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Can we expect an updated lens road map from Leica


Jk1002

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33 minutes ago, Stuart Richardson said:

Oof. I wish they would prioritize the 21mm summicron over the 28-70 zoom, which seems redundant. There are currently no Leica quality primes in the very wide range, and 28, while useful, is already very close to the 35mm and catered to in both zooms and a number of M and third party lenses). A 21mm f2 with SL summicron quality would be incredibly useful for architecture and landscape...zooms are fine for some things, but not if you care about edge to edge uniformity or distortion (there is almost always residual complex distortion in my experience, even after “correction”). It would give the L mount a true no compromise wide angle prime, which it is lacking. What L mount is certainly not lacking is any number of general purpose zooms...there are several already from Leica, Sigma and Panasonic, let alone the cheaper adapted models. 

Agreed, and one of the reasons I bought into the L system was a complete range of prime lenses being available. And quit frankly I’m getting rather pissed off at the continuing delays and radio silence from Leica. Had I known at the outset these delays would exist, I never would have bought into the SL system. More fool me. 

Edited by jplomley
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3 hours ago, Jeff S said:

It seems the latest FW release (linear focus and 90-360 degree focus turn option) will significantly improve manual focus for many SL lenses.

Jeff

Agree. I downloaded the FW update this afternoon & after some brief testing on both the VE 24-90mm L & VE 90-280mm L,  I can confirm that it's made a huge difference to MF on these lenses.  

I've set the 24-90mm to 90º turn & the 90-280mm to 150º turn. MF is now fast & accurate, without literally going around in circles trying to lock on to focus.

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1 hour ago, Steven said:

I don't think they see it a redundant. They see it as a refresh to the 24-90, which is their best seller SL. 

Who knows how they see it? Pretty strange to refresh a lens by making its zoom range significantly narrower. If this is truly something they are working on, it is aimed at a different segment. I understand how this lens can appeal to people, I just wish that it was not what they were focusing their efforts on, since there are some very noticeable gaps in the L lens line, and frankly they are not in the 28-70mm range...the facts are at this point that there are 0 Leica SL mount prime lenses wider than 35mm or longer than 90mm. By contrast there are three Panasonic zooms in this range (20-60, 24-105 and 24-70), a native 24-70 Sigma lens and Leica's own 24-90mm.

On the prime front, Sigma and Panasonic thankfully have lenses scheduled, but they are from their more workaday lineups, not their no compromise lines. In any case, I just think it would be nice to have a wide angle prime after five years since Leica started the L mount.

Edited by Stuart Richardson
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I think the biggest problem for companies in these days is not lens roadmaps, but not going bankrupt. I think we have now lenses for all occasions. (At least I have them). We have a huge choice now compared to MF cameras.(There are at least 5 native wide angle zooms.)

I would hate if Leica offered a big roadmap, but went bankrupt in a few months. I have experience with this already once with the R system. Or if Panasonic who is the source for many technical building blocks went out of the camera business.

I was simply surprised that Sigma is churning out new lenses almost all the time, despite the crisis. But it is probably more for E-mount than L-mount (If you look at the numbers sold). And their cameras (Foveon) are still far away. And I heard lately they will also produce for Nikon mirrorless.

Edited by caissa
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2 hours ago, Stuart Richardson said:

Who knows how they see it?

They obviously see it as a great opportunity to refresh their best seller, so they can sell it again to people who didn't buy it the first time and those who own it but will get gas and upgrade. 

 

2 hours ago, Stuart Richardson said:

If this is truly something they are working on, it is aimed at a different segment.

No, it is aimed at updating the lens to the new tech. 

 

2 hours ago, Stuart Richardson said:

Pretty strange to refresh a lens by making its zoom range significantly narrower

I disagree here as well. By making it narrower, they are solving the three issues that people complained about with the 24-90. They are, from the least important to the most important: 

3. The weight

2. The size

1. The variable aperture. 

If they can make a constant aperture 28-70 with the same IQ or better than the 24-90, and for half the size, guaranteed best seller. Also, I remind you that 24-90 is an odd range. The market standard is 24-70, and we've seen with the Canon RF 28-70 how giving up the 4mm on the wide end can have an enormous impact on IQ. 

Seems to me like the smartest move Leica has made in a long time. That and the SL2-S. 

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45 minutes ago, Steven said:

I disagree here as well. By making it narrower, they are solving the three issues that people complained about with the 24-90. They are, from the least important to the most important: 

3. The weight

2. The size

1. The variable aperture. 

 

A fourth issue for me is the telescoping zoom, unlike the internal action of the two other SL zooms. Extension defeats full compactness, balance and perhaps degree of weather sealing.  Just not as elegant.  Hope they address that.  

A fifth, but minor issue, is the relatively less superb IQ at 90 vs the wide end. Presumably the narrower range will take care of that slight discrepancy.

Jeff

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3 minutes ago, Jeff S said:

A fourth issue for me is the telescoping zoom, unlike the internal action of the two other SL zooms. Extension defeats full compactness, balance and perhaps degree of weather sealing.  Just not as elegant.  Hope they address that.  

A fifth, but minor issue, is the relatively less superb IQ at 90 vs the wide end. Presumably the narrower range will take care of that slight discrepancy.

Jeff

I spoke to a second source today, probably in an even higher position than the first one. He confirmed that the next lens is the 28-70. He was more reserved about the January announcement but did say it was at the latest in the first trimester of 2021. It’s coming! 

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1 minute ago, Steven said:

I spoke to a second source today, probably in an even higher position than the first one. He confirmed that the next lens is the 28-70. He was more reserved about the January announcement but did say it was at the latest in the first trimester of 2021. It’s coming! 

Any word on my 4th issue?

Jeff

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18 minutes ago, Steven said:

I spoke to a second source today, probably in an even higher position than the first one. He confirmed that the next lens is the 28-70. He was more reserved about the January announcement but did say it was at the latest in the first trimester of 2021. It’s coming! 

Thats it for me then. All my L stuff will be up for sale. Leica has lost the plot entirely and cannot be trusted. Looking forward to getting a Hasselblad, equipped with a fine selection of wide angle primes.

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4 hours ago, michali said:

Agree. I downloaded the FW update this afternoon & after some brief testing on both the VE 24-90mm L & VE 90-280mm L,  I can confirm that it's made a huge difference to MF on these lenses.  

I've set the 24-90mm to 90º turn & the 90-280mm to 150º turn. MF is now fast & accurate, without literally going around in circles trying to lock on to focus.

I wonder, does it have an influence on the AF speed ? Or is it completely independent ?

Do I understand correctly, that it makes no difference on the 16-35 (does not support it) ?

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13 minutes ago, jplomley said:

Thats it for me then. All my L stuff will be up for sale. Leica has lost the plot entirely and cannot be trusted. Looking forward to getting a Hasselblad, equipped with a fine selection of wide angle primes.

Hasselblad has just a tiny selection of lenses and is terribly slow. And we have seen that multishot delivers better IQ than the X1D. But if you are happy with it .....      I simply don’t understand why you cannot work for the meantime with the SL 16-35.

I get the impression you wanted to switch the system anyway and finally found a “reason” for this step.

You rather trust an Asian (Chinese ?) company that is completely unknown to most in the west ....    I find this quite odd..   But everybody gets happy in his own way.   🤔🤣😷🤧

I did not buy the 24-90 and will probably also not buy a 28-70. But I see no reason to be upset if they offer it before the primes. I still use some M primes if I want to, but very rarely. In these times priorities should also shift a little bit.

    

Edited by caissa
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I think with the lockdown caused delays how can you be upset about the delay with the wide primes. They are coming and I would think just because there might be another zoom on the horizon would not imply they re prioritized the wides.

Also the 28-70 or 24-70 is just a rumor, not even from a trusted site.

While I can see them going after a smaller zoom based on popularity of the Summicrons I could also see them rework the 50 Summilux.

A map would be really helpful to me. 
 

Cheers

JK

Edited by Jk1002
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I never bought the 24-90, and on occasion I do see possible images more than 100 m from the car, so I find the idea of a 28-70 at half the weight and size intriguing.  I suspect that if the rumor is correct, there could be a partner involved, as there was in the 16-35.

Leica doesn't do things because I need them.  Or want them.  My mental picture of the motivations of engineers and their managers in a German company is that they all want to keep working and getting paid for providing new products at a high level of quality to a known (and hopefully growing) set of customers. 

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5 hours ago, caissa said:

You rather trust an Asian (Chinese ?) company that is completely unknown to most in the west ....    I find this quite odd..   But everybody gets happy in his own way.

Hasselblad is Swedish. 
Its major shareholder is very famous DJI. The world leader in drones for photography and video. It is far from unknown. DJI is synonymous of drones. 

One majority shareholder does not make your company chinese overnight. 
Hasselblad is even more Swedish than IKEA which headquarters and foundation (which own the company) are not even located in 🇸🇪 
 

 

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1 hour ago, nicci78 said:

Hasselblad is Swedish. 
Its major shareholder is very famous DJI. The world leader in drones for photography and video. It is far from unknown. DJI is synonymous of drones. 

One majority shareholder does not make your company chinese overnight. 
Hasselblad is even more Swedish than IKEA which headquarters and foundation (which own the company) are not even located in 🇸🇪 
 

 

Off topic, sorry, but I hear recently that DJI had not a very clear accounting department and that they were going under trial for not declaring over 150M of revenues. Something like that, not sure. 

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3 hours ago, nicci78 said:

Hasselblad is Swedish. 
Its major shareholder is very famous DJI. The world leader in drones for photography and video. It is far from unknown. DJI is synonymous of drones. 

One majority shareholder does not make your company chinese overnight. 
Hasselblad is even more Swedish than IKEA which headquarters and foundation (which own the company) are not even located in 🇸🇪 
 

 

Well you have the right to your own opinion. If you want to see it this way, then you will do anyway. But I know what is swedish and what not. No need to discuss this in depth.   Enjoy your fake news ....     :D    Enjoy a trip to your swedish lens factories.   Maybe you can have dinner with the swedish workers. Maybe you could even make a video about the manufacture....

I actually wonder what is more swedish in your eyes, Hassy or Polestar ?    (No need to answer, I am not interested. A rhetorical question.)

Edited by caissa
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