since the bigger photo sensors. That's all I can thik of right now as a differences between the two cameras. The upgrade makes sence and it's not just a desire it's a different experience. But the leica is bigger as a size and not a pocket camera at all

[rhe]

Thank you very much for sharing your excellent images! And for providing additional information about the improvements of the 109 over the LX7 as you have experienced!

 

I particularly find your images 005, 006, and 007 to hold my attention and they draw me to revisit more than a few times.

Edited August 16, 2015 by rhe

[intruder]

excellent write up and images, well done.

[photogray]

Hi and thanks for your comprehensive experiential post. As you are interested in stealth mode street photography, I too have a long history of this, going back to my first M3 in 1972. When I bought the D-Lux 109 I was amazed that I could operate it remotely with my iphone. I've been using my phone as a remote and no one has any idea they're being photographed. Amazing stuff. Now, if I could only take some great pictures again.....

Best,

Rob

[Tzengia]

Hi,

interesting report and nice pictures. One question, what is you opinion about the auto focus system? is this fast and reliable?

thaks

[monokul]

Hi,

interesting report and nice pictures. One question, what is you opinion about the auto focus system? is this fast and reliable?

thaks

 

The autofocus system has three options for the speed in which it's working. I've used them all and now I use the slowest. However from time to time it's not locking correctly. Now I'm trying to use the "direct focus eria" but the problem is that the camera does't seem to remeber this as a custom function. It's easy to turn it on by pressing the navigation ring in "up" direction. Two days ago in a sunny day at 11:00 AM I pointed the camera at a fearly contrasty moving figure and the camera didn't lock focus but it took the shot. It's happening quite rear but I can't say the autofocus is "DSLR"-like reliable. But in general I'm pleased with the results. If you leave it by it's own jujment sometimes the system locks on the background since there may be more contrasty objects.

[monokul]

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica Lux

[monokul]

Both images are shot at 1/1000 at F 2,8 and 35mm equivalent.