Sometimes I wonder if so called reviewers even have a basic idea of what the attributes of a camera sensor should be. The woeful DxO did a hatchet job on the M10 sensor, saying it performed about as well as an APS-C sensor !!! Now I am aware that DxO have a poor reputation these days (richly deserved I might say) but this is just nonsense. One of their top performing sensors is in the Nikon D850. Now I have one of those and yet I believe that the sensor in the M10 has better colour and is sharper and is in fact the best sensor I have ever used.
Since this sensor is unique and probably won't ever be used in any camera again, because the next M camera will have the sensor in the Leica S2 and Q2. It is allegedly made by TowerJazz, a company Panasonic partly owned but have now sold their share. But whatever it's origin I love the images it creates. I've been changing my lenses around to make the best of it, selling my M lenses and using my Leica R lenses via the Leica R>M adapter. For me (and I guess a lot of serious photographers) the technical specifications are not that important, because let's face it there actually aren't any bad sensors out there anymore and how the image is processed is much more important than the sensor itself.
I would particularly single out the performance of two of my Leica R lenses.
The lenses are - 50mm Summicron R f/2 and 135mm Elmarit R 135mm. They are both fitted to the M10 via the Leica R>M mount adapter. The results from these two lenses are ridiculously sharp. Edge to edge and corner to corner. Both were manufactured in the 1980's for film cameras and have no need of lens profiles to fix any faults. Incidentally they are not that expensive and they are way better than any of the cheaper M mount lenses such as 7Artisans etc. It also means I have to use the add on EVF as the rangefinder doesn't work. However I've never been a rangefinder fan anyway.
Below is a bit of surprise and shows just how good this sensor is.
Now while this isn't a particularly aesthetic combination, it does work well. The lens is a Nikon 24 -120mm f/4 zoom. I always test every lens I have with adapters just to see what it's like. So I finally got round to trying this zoom on my M10. It's a G lens so there is no way to change the aperture, What I have to do is stick a bit of cardboard in the lens changing lug and leave the lens wide open. I did some quick tests in the garden and was very surprised at how good the shots were. I decided to give the combination a real world test and produced the images you see above. Even wide open the lens produced some seriously sharp images. Now this is a modern lens so it has all kinds of issues such as vignetting. However by applying the Photoshop profile in camera raw and some post production work I managed to get excellent results. I have since ordered the Nikon F/G to Leica M adapter with an aperture ring on it.
Going back to the points I was making at the start of this post, I am completely bewildered as to why people who claim to be scientifically rigorous can fail to see just how good the sensor is. Bewildered I may be, surprised I'm not. I've lost count of how many times I've read less than complementary reviews of Leica sensors. And seen for myself just how good they are. Now sites like DxO seem to love Sony sensors and yes they are good in an efficient way. But to my eyes they produce dull and uninspiring results. Yes they may have excellent dynamic range etc. but the majority of us aren't scientific photographers, we are trying to produce something artistic and aesthetically interesting.
To be honest I am completely disinterested in dynamic range, what I want is images that jump off the page or the screen. And my Leica M10 images (with the right lenses) do just that. I don't know what criteria people like DxO use but my M10 produces images that are sharper than my Nikon D850. Now I'm not demeaning what my D850 does, it's a great sensor, but the M10 has the edge for me. It's a cross between the M9 CCD sensor, the Sigma Foveon sensors and a modern Bayer sensor. What's not to like?
Now all of this has created a dilemma for me. I was planning to sell the M10. For various reasons, including weight, 'clunky' handling and perhaps most important price. As you are aware I make my living selling travel, landscape and architecture images for the travel trade via picture libraries. Of course as of now thanks to that vile little virus there is no travel trade so my library sales are falling. Another part of this was that I now feel I was using the 'wrong' lenses. I had bought the 7Artisans 28mm f/1.4, 50mm f/1.1 and the 75mm f/1.25. Now these are great value for money, but when I started using my R lenses I realised that I was not getting the results I could have been.
So instead my M10 heading for ebay I am trying to be able to keep it. The bottom line is I now look forward to viewing my M10 images and that's a good thing. Eventually if the travel trade doesn't pick up I may be forced to sell it, but I will try not to let that happen.
