Sharing my recent collection of photos taken with the LEICA M10 Monochrom with a combination of M lenses. These photos was shared during the The Leica Conversation - Soul of the Monochrome last May 2021.
Solo Exhibition - The Essence of The Himalayas at Leica Store
I am truly honoured to be given the opportunity to come out with a series of photos for Leica Store Malaysia with a pre-production Leica M10-R camera for the launch end of last year. The new M10-R has a 40 megapixels sensor upgrade with an added touch screen which makes this much easier to use. It is also equipped with the silent shutter similar to the M10-P. The new sensor has given the camera a lot more resolving power as compare to the base model M10 with 24 megapixels.
Due to the MCO, I have revisited these set of images last week and added a touch of colour grading to the existing images which I have done ealier just to enhance the mood further.
Shots below were taken with Leica M10-R with 50mm f0.95 Noctilux and 24mm f1.4 Summilux .
First and foremost, I would like to extend my thanks to Leica Store Malaysia for allowing me to test drive the brand new Leica M10 Monochrom with the amazing 50mm f0.95 Noctilux and 24mm f1.4 Summilux last year. I am terribly sorry on the delay in coming up with this blog post due to my heavy workload. Due to Covid 19 lockdown, I finally have time to catch up with my blogging once again which I miss quite dearly.
What can I say about this camera? Given the newly developed 40 megapixels BW CMOS sensor with the colour and low-pass filter removed, this camera has huge resolving power with amazing nice black to white tonality which can’t be replicated with a colour DNG file converted to BW. The details are amazingly sharp, tact sharp I would say. It’s the sharpest Leica M I have ever tested to date. I think this camera would pair amazingly well with the Leica 50mm APO lens! The ISO range on Mono also been extended to 100,000 as compared to the 50,000 on the M10P.
Shots below were taken with the M10 Mono with 35mm f2 Summicron ASPH and 50mm f 0.95 Noctilux.
The Leica Type M240 is my first digital M camera which I bought when It was first launched in 2012. It is still my go-to digital M camera till today which I heart dearly. The no-frills M240 is equipped with 24 megapixels CMOS sensor, ISO range of 200 to 6400, 1080p video mode ( in fact the only M camera with video function ), built-in live view with focus peaking and shutter speed up to 1/4000s
Back then, the improvement of the M240 was leaps and bounds ahead of the CCD equipped M9 however moving forward 9 yrs, is this camera still relevant/competent till today with the new M10, M10p and M10-R which is way more advanced? Here is my take on this.
PROs
Huge battery - 1800 mAh. This battery just keeps working! I brought this camera to the Everest Base Camp with just two fully charged battery and there ware no charging point along the way. In 3 days at -10 deg Celcius, I only use up only 3/4 of one battery which is pretty amazing! From my experience, most of the battery would die off rather quickly due to the extreme weather. I guess due to the video function, the engineers created a much larger capacity battery which is a major plus point.
Black paint instead of black chrome - I am a huge huge fan of black paint as it ages really well. The paint will wear off over time and reveal the golden bronze patina which I love. Think Lenny Kravitz Leica M-P ( click image HERE )
Video - Given the fact that not many M users use the video mode but I feel it’s a good function to have when necessary. Even though it does not have image stabilization hence the video could be a little shaky at times but it’s quite good to have sometimes.
CONs
Limited ISO range - given the fact that this is a 9 yr old camera, the ISO performance is certainly hard to compete with the newer M models. The useable range of ISO is 2000 at max. Given the fact that I am used to shooting with film M all these while, hence I am pretty comfortable with it still.
It’s Size - The M240 is relatively larger and heavier than the newer M in comparison.
I secretly wish it comes with a touch screen. Having used the more advanced M10-R recently, I am totally in love with the touch screen functions as you can zoom in to your image instantly as well as to check your focus peaking accuracy.
Despite its age, the camera still renders image flawlessly. Below are some samples of photos taken with the Leica M240 + 50mm f1.4 Summilux ASPH.
