After my yesterday’s post about the rumor that Leica M10 will have live view capabilities, I got some interesting comments from readers about the possibilities of adding new technologies in the next M camera. Here is John’s comment:
It’s quite possible that the next digital Leica M (M10?) will include “live view”. IMHO, the hint can be found in the latest top of the line CCD from Kodak: the KAI-29050. This new 24x36mm 29 megapixel (!) sensor is an “interline transfer” sensor (i.e. not the traditional “full frame” technology used by Leica so far). A product summary pdf file has recently been added. See the bottom of the page: http://www.kodak.com/ek/US/en/Image_Sensor_Solutions/Products/Interline_CCD.htm (direct link to the PDF file of the Kodak KAI-29050 sensor).
While I agree that the “video” factor might not be that appealing to most Leica M users (myself included), I believe that there is another key advantage to using this new (to Leica) interline transfer technology: by using the KAI-29050’s built-in electronic shutter (which does not exist in a “full-frame” sensor), Leica would be able to carry out essential calculations to achieve vastly improved (more accurate) exposure and white balance, milliseconds before the actual exposure.
In such case, the use of the Leica S2’s MAESTRO “ASIC” chip would be of considerable help to do the number crinching. There’s another rumor for you: the Leica M10 will use the MAESTRO chip! 😉
Thomas Leuthard (85mm.ch) just published a second free book about street photography called Collecting Souls… What Street Photography means to me. Both books can be downloaded here as a PDF document.
Those are the latest Leica related rumors I have been receiving:
I already mentioned that the next lens to be announced by Leica will be a new 50mm f/2.0 Summicron-M ASPH. A l-camera-forum member recently discovered a new lens code in the latest M9 firmware that is probably designated for the new 50mm Cron:
“Since I had already coded the lens as code 53, I tried the other frame lines. Guess what, code 53-3 (110101 with frame 50/75) brings up a new lens called 50/2. The current 50 summicron (VI and V) and previous version (III) already have codes 33 and 23. So, is this new 53-3 code for an upcoming, new 50 summicron which has been speculated about?”
Leica M10 will have live view, announcement at Photokina 2012.
Possible Leica lens price increase at the end of 2011. No surprise here since Leica has been raising prices in the last few years. The 50mm Summilux is one of the lenses that will probably get a price increase (current US price: $3695).
