The previously rumored Laowa 12-24mm f/5.6 full-frame zoom lens for Leica M-mount by Venus Optics is now officially announced. The Leica M version is priced at $699. Pre-orders are now open at the official online store (Laowa lenses are also sold at Adorama and B&H).
Additional information – specs, MTF chart, sample photos (the press release can be found here):
The black Leica MP 0.72 rangefinder film camera is expected to be in stock at B&H Photo on June 2, 2027.
The Leica MP has been very hard to find in the last few years and there were even some rumors that the model is no longer in production and will be discontinued soon.
Adorama lists the black Leica MP with a “Slight Delay. Usually ships within 2-5 Days” but I don’t think this is accurate:
The newer Leica M-A (Typ 127) film camera is also out of stock at B&H and Adorama. The M-A is the latest film rangefinder introduced by Leica – it doesn’t have a light meter and is fully mechanical (if does not need batteries to operate).
For Leica MP/M-A pricing and availability, check our sponsors:
Leica Camera is relocating its North American Headquarters to the Alfred Sanzari’s Glenpointe campus (Teaneck, New Jersey):
The Xiaomi 12S Series “co-engineered with Leica” was officially launched in China today. In particular, the camera of the flagship model, the Xiaomi 12S Ultra, sets a new standard in the area of smartphone photography.
Wetzlar, 4 July 2022. In May of this year, Xiaomi, one of the world’s leading smartphone companies, and Leica Camera AG publicly announced their strategic partnership in the mobile imaging segment. Now, the first products jointly developed by the two companies, the Xiaomi 12S series ‘co-engineered with Leica’, have been presented to the Chinese market.
For more than 100 years, Leica has stood for photographic excellence, best picture quality and the fine art of German precision engineering. ‘For almost a decade now, we have been successfully incorporating our know-how into camera systems in the smartphone segment, thereby repeatedly demonstrating our expertise and activities in future-oriented technology fields such as image processing, image quality tuning and computational imaging. Today, we and Xiaomi have come together to present the beginning of a new era in the world of smartphone photography. In particular the jointly developed flagship model, the Xiaomi 12S Ultra, illustrates the innovative power of both companies, and will delight our customers with a camera module that offers them exceptional imaging quality, the classic Leica image look and unlimited creative freedom’, explains Matthias Harsch, CEO of Leica Camera AG.
“The World Deserves Witnesses” – in 2021, Leica adopted this motto to launch a successful brand campaign, celebrating the art of photography as a witness to the world. With the likes of Joel Meyerowitz, Steve McCurry and Elliott Erwitt, the greats of photography bore testimony to our world, while emerging talents and distinguished photojournalists also contributed their share. The particularity of “The World Deserves Witnesses” campaign is that Leica does not commission any pieces, but curates the existing work of photographers who are eye-witnesses of our times. Leica is now calling photographers of all ages, using any equipment to become witnesses, and to submit their work centred around the themes “Joy” and “Hope”. The deadline for submissions is 30th September 2022.
The previously rumored Leica price increase in Europe is now official. Some Leica stores have already shared the new pricing – here is an example: the hard-to-find Leica MP camera is now €5,050 instead of €4.800 (a few more examples can be found here).
Check the new European Leica prices at:
