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Leica CL, buy now or wait?


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2 minutes ago, Valau said:

SL to big and heavy for comfortable photography, M is a very nice camera but optical viewfinder not as good as the CL's digital one and can be prone to 'black out' under certain lighting conditions, CL + FF goes back to the original Barnack idea of a small pocketable camera

Not in the physics of this universe

CL + FF is much bigger then CL, even more so the lenses. More like Z6 size, or SL size

No way of making anything smaller then the M for FF. Which is FF without back focus correction and no AF

The SL is Leica's FF mirrorless. Already thought out and in production

 

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I love my CL (and yes, I bought it used); even more than my Q. But it does not produce the IQ of the SL, and it won't be anything close to the SL2, whatever that is. But I love it nonetheless and don't regret getting it for a pico second.

As to lenses. Get the 55-135: it is incredibly sharp, though I found it took some practice to get the best out of it. Try to get the 11-23, which is truly amazing and a great photographer can make it give the unbelievable L 16-35 a run for its money , but it is not now in stock anywhere. Best primes are the 23 and the outstanding 60 macro.

The kit zoom is the 18-56, which is much-maligned, but very good actually. The problem is that it is slow and essentially useless indoors or with bad light. Consider instead the newly announced much faster (and therefore heavier and less range) Panny L mount 24-70 f/2.8 which is Leica "blessed". I'm betting that's a great lens, and it's on my radar.

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1 hour ago, colonel said:

Not in the physics of this universe

CL + FF is much bigger then CL, even more so the lenses. More like Z6 size, or SL size

No way of making anything smaller then the M for FF. Which is FF without back focus correction and no AF

The SL is Leica's FF mirrorless. Already thought out and in production

 

If Sigma can do it with the fp then Leica must be able too!

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5 hours ago, jaapv said:

Yes, but do you need/want it? To me things like weathersealing, improved video and a better eye sensor are not worth the money it would cost.

I have to admit I'd be very happy to see a CL2 with in-body IS and better weather sealing, not to mention built-in sensor cleaning. But that's not preventing me from loving my CL1.

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2 hours ago, Valau said:

If Sigma can do it with the fp then Leica must be able too!

Are you kidding !

in addition to the FP having no grip or any external features of any kind, it’s lens size are strictly FF size, so the package is the same

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I know that on paper and probably also in reality the pure IQ of flagship full frames would be better and that a Z6 would probably cost the same. Problem is size and weight. 
I thought that going to mirrorless would have been a good compromise but actually I used basically only during a 3 years trip to Australia and rarely again.
A6400/A6600 are great cameras but seem to have the same issues in terms of ergonomy/feeling. They are not so ispiring.
The CL seems to me a very good compromise of size, functionality, ergonomy and feeling for the standard range 11-135mm => 16-200mm. For the few cases in which i will need anything longer I would probably get an inexpensive zoom camera or a C-Lux.

My question about the lifecycle was because i noticed that for APS/C it has been about 2 years between each model. 

Improvements over the current CL probably I would value IBIS and maybe a better ISO invariance, after all new generation sensors are getting better and better in low light.

 

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On 8/29/2019 at 9:37 AM, bags27 said:

I love my CL (and yes, I bought it used); even more than my Q. But it does not produce the IQ of the SL, and it won't be anything close to the SL2, whatever that is. But I love it nonetheless and don't regret getting it for a pico second.

As to lenses. Get the 55-135: it is incredibly sharp, though I found it took some practice to get the best out of it. Try to get the 11-23, which is truly amazing and a great photographer can make it give the unbelievable L 16-35 a run for its money , but it is not now in stock anywhere. Best primes are the 23 and the outstanding 60 macro.

The kit zoom is the 18-56, which is much-maligned, but very good actually. The problem is that it is slow and essentially useless indoors or with bad light. Consider instead the newly announced much faster (and therefore heavier and less range) Panny L mount 24-70 f/2.8 which is Leica "blessed". I'm betting that's a great lens, and it's on my radar.

I am an experienced SL user who purchased a used CL w/ 23 and 35-TL lenses about 6 months ago. Mainly, I was looking for a lighter system with reasonably sized and reasonably priced AF lenses. To be honest, I am hard pressed to see much difference in IQ between the two cameras. The same applies to the Q. I have also discovered some amazingly good recent Voigtlander lenses (Nokton 75/1.5 and Nokton 50/1.2) that are easy to focus manually on the CL. I would put them up against the very best M lenses from Leica. 

The only improvement that I want to see an a CL2 is in-body image stabilization.That would be especially useful when hand-holding longer focal length lenses at slow shutter speeds. We know that it is technically feasible without making the camera much larger.  Examples include the Leica Q and the Sony A6600. Please do it, Leica.

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On 8/29/2019 at 3:55 AM, ruskkyle said:

I have to respectfully disagree with the above sentiment @colonel.

The image quality of all the cameras you mention is, of course, fantastic. That is a given these days. But the CL is also a wonderful camera IQ-wise when paired with the right lenses and @matteolesinigo specifically mentions ergonomics and feel as contributing factors. I'm sorry but the simplicity and thoughfulness of Leica design is second to none and in that regard I'm sure he would be very happy making the switch.

 

Eh not second to none but yeah a major priority. I think it’s hit or miss given AEL toggle missing and other things. Speaking as a Q2 owner. I think Leica gets lazy due to this kind of constant mythology. Would be good if we all stopped speaking about them as if they can do no wrong and maybe we would get an even better product. 

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On 8/29/2019 at 10:59 AM, colonel said:

Not in the physics of this universe

CL + FF is much bigger then CL, even more so the lenses. More like Z6 size, or SL size

No way of making anything smaller then the M for FF. Which is FF without back focus correction and no AF

The SL is Leica's FF mirrorless. Already thought out and in production

 

Minolta CLE is smaller and better version of the M and the Sony RX1 is smaller and FF and could probably be increased in size just enough to support a FF mount theoretically. Just saying I don’t think that’s an accurate claim on behalf of the M. 

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On 8/29/2019 at 8:54 AM, Valau said:

SL to big and heavy for comfortable photography, M is a very nice camera but optical viewfinder not as good as the CL's digital one and can be prone to 'black out' under certain lighting conditions, CL + FF goes back to the original Barnack idea of a small pocketable camera

In my opinion no EVF is "as good" as the optical finder on the M for clarity of focus and composition.  I have been looking at them all, that are available to look through in stores, since I am considering a change to autofocus having 65 year-old eyes.  I would very much be interested in an upgraded CL if it would have something like the new Panasonic or Sony EVF, with increased resolution, clarity and higher magnification.  Weatherproofing would be nice since the CL looks to be a great travel/street camera.  APS-C is presently more than adequate and remember the Barnack camera used a smaller format size than the 6x9/9x12 which was typical at the time.  The f1.4 prime lenses are much too large, and the zoom is a bit too big and slow as well, the 18 Elmarit and 23 Summicron need a compact 75-90 prime lens addition to the line-up.  A CL-Vario with the above upgrades would be an excellent travel camera if the lens would have similar range but faster speed than the current f3.5-5.6 zoom, like f2.8-4.0.

Back to the original question; buy a CL now, but when the upgraded camera is announced original CL prices will drop significantly.  The decision is gambling on how long that will be vrs having a camera to use in the meantime.

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1 hour ago, Rick in CO said:

In my opinion no EVF is "as good" as the optical finder on the M for clarity of focus and composition.  I have been looking at them all, that are available to look through in stores, since I am considering a change to autofocus having 65 year-old eyes.  I would very much be interested in an upgraded CL if it would have something like the new Panasonic or Sony EVF, with increased resolution, clarity and higher magnification.  Weatherproofing would be nice since the CL looks to be a great travel/street camera.  APS-C is presently more than adequate and remember the Barnack camera used a smaller format size than the 6x9/9x12 which was typical at the time.  The f1.4 prime lenses are much too large, and the zoom is a bit too big and slow as well, the 18 Elmarit and 23 Summicron need a compact 75-90 prime lens addition to the line-up.  A CL-Vario with the above upgrades would be an excellent travel camera if the lens would have similar range but faster speed than the current f3.5-5.6 zoom, like f2.8-4.0.

Back to the original question; buy a CL now, but when the upgraded camera is announced original CL prices will drop significantly.  The decision is gambling on how long that will be vrs having a camera to use in the meantime.

The EVF on the CL is actually quite good, though not up to the level of the SL. It is certainly better than the Q in that regard. Magnification has two levels and is more than adequate.

As others have stated, given Leica's usual camera cycle, I would not expect a CL2 for at least one more year, possible two.

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The Leica T was announced in April 2014, the TL2 in July 2017, the CL in November 2017.

Based upon these dates, and similar to what other have already mentioned, I would not expect the CL2 before end of 2020, more likely first half of 2021.

 

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