rumors SL2 with 36MP sensor only

[Jon Warwick]

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If it did end up with less megapixels than the S1R, could one hypothetical reason be that backward integration of M lenses is less challenging on larger pixel-sized sensors?

[MarkP]

1 hour ago, nicci78 said:

47 MP from the Q2 is not state of the art. After using the Q2 after two months. I am not impressed at all. This sensor does not worth the trouble upgrading from Q. 

High ISO is worst that original Q. 

ISO 50 is buggy with blown out highlights caused by unreliable live histogram. Drives me crazy. 

Q2 is noticeably slower than Q. With a broken face detect AF. 

Q2 processor is too slow to handle 47MP. 

SL2 should have way faster CPU. 

Interesting.

Hard to imagine that with the Q2 at 47MP, and the next S pending (maybe...), that the SL2 will be anything other than 47MP (and maintain reasonable M-lens compatibility)

 

Edited August 25, 2019 by MarkP

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[thighslapper]

20 minutes ago, Jon Warwick said:

If it did end up with less megapixels than the S1R, could one hypothetical reason be that backward integration of M lenses is less challenging on larger pixel-sized sensors?

This is an issue that Leica is permanently stuck with ...... as the SL is branded as 'SLR without the R'. Backwards compatibility and the Eye Res EVF were THE MAIN selling points with this in mind.

The sensor will have to be a modified existing one or a custom design. I'd bet on the second .... and the difficulty in obtaining adequate processing power ..... and the issues that go with it such as battery life and heat ..... being the main reason why it's slow to appear. It cannot take 4 years to design and produce a replacement unless there is something more startling under the bonnet than 36mpx ..... or major problems with getting it all to work properly. If Leica are rigidly sticking to a 4 year update cycle then with a Flagship Professional FF Digital Camera they can't just offer a few minor tweaks ..... unless we are seeing the birth of another 'retro' product line that eschews most 'unnecessary' new specifications for a 'traditional' user experience .... 

Personally, 24 to 48mpx is the absolute MINIMUM I would think worthwhile upgrading for. I was a bit reluctant even at that as I thought the difference wouldn't be much,  but the increased linear resolution of 33% is actually noticeable in regular use, particularly with cropping and beneficial in prints at A3+ and A2. 48mpx Lumix RW2 files converted to DNG come in at an average of 50Mb so storage and processing is much the same.

 

Edited August 25, 2019 by thighslapper

[nicci78]

47MP sensor is still FSI design. 

If new 36MP is BSI it can be better overall 

[Chaemono]

What I find brilliant about that new 36 MPx Sony sensor, irrespective of whether the SL2 will use it or not, is that it’s fast, 20 fps of continuous shooting, it’s made for lighting fast AF with on-chip PDAF (who knows if Leica has the processor to make use of both 😁), and when one “slows it down” to 10 fps, it’s 16 bit and has almost two stops of DR improvement. Amazing! It’s made for stills and for video. After Sony used virtually the same sensor in the α7R III as in the II, one could have thought that Sony Semiconductor Solutions had lost their mojo. Maybe the 2016 Kumamoto earthquakes threw them back. They seem to be back on a roll and don’t just focus on 50 to 100 FF MPx sensors, thank you. 

Edited August 25, 2019 by Chaemono

[scott kirkpatrick]

1 hour ago, thighslapper said:

Personally, 24 to 48mpx is the absolute MINIMUM I would think worthwhile upgrading for. I was a bit reluctant even at that as I thought the difference wouldn't be much,  but the increased linear resolution of 33% is actually noticeable in regular use, particularly with cropping and beneficial in prints at A3+ and A2. 48mpx Lumix RW2 files converted to DNG come in at an average of 50Mb so storage and processing is much the same.

 

I'm coming around to seeing the value of all the extra pixels, even if i don't fill them with people.  But the issue in supporting legacy M lenses is simply the thickness of the cover glass layers.  These are needed whether back-side or front-accessed, and Leica has learned some tricks to keep them down to about 1 mm (a bit less in the M series), while others seem to be using closer to 2 mm or even 3-4 mm to solve other problems.  I don't think reducing the surface area of the pixel is a fundamental problem, as the wells simply need to hold 2^14 to 2^16 electrons to get the necessary bits of dynamic range.  So they get deeper to obtain the same volume.  Within the technology that Leica practices, the very similar DR plots for the SL(6 micron pixels) and the CL(4 micron pixels) show that this can be done.

Incidentally, I use LZ (.zip) encoding to reduce each day's worth of shots and discard the original raw files once the zipped data is backed up.  But I only see about 5% reduction in volume, not the 70 MB --> 50 MB that you quote for reducing RW2's to DNG's.  Are you using Adobe's translator, which may leave out the embedded jpegs?  Or reduce quality in some way that Adobe doesn't share?

 

[sillbeers15]

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I think all you guys have good arguments in due respect with individual perceptions.

with my good experience with Leica since M8, I trust Leica to give SL2 a go. In the event of deviation from my expectations, I’m ready to fall back on a S1R, which I think it is good enough for the SL native lenses and make do with all the buttons and typical Jap camera user interface.

[nicci78]

17 minutes ago, scott kirkpatrick said:

 

Incidentally, I use LZ (.zip) encoding to reduce each day's worth of shots and discard the original raw files once the zipped data is backed up.  But I only see about 5% reduction in volume, not the 70 MB --> 50 MB that you quote for reducing RW2's to DNG's.  Are you using Adobe's translator, which may leave out the embedded jpegs?  Or reduce quality in some way that Adobe doesn't share?

 

Do not zip photo files. It is useless and not convenient. 

Converting to DNG is not enough. You have to also choose between lossless or lossy compression. In Lightroom or in DNG Converter. 

[panoreserve]

Am 23.8.2019 um 16:27 schrieb nicci78:

Hi everybody, I got some info from well known french Leica seller. 

SL2 will not sports Q2’s 47MP sensor. But rather an in between pixel count, around 36 or 37.5MP. 

Because SL2 doesn’t need to crop heavily as the fixed lens Q2. You can change optics or just zoom in. 

The idea is to provide a very fast SL2 with just enough more pixels to make sense. But not to much to protect clean high and fast operation. 

Announcement in September 2019  

New body : slightly smaller but way better looking  

Did you get same information from your reseller ? 

 

 

Sounds unlikely. Please keep in mind that esp. the SL-Apo-Summicrons are designed for > 80 or even 100MP. Their resolving power would be a „dead capital“ - at least for the next 4 years...🙁

[thighslapper]

2 hours ago, scott kirkpatrick said:

Incidentally, I use LZ (.zip) encoding to reduce each day's worth of shots and discard the original raw files once the zipped data is backed up.  But I only see about 5% reduction in volume, not the 70 MB --> 50 MB that you quote for reducing RW2's to DNG's.  Are you using Adobe's translator, which may leave out the embedded jpegs?  Or reduce quality in some way that Adobe doesn't share?

I just use Adobe's freely available DNG converter. I've left it with the default preferences. I presume there is some sort of lossless compression involved as the file size spread is fairly wide ....

I use the converted DNG's and archive the original RW2 files on one of my external back up drives.... just in case ..... 

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Edited August 25, 2019 by thighslapper

[Chaemono]

vor 20 Minuten schrieb panoreserve:

Sounds unlikely. Please keep in mind that esp. the SL-Apo-Summicrons are designed for > 80 or even 100MP. Their resolving power would be a „dead capital“ - at least for the next 4 years...🙁

On the surface, there seems to be some merit to this argument. But Leica makes the SL lenses future-proof for two decades, not for the next camera iteration. 😂

[caissa]

5 hours ago, nicci78 said:

47 MP from the Q2 is not state of the art. After using the Q2 after two months. I am not impressed at all. This sensor does not worth the trouble upgrading from Q. 

High ISO is worst that original Q. 

ISO 50 is buggy with blown out highlights caused by unreliable live histogram. Drives me crazy. 

Q2 is noticeably slower than Q. With a broken face detect AF. 

Q2 processor is too slow to handle 47MP. 

SL2 should have way faster CPU. 

Many of these problems sound like software problems. I am not astonished that this is so, as Leica is looking for sw engineers. The S1R is better because it has better software. It is actually good enough for me. And good enough for pro use.

So Leica is well advised not to go completely off the beaten track with a different sensor, and the need to write more software on their own.

[caissa]

5 hours ago, colonel said:

Reminding folk that Leica sensors for the SL are custom designed and have angled micro lenses at the edge. This is the kind of specialisation you are getting that’s different. All Leica FF and MF sensors have been custom designed. Only it’s ApS-C and smaller ones are off the shelf

The over sized, over weight, over buttoned Panasonic FF cameras with their last generation AF are a poor benchmark for what Leica must do. I think the SL (Version 1) is better then these cameras in every way, especially speed. I would also rather have the 24mp Leica sensor with thinner glass and angled micro lenses then the Panasonic S1R sensor, but that’s just me.

As someone who has used the latest generation of Canon, Nikon and the last generation of Sony FF mirrorless, I would unhesitatingly pick Sony if I was on a smaller budget and Leica if I had more budget bandwidth. In some ways this is exactly what Leica must be trying to achieve in the market. It has to sell 10000s of cameras, not 100000s 

I don’t think Leica has this strategy. They do not have the staff to produce 10000s cameras. They are already in trouble with the Q2. It is a bad dream if you hope for that. The cameras are built manually, so very difficult to speed it up.

I just wonder how many cameras Panasonic produces every month.

Edited August 25, 2019 by caissa

[caissa]

3 hours ago, Chaemono said:

What I find brilliant about that new 36 MPx Sony sensor, irrespective of whether the SL2 will use it or not, is that it’s fast, 20 fps of continuous shooting, it’s made for lighting fast AF with on-chip PDAF (who knows if Leica has the processor to make use of both 😁), and when one “slows it down” to 10 fps, it’s 16 bit and has almost two stops of DR improvement. Amazing! It’s made for stills and for video. After Sony used virtually the same sensor in the α7R III as in the II, one could have thought that Sony Semiconductor Solutions had lost their mojo. Maybe the 2016 Kumamoto earthquakes threw them back. They seem to be back on a roll and don’t just focus on 50 to 100 FF MPx sensors, thank you. 

I thought the AF technology will come from Panasonic anyway. And there currently 5 frames/s seems to be the best they can in FF. This is good enough for me. So what would it be good for, if the camera had 20 frames/s but without AF ?  Good on paper, but not really useful in practice. And also completely unnecessary for most users. Collecting an awful lot of rubbish that needs to be cleaned up again.

There is the 6K/30 mode if you absolutely need 30 frames/s.  (18MP pictures). (In the S1R).

Edited August 25, 2019 by caissa

[panoreserve]

vor 24 Minuten schrieb Chaemono:

On the surface, there seems to be some merit to this argument. But Leica makes the SL lenses future-proof for two decades, not for the next camera iteration. 😂

In digital age 4 years are a long time...Given a (hypothetical) 36MP-SL2, which (I‘m sure) would be a huge flop in the market,  future SL- iterations (Mk III in 2023 etc.) will be  highly questionable...

Edited August 25, 2019 by panoreserve

[Chaemono]

vor 18 Minuten schrieb caissa:

Many of these problems sound like software problems....The S1R is better because it has better software.

Exactly. That’s why the S1R sensor gets a higher DxOMark than the Q2’s even though it’s essentially the same sensor. 😂

vor 18 Minuten schrieb caissa:

So Leica is well advised not to go completely off the beaten track with a different sensor, and the need to write more software on their own.

There seems to be a misunderstanding here. Their likely decision, if Nicci is to be believed, to go with Sony for the SL2 sensor is to leverage Sony’s image sensor and image processing expertise coupled with Sony’s manufacturing capabilities. It fills an engineering gap they had in-house, it doesn’t create one. 

vor 5 Minuten schrieb caissa:

I thought the AF technology will come from Panasonic anyway. And there currently 5 frames/s seems to be the best they can in FF. This is good enough for me. So what would it be good for, if the camera had 20 frames/s but without AF ?  Good on paper, but not really useful in practice.

It’s all speculation at this point anyway. Leica may not even have the processor to handle faster AF. But one would think that were they to go with that new 36 MPx Sony sensor with on-chip PDAF, that they would try to license AF technology to complement it, and obviously not from Panasonic. 

vor 6 Minuten schrieb caissa:

And also completely unnecessary for most users.

🤣 It’s this attitude that made Panasonic fail to include in their DSLR-sized FF mirrorless bodies PDAF. And sales are so sloooooow.

vor 7 Minuten schrieb panoreserve:

In digital age 4 years are a long time...Given a (hypothetical) 36MP-SL2, which (I‘m sure) would be a huge flop in the market,...

Yeah, whatever. 

[caissa]

Sony is a huge company and chip production and camera prod are not necessarily in the same sub company. The question is, is the AF software part of chip prod or does it belong to camera prod. And are they willing to share/license that sw ?

Edited August 25, 2019 by caissa

[caissa]

A camera that allows more cropping is for me more useful than a camera that is faster (e.g. 20 frame/s). So I would simply prefer 47 MP.

Nice would be a cropped mode for tele (and maybe more speed). Like the Canon 5DSR that has 1.3x and 1.6x crop if needed. (50, 30, 20 MP to choose from).

[jaapv]

32 minutes ago, Chaemono said:

Exactly. That’s why the S1R sensor gets a higher DxOMark than the Q2’s even though it’s essentially the same sensor. 😂

Which is essentially the gripe I have with DxO: They present camera output as if it were sensor quality.

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[Chaemono]

vor 49 Minuten schrieb caissa:

Sony is huge and chip production and camera prod are not necessarily in the same sub company. The question is, is the AF software part of chip prod or does it belong to camera prod. And are they willing to share that sw ?

Very good question. It’s clearly stated that Sony will make the 36 MPx sensor available to customers. One would hope that AF software to complement its on-chip PDAF functionality  is offered, too. 

vor 40 Minuten schrieb caissa:

A camera that allows more cropping is for me more useful than a camera that is faster (e.g. 20 frame/s). So I would simply prefer 47 MP.

The nice thing about that Sony sensor is that speed is just one aspect of it. 16 bit for 10 fps and almost 2 stops of DR improvement is what attracts me. With ON1 Resize, one can upsize 36 MPx to useful 72 MPx and then crop 70 percent if needed. There’ll be plenty of detail in the crop, especially with the Summicrons. 😁