It’s 4:37 PM Friday at a long-range planning meeting in Leica offices in Wetzlar. Attendees want to get on with their weekend. Fritz is talking.
“My friends, we all know that we face a problem unique to our beloved company,” he says. “Many of our lenses cost more than our competitors’ entire cameras. Sometimes two of those cameras. Potential customers are hesitant to embark on our system with its precision lenses. For them, making the leap to Leica is very expensive. We are asking them to get started on a very costly journey.”
Ingrid shifts in her chair. She wanted to be in the Jungfrau right now. Finally, she speaks.
“My dear Herr Fritz, maybe, just maybe, there’s something we can do about this burden, which has been with us since Oscar ran this meeting so many years ago,” she says.
Fritz leans forward, a sense of urgency in his voice.
“Ingrid dear, tell us now what we can possibly do. Don’t make us wait another minute.”
“Well Herr Fritz, why not sell a camera with a fixed lens. Our customers won’t have to worry about the price of lenses because the camera uses only a single, fixed lens”.
A silence falls over the room. Then Fritz speaks, “But can we call it a Leica? It seems to pose more questions than it answers.”
Ingrids speaks again. “Questions indeed. Let’s all think about it and, for the moment, call it the Q for questions.”
Thus the Q was born, soon to soar above the highest peaks in Deutschland.
Alan’s Concise Q3 Review
I will not address improvements over the Leica Q2 nor the pros and cons of a fixed lens camera. I will just briefly address how this camera works.
I previously wrote an article about zoom by crop, like the Q3, in January 2021. So I’m experienced with this approach to photography and see virtues in it.
The Q3 is about the size of other full-frame mirrorless cameras. But it has a single, fixed, 28mm lens. Users crop photos shot with this lens to approximate the field of view of longer lenses. But of course, you already knew this.
The Q3 Menu System
There are 4 buttons that work as top-menu buttons. Each button selects multiple functions and most functions are two steps deep in the Q3 menu.
When you long-press one of the four top menu buttons, a list of functions (which you previously selected) appears. You can scroll down and select a function (such as ISO) from this list and it will subsequently appear whenever you short-press that button. Or you can press that button long again to change the assignment. In practice, it’s a challenge to remember which functions you assigned to which button.
Many cameras rely on menus for less-used functions, but most have labeled buttons for common functions, such as ISO and Exposure Compensation.
One of the Q3 four top menu buttons is difficult to use because it’s flush with the body so you can’t feel it when the camera is held up to your eye. There are complaints about this flush button online.
Changing between manual and autofocus is difficult. It uses a tiny button that is out of sight on the bottom of the lens.
The Q3 has a leaf shutter and its maximum speed is too slow to shoot at wide apertures in sunlight without overexposing.
The Q3 body does not have a grip. So many owners attach the Leica $195 accessory grip. But you must unscrew it to access the SD card. The accessory grip is shallower than the grips on conventional cameras. This is a third-party grip.
Some owners also buy a $230 thumb-rest but it blocks the flash socket.
The Q3 ships with a lens hood. But the hood is tightly wedged inside the lens cap and many articles are posted online about how to remove the hood from the lens cap. I read the articles, but could still not separate the hood from the cap.
Leica says the Q3 weighs 743 grams. But that is without the lens hood and cap. The lens hood and lens cap bring it to 786g which is heavier than my full-frame Sony a7R IV with a 35mm f/1.8 lens. Adding the grip to the Q3 further increases the weight. The grip is much smaller than most grips.
There is also a Sony compact full-frame body. When it is combined with a lightweight 35mm lens, its total weight is 200g less than the Q3 with grip.
Digital Zoom
This is the term used in Leica News Release. The user selects “focal lengths” like 35mm or 50mm and corresponding white frames appear in the viewfinder. However, the image saved is always the same full field of view of the 28mm lens. So professional photographers recommend ignoring the frame selection step.
“The image in the EVF looks so far away” is a common complaint posted online. In fact, the wide 28mm FOV in the EVF does make subjects look “far away”.
Stiff Shutter
Pressing the shutter takes more force than any camera I’ve ever used. The button has some tactile feedback and I think the picture was taken, but the feedback was just an acknowledgment of a half-press and I had to go back and press harder to take the picture. Often I feel that I’m shaking the Q3 as I press so hard. There are complaints about this online and some have sent their Q3 to Leica for repair. There is also an official $75 Leica accessory called the soft-release button. Some write that it makes the shutter button easier to press.
Summary of Unexpected Issues
The four biggest unexpected Q3 issues encountered during this review are:
- The unlabeled menu system is hard to remember.
- The hard-to-press shutter.
- The difficulty in changing between AF and MF.
- The inability to shoot with large apertures in sunlight.
Despite these issues, the Q3 is greatly beloved and Leica’s best-selling camera.
For some, simply mounting a 35mm f/1.8 lens on an ILC gives the functionality of the Q3 at the same or less weight and lower cost. That also permits a photographer to select a lens intended for the task, such as birding or portraiture.
About the author: Alan Adler lives in Los Altos, California. The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author. He has been an avid photographer for 60 years. He is also a well-known inventor with about 40 patents. His best-known inventions are the Aerobie flying ring and the AeroPress coffee maker.