sillbeers15 Posted February 25, 2016 Share #1 Posted February 25, 2016 Advertisement (gone after registration) I have been curious about the Leica SL's AF make up ever since I had the camera. It looks like: FF CMOS sensor + Mestro II processor + Panasonic GH4 Contrast AF platform = Leica SL (Type 601) Any thoughts from anyone else? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advertisement Posted February 25, 2016 Posted February 25, 2016 Hi sillbeers15, Take a look here Leica SL (Type 601) Auto Focus Technology. I'm sure you'll find what you were looking for!
ramarren Posted February 25, 2016 Share #2 Posted February 25, 2016 I have no idea whatever what CDAF system Leica is using or whether it was licensed from someone else and then modified to suit. All I am sure of is that it works very very well. Part of that has to be the mechanical optimization that Leica has put into the Vario-Elmarit-SL 24-90mm lens: it only moves one, very light and pretty small element to effect the focus, with a very fast servo that can traverse the entire focus range in 110 milliseconds. I understand that the upcoming 90-280 will similarly move two small, light lens elements, and likely with two of those same servomotors. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cpclee Posted February 25, 2016 Share #3 Posted February 25, 2016 Agreed. AF on the SL as well as on the Q is impeccably well implemented and puts Leica in a very good competitive position with the very best rivals out there. If you think that back in 2009 or so when they launched the X1 its contrast detection AF was still rather slow and below average, they really have come a long way. The product manager of X1 btw was someone Leica hired away from Panasonic. I assume he brought a lot of Japanese camera technologies and sourcing knowledge to Leica which probably have benefited Leica tremendously since. No modern camera can get away from having some components from Japan. That's where 99% of the world's camera supply chain is based. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sillbeers15 Posted February 25, 2016 Author Share #4 Posted February 25, 2016 Well thanks for the additional information, I was hoping for someone who knows more than me to contribute to this tread so that it can contain meaningful information for whoever that reads it. I'm just a hobbyist, so I do not have enough experience in comparing various current AF technology available to compare the SL's AF capability and judge it's worth. As I read on more about Panasonic GH4 reviews and product specific(which has been in the market one year ahead of the Leica SL), I see more similarities between both camera's AF system (btw GH4 has been praised in reviews about its contrast AF detection speed on AF-S and average AF-C speed comparing to other mirrorless & even D4). Firstly, both camera's AF is Contrast detection only (most new Mirrorless have both Phase detect & contrast detection), both have stabilizer only 'in lens', looking at the contact point between the battery grip of both camera looks identical again,.... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
steppenw0lf Posted February 26, 2016 Share #5 Posted February 26, 2016 Just one thing to add: I find focus peaking very well implemented. Much better than in other brands. (For me this is "AF for the poor".) This is probably also related to the nice and swift EVF. Stephan Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wlaidlaw Posted February 29, 2016 Share #6 Posted February 29, 2016 If you want to see how bad peaking can be, look at Olympus' implementation of it on the EP-5. For a start it is either in black or white, which can be confused with parts of the image and when it does appear, it is a blobby fuzzy mess. The SL's peaking, especially with high contrast lenses, is first class. My only suggestion for a possible improvement would be to offer the option of amber coloured peaking, which I have seen on another camera (I forget which) and I thought it was an excellent contrasting colour. There are times the AF does not work. If you are trying to focus on distant objects and there is any haze, the lens will refuse to pick up a focus. I wonder if this is one of the cases where a phase detection system would work better than the Contrast Detection in the SL. Wilson Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramarren Posted February 29, 2016 Share #7 Posted February 29, 2016 Advertisement (gone after registration) Wilson, I've seen situations where AF does not work occur with every camera, PDAF or CDAF. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlashGordonPhotography Posted February 29, 2016 Share #8 Posted February 29, 2016 Wilson, I've seen situations where AF does not work occur with every camera, PDAF or CDAF. Ain't that the truth...... Long live the M. Gordon Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
talt03 Posted March 1, 2016 Share #9 Posted March 1, 2016 Wilson, I've seen situations where AF does not work occur with every camera, PDAF or CDAF. Check this one. It may change our impression and later we'll ask for more.http://oleliodden.com/photo-gear/field-reviews/beta-test-report-nikon-d5/. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramarren Posted March 1, 2016 Share #10 Posted March 1, 2016 Check this one. It may change our impression and later we'll ask for more. http://oleliodden.com/photo-gear/field-reviews/beta-test-report-nikon-d5/. I expect the Nikon's AF performs quite well. I doubt it's perfect... But the reason I bought the SL was to use my R lenses, where I have focal lengths from 15mm to 500mm that all perform very nicely. One reason I'm not buying a Nikon D5 is that I won't buy a whole new slew of lenses. I might buy one more SL AF lens. Maybe. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sillbeers15 Posted March 1, 2016 Author Share #11 Posted March 1, 2016 I'm still in the process of trying out the SL lens' AF capability. At the moment, my intentions is to combine using the AF & some of my M & R lenses. I'm excited about the coming 90 to 280mm AF zoom. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
steppenw0lf Posted March 1, 2016 Share #12 Posted March 1, 2016 Hello Wilson, here your citation. Unfortunately I mixed it up when editing. There are times the AF does not work. If you are trying to focus on distant objects and there is any haze, the lens will refuse to pick up a focus. I wonder if this is one of the cases where a phase detection system would work better than the Contrast Detection in the SL. Wilson I also wondered and tried to find out more about the differences between phase-detection AF and contrast AF. This is not the absolute truth, so please correct it, if you have newer information: Contrast AF is related to life view, while pd AF is related to classic digital cameras. (It is unclear how definitiv this is). Question: Could that mean that everybody is always using contrast AF, when lifeview is activated (on any camera) ? Phase detection AF compares two images and if they are not equal, then it knows what to do to correct this. This way it also knows approximately how much it has to correct the focus and in which direction. Contrast AF cannot do this (it does not compare two images), so it could first go into the wrong direction, or correct too much (and needs to undo part of this overcorrection). Because of this difference in the algorithm, in general opinion phase detection AF is regarded as being quicker - I think this is just an opinion and not necessarily scientifically founded. Regarding the sensitivity of each type of AF (that was your remark) no general statement can be made. So we cannot expect that a system with pd AF would be able to work under worse conditions (speak less light or contrast). It all depends on the current state of technology. This is probably over-simplified, and so I'm glad if somebody with more knowledge can demystify it and shed more light (or contrast) on this picture. Stephan Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ario Arioldi Posted March 2, 2016 Share #13 Posted March 2, 2016 Actually many of the current mirrorless cameras can use both the PD (faster) and CD (accurate) technology depending on the circumstances. Then there is the new Panasonic DFD (Depth From Defocus) technology well described here http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/panasonic-gh4/panasonic-gh4TECH.HTM which is supposed to overcome the speed limitation of the CD technology. Has DFD been also implemented into Leica Q and Leica SL? Based on the cooperation agreements between Leica and Panasonic it does not seem unrealistic. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sillbeers15 Posted March 3, 2016 Author Share #14 Posted March 3, 2016 I had disappointing results trying to lock focus (will not allow to trigger shutter without) on small moving subject (bird in flight) when using single point tracking focus (AF-C) on the SL. Without enough experience using other DSLR AF systems, I'm not certain if it were b/c the SL AF-C is just not good or my application on 'single point' is not an appropriately used on tracking subject or that in general no single point AF system will work well tracking small moving subjects? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.