Revising my impressions of the DMC-L1...

[audidudi]

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I spent last week in NYC on business. Because I was staying in Times Square and knew that I would have some time free to play "tourist" in the late afternoons and early evenings, I decided to bring along one of my "good" cameras. This normally would have meant my DMC-LC1, as I love its image quality and fast lens, but this time, I reached for my DMC-L1 instead (it normally lives on a tripod), as I knew I'd be shooting in low light most of the time and the LC1's images tend to get noisy when I shoot at anything other than ISO100 plus it lacks the L1's OIS, which I've found to be helpful once the shutter speeds fall below 1/30.

 

Although "street photography" isn't usually my thing, I really got into it this time and to my surprise, the L1 worked very, very well. While it's physically larger and more visually imposing than the LC1, I was comfortable carrying it around in one hand for several hours and I'm convinced its image quality under these circumstances was a step up from what the LC1 would have captured. Yes, I wish its lens was a little faster, and Yes, I wish it worked as well as ISO400 as it does ISO200, but overall, I came away very impressed by the quality of its images. In fact, I'm now thinking that if the D3 is even a little better, perhaps I should consider swapping, despite the difference in price. Heck, I've even thought about an M8 (ISO640 would have been useful on this trip!), but I don't like its 3:2 format and I'd almost certainly end up laying out thousands on lenses for it, which is a trap in which I've been snared by before...

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[jdlaing]

My feeling is it is not so much "better" as it is different.

The warranty is better.

I personally feel the D3, if you took a batch of 100, would have no rejects or very very few whereas Panasonic would have the obligatory 4-6 out of 100.

 

I can force my D3 to have identical pictures as my L1 but I do not.

I haven't been able to force the L1 to have the same pictures as the D3..............if you get my meaning.

 

I too become more impressed as time goes by.

[lemalk]

James -

The L1 and D3 are identical in the way they handle - I know there's a difference in the standard color, saturation, etc.

 

Do you think your impression of the D3 being superior is just in the "confidence" of carrying the Leica vs. the Panasonic?

 

I have a D3 and I love it, but I wouldn't hesitate to carry and shoot the L1 the same as the Leica.

[jdlaing]

James -

The L1 and D3 are identical in the way they handle - I know there's a difference in the standard color, saturation, etc.

 

Do you think your impression of the D3 being superior is just in the "confidence" of carrying the Leica vs. the Panasonic?

 

I have a D3 and I love it, but I wouldn't hesitate to carry and shoot the L1 the same as the Leica.

 

I have both.

They do handle the same but there are definite differences in switches and levers and not just the color of the paint. I was quite surprised when I got the L1. Now I know why Leica insisted on their own version.

The RAW and JPEG image rendering are both quite different between the two. Again I was surprised at those results.

It is my personal feeling that the confidence of carrying one over the other is the customer support, the warranty, the fit and finish and the quality control of assembly.

 

The picture quality is a personal taste issue.