Leica Q

I think the Leica Q is easily my Purchase of The Year (POTY; is there such a thing..?) for 2015.

And no, not because of its price tag but because I know we will be very happy together for the next few years.

The Husband and I have been quite the shutterbugs and he has taught me a lot about cameras. For me, I just like to grab my gear and jump straight into the scene whereas he prefers to read up and prepare for things a little bit more. As such, he is much better at composition and framing of subjects. In any other case, I am also more comfortable with back end work like post-processing. Hence, we make a pretty good team, #teamclembree FTW! A point to note is that we have always used the Fujifilm X-T1, a fantastic camera by all measures, but have yet to make the move to a full-frame system.

Anyways. I got on the wait list for the Leica Q and put my downpayment for it at the end of August and received it just last Friday, so the wait was about slightly more than a month. I was getting really impatient, to be honest. I think the worst part about the wait was that the camera store couldn't give me an ETA, so it was like an open-ended wait. I guess it's not their fault since they're just the distributor for Leica. When I got the phone call telling me that my baby was here, I was just over the moon! I was at work when I received the call and quickly drove down to the City to pick it up. I got the Q at a really good price- AUD$5,450, considering that the RRP is about AUD$5,900. Singapore priced it slightly more expensive at SGD$5,990. I got a good "because you're pretty" discount from the salesman at my local camera store, ahh the perks of being a young-ish female hey!

Unwrapping the Leica Q was a challenge! It was encased in a box within a box within yet another box! Given the price tag, I shouldn't be surprised at how intricately it was packaged but I still was. I had to take a photo of the two little drawers in the main box itself. You'll see it down bellow later. 

 See what I mean by the "two little drawers". Too cute! All the manuals and spare bits were inside. I was also impressed by the fact that all the little bits and pieces (charger, battery, cables etc..) were housed in separate little cloth drawstring purses. It was a welcomed change from the other camera brands that package their stuff in clear plastic bags. Also, the Q comes with a leather neck strap, not the shitty nylon ones you get. You get what you pay for, I suppose.

Enough swooning about the packaging. 

What's the image quality like? I would have to disappoint my readers slightly by saying that I have yet to test it out properly. As I had received it only a day before our actual shoot down at Tweed Heads, I was unable to learn how to use it in time! I did bring it down with me but had it all set to go in Auto mode.

I took a few shots and by George, the photos are amazing! Usually in Auto mode, photos don't always turn out the best, but this experience with the Q blew me away. This JPEG photo below is straight out of camera with no post-processing at all:

Wow, just wow! Can you imagine what it could do if I had tweaked the camera to more appropriate settings? I don't claim credit at all for the photo above because all I did was hit the shutter.

I might actually be exclaiming for no reason at all (hahaha) because I obviously know that there'd be a great difference between using an APSC and a full-frame sensor, but I just didn't know that it'd be this awesome even at a default mode and without post-processing.

I really do look forward to shooting with the Q a bit more in the future. I still don't know if I would regret its fixed lens eventually but hey, for what I paid for a Leica, I can't complain. I'll work around it and get the best out of it as much as I can. I did consider other Leica models, but I don't think I appreciate using a rangefinder at all. The Q has an almost lightning fast autofocus and a great macro mode (min. distance 17cm, like whuuuut)! Sure, not everybody would love it but I think for what I do and what I shoot, it's great! One thing is that I do wish they had put on a tilting screen (like my trusty X-T1) on the Q though- it would make awkward-angled shots much easier to take.

Watch this space for more photos from the Q in the near future!