Does Leica's most recent sensors beat or match Foveon sensors?

[thebarnman]

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Have the improvements in Leica's sensors come close or beat the Foveon sensors?

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

[M11 for me]

Is not the opposite true? Sigma even comes with Bayer sensors. I am not aware of full frame Foveon sensors that would beat Bayer sensors in terms of dynamic range and noise.

 

Edited August 21 by M11 for me

[pop]

It depends a lot on what particular properties you look at. The most striking property of the Foveon sensor is how it renders colors. I have not seen any Bayer sensors which come close to that. On the other hand, they haven't been able so far to make a full format Foveon, and it doesn't appear likely that there will be one any time soon. 

In all other respects I suspect that a more recent sensor will run circles around the Foveon, i.e. will exceed its capabilities by an ample margin.

[Chris W]

It's comparing apples to oranges.

I had several Sigma cameras with Foveon sensors. The images were beautiful, also very sharp, but this might well have been down to the lenses too.

Most of the time they didn't perform well in artificial light or over ISO 400.

My modern Leica cameras also produce beautiful images, but in more challenging lighting conditions.

Edited August 21 by Chris W

[jaapv]

I think that Foveon is a technological dead end. 

[thebarnman]

On 8/21/2025 at 12:18 AM, pop said:

It depends a lot on what particular properties you look at. The most striking property of the Foveon sensor is how it renders colors. I have not seen any Bayer sensors which come close to that. On the other hand, they haven't been able so far to make a full format Foveon, and it doesn't appear likely that there will be one any time soon. 

In all other respects I suspect that a more recent sensor will run circles around the Foveon, i.e. will exceed its capabilities by an ample margin.

The color aspect is what I'm actually referring to which is why I'm asking.  Thanks by the way!  At the same time I was reading because the Leica software over time improves the way it renders (deciphers) the information hitting it's sensor that the slight improvement (color wise) is getting close or closer to the Foveon color look.  

Since I don't have a way to directly compare the two types of sensors, I figured someone here will be informed enough to at least indicate that it's close, better than it has been over the past few years, not close at all, no improvement over the years even with the improvement on how the information is being processed by the Leica camera.    

 

Thanks!

[Thorfinn]

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There is no such thing as a "Leica Sensor" 

It is possible, you will find different sensors models and manufacturers in the same type of camera. The sensor manufacturer and model is not specified and is a matter of change without notice. Today you can even find fabless sensor manufacturers - a developing company who contracts a factory. I doubt Leica possessing the knowledge of developing semiconductors. I would have read it in the job advertisements.   

Sensors are sourced semiconductors, e.g. the Leica S utilized a Kodak KAF-39000 sensor.
Kodak CCD (charged coupled device) sensors were "the shit" in those days, much more colour saturation than CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductors). Foveon separated the colours and used the colour separated complementary metal-oxide-semiconductors - one layer for each of the 3 colour channels. A different approach and results way beyond the CMOS of those days. Single colour CMOS got better, and the development was fast. Foveon is now a part of Sigma and even Sigma does not uses the technology in their camera models any more. Do you know a factory capable producing those sensors?

Since those days we got back-illuminated complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (BI-CMOS) sensors giving unknown sensitivity and stacked sensors, bumping the reading speed to a different level. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[pedaes]

13 minutes ago, Thorfinn said:

Kodak CCD (charged coupled device) sensors were "the shit" in those days

The M9 of course had this sensor, and putting aside the cover glass issues is certainly revered by some, irrespective of its low usable ISO ceiling.  However there were some comprehensive comparisons of colour with the M(240)'s CMOS sensor which was inconclusive.

[Viv]

There are no Leica sensors. Leica does not manufacture sensors.

[pedaes]

19 minutes ago, Viv said:

There are no Leica sensors. Leica does not manufacture sensors.

True, but they did commission the M Type 240 sensor from a French company (can’t remember name). 

[Viv]

5 minutes ago, pedaes said:

True, but they did commission the M Type 240 sensor from a French company (can’t remember name). 

What's your point?

[pedaes]

1 minute ago, Viv said:

What's your point?

That they haven’t always used off the shelf sensors 

[Viv]

40 minutes ago, pedaes said:

That they haven’t always used off the shelf sensors 

I did not say that.

[pop]

1 hour ago, Viv said:

There are no Leica sensors. Leica does not manufacture sensors.

What would  you call a bespoke sensor stack explicitly made by some factory for Leica?

[pedaes]

18 minutes ago, Viv said:

I did not say that.

We are at cross purposes. I didn't, or certainly didn't mean, to suggest for one minute you did. I only added the reference for completeness. Sorry if it came over differently.

[Viv]

8 minutes ago, pedaes said:

We are at cross purposes. I didn't, or certainly didn't mean, to suggest for one minute you did. I only added the reference for completeness. Sorry if it came over differently.

OK. Thanks.

[Viv]

10 minutes ago, pop said:

What would  you call a bespoke sensor stack explicitly made by some factory for Leica?

A sensor made by a company that is not Leica;

Edited September 3 by Viv

[willeica]

On 8/25/2025 at 3:51 AM, thebarnman said:

The color aspect is what I'm actually referring to which is why I'm asking.

Colour is a matter of perception or taste, not competition. You can do endless changes to colour in Lightroom, Photoshop etc, anyway. The week after next I am giving an online talk on early colour and even back in 1895 people were arguing over what system produced the best colour. The main discussion was what system best triggered the most accurate sensation in the human eye. One paper from 1895 which I will show has what looks just like the RGB colour histograms we have today - remember this was 130 years ago.

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

For anyone that is interested https://www.chstm.org/group/color-photography-19th-century-and-early-20th-century-sciences-technologies-empires

William 

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[thebarnman]

On 9/3/2025 at 3:47 AM, Thorfinn said:

Kodak CCD (charged coupled device) sensors were "the shit" in those days, much more colour saturation than CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductors).

 

I still think the color from the KODAK CCD sensors are still very nice when it comes to color reproduction.  I recently saw a video where Kodak was working hard to make the color look like the color from transparency film. 

 

I don't know if the sensors Leica uses today comes close to the look the Kodak CCD sensors could create.