Our Leica SL2s review has received an update around the new perspective control feature, and we encourage you to check it out. In what seems like a rarity, the Leica SL2s has had three firmware updates this year. That’s fascinating as it seemed like we only had one a year previously. These updates make an already very good camera even better. And if you’re a working photojournalist focusing on photographing people, then this is a seriously amazing camera. The durability, colors, image quality, and ease of use are unlike anything coming from Japanese manufacturers.
Here’s the pertinent section from our Leica SL2s review. If you’re interested in purchasing it, we strongly recommend you do so via Adorama. We’ll receive affiliate commissions at no extra cost to you. And for the record, this is one of the cameras I use the most partially because of how unique the image quality is.
September 2022 Update: A new firmware update came to the Leica SL2s, which is honestly a bit of a rarity in some ways. This year alone, we’ve seen three firmware updates to the camera. The first improved autofocus and did a few other things. The second corrected a problem created by that firmware update. And now, we’ve got another one with more features being added to the SL2s.
According to Leica’s website, here are the details from this new firmware update.
PHOTO
-NEW: Perspective control
VIDEO
- NEW: The incremental value for a direct setting of the ISO value can now be selected via the setting wheels
(1EV, 1⁄2EV, 1⁄3EV, or 1⁄6EV)
PHOTO/VIDEO
- NEW: The lens profile menu has been supplemented with additional focal length settings
- NEW: The dropdown list for FN button assignments is now customizable and has been extended
- DETAILED: Supported lenses
- IMPROVED: In some cases, the lens Exif information is missing for third-party lens adapters
- CORRECTED: In some rare cases, the functions Pair and Delete were no longer available in the Leica FOTOS menu, once the connection was disabled
- CORRECTED: Some minor issues with the newly introduced function Toggle Focus Point have been remedied. The focus positions are now saved correctly.
Of course, lens profiles are only applied to adapted lenses. So there’s not much to discuss there. What’s more fascinating though is the new perspective control feature. This was previously given to the Leica SL2, and when combined with the image overlay feature it could prove fun for architecture photographers.
Perspective control works by playing an overlay of lines on the Leica SL2s screen. It’s like an advanced level that looks at the lens output and then tries to fix distortion of some sort in-camera. Like any technology, it only does what it thinks you want and what Leica’s programmers have told it to do. It’s not a type of AI with machine learning that can think for itself. So, sometimes it’s fantastic, and other times it’s wonky.
I used this with the Leica 28mm f2 Summicron SL lens and it worked as I’d expect it do given various angles and such. It worked as I expected with Panasonic’s 50mm f1.8 and 85mm f1.8 lenses. Those are longer focal lengths, so I have to expect that they’ll work pretty flawlessly.
Where it gets fascinating and fun is with the Sigma 24-70mm f2.8 Art lens. When you zoom in and out, you totally see how the perspective control changes. And that’s pretty cool! It’s also evident this one zoom lens isn’t as good as the more affordable primes despite it being an Art lens. If that’s a loaded statement for you, consider what Nikon, Canon, and Sony are doing with their 24-70mm f2.8 lenses. Sigma is more affordable but comes at the sacrifice of autofocus speed and a bit of image quality. Leica’s variant of this lens incorporates faster autofocus motors.
If that wasn’t enough, it also showed how the perspective control worked to correct output from the Sigma 45mm f2.8 Contemporary. In our notes, and even in web searches, Sigma didn’t say this lens will have “art level” image quality, though. So we can let that claim go a bit.
Perspective control applies to the JPEGs. But the playback image, even if you’re shooting only RAW, will render as the perspective-adjusted photo. I’d also like an option to apply the control to my RAW photo as it would really help with speeding up editing. However, that’s not yet available.
Leave a Reply