Leica Q3 as a landscape camera?

[Hendo]

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Anyone here tried to use Leica Q3 as a landscape camera? For those of you who did - what is your opinion? Is it too constraining?

[Le Chef]

Check here for Q/Q2/Q2M/Q3 shots: https://www.l-camera-forum.com/forum/10-landscape-travel/

[Patrick NL]

I shot a few landscapes with it and if 28mm (more like 26mm!) is something you can work with (or a cropped version of it), I would say: YES! So much detail So much dynamic range. What could go wrong?

[Stephen_C]

I have very recently posted three exampless on the Landscape and Travel forum: here, here and here so (making allowance for the fact there are much better landscape photographers than I) you can form your own view. My personal view is that the Q3 is wonderful for landscape work.

Stephen

[Qwertynm]

Yes, it works fine. The lens is not that sharp in the corners but it’s ok if you crop in a bit. Sometimes for landscape I choose normal to light tele FL. The Q3 has enough reolution to get you between 5-10 MP in a FL range of 60-75. if you need more tele the Q3 obviously does not work. 

the sensor has good dynamic range, the lens is pretty flare resistant and sunstars are ok from f/11 onwards. You lose sharpness though at this aperture so it‘s best to have multiple exposures and then blend them in post. Focus stacking you have to do manually as well as exposure bracketing. But that is done easily with the shutter speed dial in 1 stop increments. 

yes, the Q3 works as a landscape camera with some constraints. It would not be my first choice if landscape is all you do. Look at the Fuji GFX 100 II or similar. 

Edited November 25, 2023 by Qwertynm

[falcon468]

I have traveled domestically and internationally, to include Iceland, and have mostly always just taken only my Q to use, leaving my Nikons and M4/3 cameras at home. Worked out well every time. On a river trip down the Rhine, I took my Lumix GX9 with a 45MM (90 Equivalent) for a little extra reach for the castle portion of the trip.

[Hendo]

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15 hours ago, Stephen_C said:

I have very recently posted three exampless on the Landscape and Travel forum: here, here and here so (making allowance for the fact there are much better landscape photographers than I) you can form your own view. My personal view is that the Q3 is wonderful for landscape work.

Stephen

Lovely images! Thanks! 

[Miltz]

For me it’s the best landscape camera I ever owned. The size and weight make it effortless to carry even on the longest hikes. The lens and sensor are excellent and there are really few downsides. One is long exposure noise reduction which makes your long exposures double and the other is always having only a 28mm lens. You can crop to 35mm maybe 50mm. But don’t be fooled, this is a 28mm camera that you can crop into. I’ve made prints at 20x30 so far and I’ve never seen prints look so good. If you don’t mind carrying heavier gear, and you want multiple focal lengths obviously this camera won’t be for you. There have been a few occasions that I wish I had a wider lens, but we can’t have it all. 

[Stephen_C]

11 minutes ago, Hendo said:

Lovely images! Thanks!

Thank you.

Stephen

[Hendo]

35 minutes ago, Miltz said:

For me it’s the best landscape camera I ever owned. The size and weight make it effortless to carry even on the longest hikes. The lens and sensor are excellent and there are really few downsides. One is long exposure noise reduction which makes your long exposures double and the other is always having only a 28mm lens. You can crop to 35mm maybe 50mm. But don’t be fooled, this is a 28mm camera that you can crop into. I’ve made prints at 20x30 so far and I’ve never seen prints look so good. If you don’t mind carrying heavier gear, and you want multiple focal lengths obviously this camera won’t be for you. There have been a few occasions that I wish I had a wider lens, but we can’t have it all. 

Do you carry on a second camera?

[Miltz]

4 hours ago, Hendo said:

Do you carry on a second camera?

Definitely not. If I carried a second camera it would defeat the purpose of me having the Q3 in the first place. 

[Woodstock]

15 hours ago, Miltz said:

For me it’s the best landscape camera I ever owned. The size and weight make it effortless to carry even on the longest hikes. The lens and sensor are excellent and there are really few downsides. One is long exposure noise reduction which makes your long exposures double and the other is always having only a 28mm lens. You can crop to 35mm maybe 50mm. But don’t be fooled, this is a 28mm camera that you can crop into. I’ve made prints at 20x30 so far and I’ve never seen prints look so good. If you don’t mind carrying heavier gear, and you want multiple focal lengths obviously this camera won’t be for you. There have been a few occasions that I wish I had a wider lens, but we can’t have it all. 

The long exposure noise reduction is switchable (big plus over the Q2), and given the excellent NR increasingly available in even “standard” imaging software, let alone stand alone programmes, for convenience I prefer to go down that route. I must admit that I have not done detailed comparison between the in camera and post production alternatives, but just eyeballing them hasn’t changed my opinion.

[SrMi]

2 hours ago, Woodstock said:

The long exposure noise reduction is switchable (big plus over the Q2), and given the excellent NR increasingly available in even “standard” imaging software, let alone stand alone programmes, for convenience I prefer to go down that route. I must admit that I have not done detailed comparison between the in camera and post production alternatives, but just eyeballing them hasn’t changed my opinion.

LENR helps with correlated noise (hot pixels, appears only with longer exposures), while the noise reduction in post-processors works on non-correlated noise (low exposures. "high ISOs").

[Miltz]

Leica’s long exposure noise reduction function can’t be touched my Adobe yet. It’s that good. Turning it off isn’t really an option for me. Having the option to turn it off is great, but for now it’s on for me all the time. 

[brickftl]

Here's a link to pics from my hike of the Scottish highlands in 2018. Most of them are landscape, followed by street images while in London. All were taken with the original Q (I've since upgraded to the Q3). It performed brilliantly and I love the 28mm length both for landscape and street. https://brick.smugmug.com/Travel/2018-9-London-Scotland

And even though not water sealed, my Q was constantly wet from rain. I tried keeping it under my jacket when not shooting (which wasn't often) and never had any issue with water affecting performance.

Can you get better pics with the Fuji GFX system and amazing lenses, of course. But there's a huge size/weight tradeoff, not to mention that the GFX when you factor in the lenses is much more expensive. Print wise - with the increased resolution of the Q3 you won't need the 100 mps of the GFX.  

Finally if you're hiking to the venues you'll be shooting landscape, you'll appreciate the Q3 being so lightweight compared to the GFX.

[Hendo]

2 hours ago, brickftl said:

Here's a link to pics from my hike of the Scottish highlands in 2018. Most of them are landscape, followed by street images while in London. All were taken with the original Q (I've since upgraded to the Q3). It performed brilliantly and I love the 28mm length both for landscape and street. https://brick.smugmug.com/Travel/2018-9-London-Scotland

And even though not water sealed, my Q was constantly wet from rain. I tried keeping it under my jacket when not shooting (which wasn't often) and never had any issue with water affecting performance.

Can you get better pics with the Fuji GFX system and amazing lenses, of course. But there's a huge size/weight tradeoff, not to mention that the GFX when you factor in the lenses is much more expensive. Print wise - with the increased resolution of the Q3 you won't need the 100 mps of the GFX.  

Finally if you're hiking to the venues you'll be shooting landscape, you'll appreciate the Q3 being so lightweight compared to the GFX.

Thanks for the link to your images, nice images indeed. As for the comparison to the GFX system, well, in my opinion it is hard to compare. Even if the images are better with GFX ( I am not so sure about that), I guess there is a different type of fun shooting with the Q3.

[adrianh]

You should really decide if 26mm is what you want to shoot with most of the time. If you are more into wider perspectives there are better alternatives, same if most of your pictures would be better  suited with a longer lens. A Sony A7CR with the respective lens would be then the better choice. Those cameras are a big invest so better do some research first. 

[Stephen_C]

Of course one of the joys of the Q3 for landscape work is not having an interchangeable lens. When I did landscape work with Canons in inhospitable parts of the world I got very tired of having to clean the sensor frequently (and, often, rather ineffectively). Naturally the pay-off is living with 28mm but I can take that—especially given the pleasure of carrying the Leica compared to the weight of the old Canon gear.

Stephen

[Marc B-C]

I only have a Q2 and love it for landscapes. The ability to crop a 47mp sensor removes a lot, if not all, of the issues of a 28mm lens.

The only other kit I take with me are a couple of ND filters, a Gitzo GKTBC mini travel tripod or, very occasionally, a carbon fibre tripod (Feisol CT-3441 with CB-30c ball head)

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Hallo,

Look here: Leica Q

[Woodstock]

Agree of course with SrMi's points on hot pixels and the correlated/non-correlated issue, but for me the convenience of (for example) using Lightroom Enhance, rather than waiting for the Q3 LENR to take its time, is a factor. As I said in an earlier post this was primarily why I got rid of the Q2 with its non-switchable LENR but couldn’t resist the lure of the Q3.

Miltz's view on the merits of Q3 LENR vs Adobe is interesting; I see no reason to suggest that this would not be the case in absolute terms, but the relative quality of the alternative, when combined with the lack of “down time” between exposures, is thus far fine for me.

Thanks for the thoughts guys.