SL2-S vs iPhone 14 Pro

[lencap]

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OLD may have been the wrong word.  Perhaps VINTAGE is better!

Age gives perspective, and I find it comforting and relaxing.  My dad introduced me to photography when I was 10 or so.  He had a Kodak rangefinder camera and developed his own film in the basement.  I remember mixing chemicals, checking temperature, rotating the mixing pans, watching the timer and lots of other wonderful memories.  At that time developing film at home by hand was pretty advanced stuff.  We enjoyed it, growing closer through the hobby.  Those memories are as fresh as if they were yesterday.

Today the world has moved on to something quite different.  Time together in person has morphed to virtual space in many ways, making tactile experiences very pleasurable and unfortunately far too rare.  That's one of the things that I believe will return - the desire to experience something fully absorbing and personally rewarding.  For some that's film photography, for others it's vinyl records, among many other activities and diversions.  I welcome all of them.

The picture is of mom and dad in 1948, shortly before I arrived.  It was shot on the same Kodak rangefinder that dad used to teach me about photography.  I doubt a digital image or camera would have survived as long.

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Edited October 14, 2022 by lencap

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The Leica Q3 is available for pre-order at B&H Photo Video and Adorama

[huwm]

I can feel that I'm heading that way but will stick with my Vinyl n Valves as well as SL2 n Q2 a good while longer, dropping this baby into the grooves is a salutary experience.

AN Io2 mounted on SME V on Michell Orbe etc.....

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[helged]

On 10/8/2022 at 7:51 PM, beewee said:

It’s been about a week so here’s the answer to which image is from which camera.

Image 1: iPhone 14 Pro, wide angle (24mm equiv) without crop

Image 2: SL2-S, 16-35 SL @ around 20mm

In comparing the output at least between the two photos, I can summarize my observations as follows:

• Dynamic range
  • Since the photos were not taken at exactly the same time and exposure settings, I hesitate to draw any hard conclusions but I can say that both cameras offer some really useable dynamic range that gives a ton of flexibility for post processing in lightroom.
• Colour
  • Although I was able to achieve very similar colours, the SL2-S appears to have slightly more colour fidelity and separation in the yellow foliage. Even though the iPhone 14 Pro image has higher resolution, especially in the center of the frame, and zooming in from Lightroom revealed more detail, the SL2-S offered slightly more clarity/separation in the yellow foliage when zoomed out and viewed normally. I think this is likely coming from the red channel and Leica has been known to put a lot of effort over the past few years in the red colour filters in the sensor to achieve deep reds and natural skin tones. I think this is also helping with the deep yellow foliage in this case.
• Optics/details
  • It’s hard to separate what aspects are coming from the digital processing pipeline and what are from the lenses but I’m impressed overall with the iPhone 14 Pro. When I first heard about the 48 MP sensor, I bemoaned that it would just create larger files without being able to actually resolve more detail but that’s not the case here. The iPhone 14 Pro can indeed resolve very well out to almost the extreme corners. Even the extreme corners look acceptable.
  • The most noticeable issue I’ve noticed with the iPhone 14 Pro camera is the presence of some reasonably controlled blooming/fringing and chromatic aberration in high detail areas with bright background where there is sky behind the top of the larch trees. Here, the presence of blooming/fringing and chromatic aberration results in degraded image quality for such scenes.
  • The good news for the iPhone 14 Pro is that the new lenses seem to have finally fixed the issue with ghosting that was very problematic with iPhones 11-13 due to reflections off the sensors and the lens coatings.
  • In the case of the 16-35 SL, the lens performs very well and stacks up against the iPhone 14 Pro’s wide camera. I’ve had limited time playing with the 12 MP ultra-wide (14mm equiv) and telephoto (77mm equiv) camera on the iPhone 14 Pro but in the limited time that I’ve shot with them, the ultra-wide has very poor image quality on the edges but the telephoto is quite useable. The 16-35 SL absolutely crushes the ultra-wide camera on the iPhone 14 Pro and it’s not even worth comparing the two because they are so different and the iPhone 14 Pro’s ultrawide is so inferior. I’m not sure if it’s just my phone but I got the impression that my iPhone 12 Pro had a better quality ultra-wide than my iPhone 14 Pro.

So will I still carry the SL2-S or will I use the iPhone 14 Pro in its place?

• For any situation where I really do want to capture high quality images beyond 24 mm in either direction, the SL2-S still has its uses. This is especially the case when I’m shooting with the 90-280, ultra wide landscapes at 16mm, and astrophotos at 14mm for milky way and northern lights
• I would not hesitate at all shooting with the iPhone 14 Pro’s main wide camera in Raw for ‘important’ images but I wouldn’t really bother with the ultra-wide
• To me, 24mm is my favourite focal length for everyday shooting and there are certainly situations where I’d be happy to shoot with just a 24mm. In fact, for many many of years, I primarily shot with a M8.2 + 18 SEM (24mm equiv) and the M10 + 24 Elmar-M. And had the Q2 been designed with a 24mm, I probably would have gotten that one too.
• At this point, the iPhone 14 Pro main camera has basically taken up the role of a theoretical Q2 with 24mm lens. The fact that it fits in my pocket and is with me all the time means I don’t need to carry another camera like a Q2 to get some amazing results, that’s an amazing thing.
• When I’m out and my goal it take photographs such as on travel or hiking in the mountains, the SL2-S will come with me.
• For situations where my primary goal is not photography, such as when I’m out skiing or climbing, I wouldn’t hesitate to leave the SL2-S behind and lean on the 24mm equiv iPhone 14 Pro main camera for a day out in the mountains. I would not feel like I’m giving up too much by shooting with the iPhone 14 Pro in ProRaw as compared to the SL2-S.
• With all this being said, if Leica does release a 100 MP SL3 body and the long-awaited 21mm and 24mm APO-Summicron SL, that would tip the equation back toward the SL3 + APO-Summicron. I have the 28mm APO-Summicron and the look and resolving power of the 28 APO is just unreal and on another level that can’t be matched by any of the SL zooms. My only gripe with it is that it’s not 24mm or 21mm. In order to stay ahead of the game, Leica seriously needs to get those lenses out the door before Apple’s $2000 phone eats their lunch too.

 

Apparently, the SL-21mm will see the light in early 2023... https://leicarumors.com/2022/10/11/leica-to-announce-a-new-21mm-f-2-apo-lens-for-the-sl-system-leica-apo-summicron-sl-21mm-f-2-asph.aspx/.

[wizard]

Am 3.10.2022 um 03:33 schrieb Photoworks:

1st image must be the iPhone , always too much shadow and highlight recovery.

+1, those were my thoughts, too. The first image just looks unnatural in a way, as do many or even most images taken with smartphones. Not my cup of tea, even though I have to admit that smartphone cameras have come a long way and are certainly perfectly sufficient for taking photos which will be posted on any kind of social media, which is what interests the average user most these days.