**A Review of the Leica Q3: A Versatile Camera for Everyday Use**

As I spent more time with the Leica Q3, I was struck by its versatility as a camera. While it may not have all the bells and whistles of some other cameras on the market, it delivers in many areas that are crucial for everyday photography. One of the biggest advantages of the Q3 is its ability to record video. The camera's high-resolution CMOS sensor is capable of producing excellent video quality, although it does come with a caveat: the scanning process can take a little time, resulting in a "jello effect" when panning shots are involved.

This means that if you're planning on doing any extensive video production, you may need to adjust your expectations. However, for basic b-roll shots or more static footage, the Q3 is perfectly capable of producing high-quality results. And let's be real – not everyone needs 8K resolution in their everyday photography. The Q3's ability to produce excellent images at lower resolutions makes it a great option for those who just want a reliable camera that can handle most situations.

One feature that I think the Q3 does particularly well is its lens design. The Leica Q3 features an excellent lens, which is often a key factor in determining a camera's overall quality. And with the Q3, you get the benefit of this top-notch lens without breaking the bank. In fact, when compared to other cameras on the market, the Q3 offers an incredible value proposition – especially considering that it comes bundled with a full-frame sensor and excellent optics.

Of course, for those who are really serious about video production, there are other options available that may be more suitable for their needs. The Leica SL2s is a great example of this, featuring a 24-megapixel sensor and built-in audio inputs. But for everyday photography, the Q3 is an excellent choice.

One thing that I think Leica could do to take the Q3 to the next level would be to develop more accessories that can simplify the video production process. For example, a hot shoe adapter with XLR input would make it much easier to connect external audio equipment and sync audio with footage in post-production. This is an area where Sony and Panasonic have already made significant strides, but I think Leica could also learn from their examples.

In terms of usability, the Q3 is a small and portable camera that can be easily carried around. It's also incredibly versatile – making it suitable for a wide range of photography styles and applications. This makes it an excellent choice for anyone who wants a reliable camera that can handle most situations without needing to carry a whole arsenal of equipment.

As I continue to use the Q3, I'm reminded of just how much value it offers in comparison to other cameras on the market. With its exceptional lens design, high-quality images, and impressive video capabilities, the Q3 is a great option for anyone looking for an everyday camera that can handle most situations. And at this price point, it's hard to argue with the value proposition.

**A Final Verdict**

In conclusion, I'm very impressed with the Leica Q3 – not just because of its impressive specs, but also because of its practicality and usability. While it may not be perfect for every use case, it delivers in many areas that are crucial for everyday photography. With its excellent lens design, high-quality images, and impressive video capabilities, the Q3 is a great option for anyone looking for an everyday camera that can handle most situations.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enforeign so this is the much anticipated Leica Q3 featuring a 60 megapixel tri-resolution backside illuminated CMOS sensor for the first time in any Leica we've now got phase detection autofocus you can shoot up to 8K 30p or 4K 60p or even 1080 120p video it features a 5.7 million.evf and there's a lot more welcome back everyone in this video we're going to be talking about the Q3 Leica we're gracious enough to loan me the camera for a few days and check it out there's a lot to unpack here so let's go ahead and get started so this is now the third generation of leica's Q lineup is a fixed lens mirrorless that Leica is designed as an everyday camera this is a point-and-shoot on steroids and like its predecessors the Q3 is a full-frame camera that now Sports a full 60 megapixel backside illuminated sensor and like the M11 it is a tri-resolution sensor that can shoot both raw and jpeg images at 60 36 or 18 megapixel of course the concept with the Q series is that you have a fixed wide angle lens but you effectively can crop in to simulate three additional prime lenses the screen uses crop modes and the same style that you have on a rangefinder and the Q3 has added the 90 millimeter focal length to this now when you're shooting in raw these files will come in cropped to your photo editor so while you won't have the natural compression that you have on longer focal length lenses this does give you the distinct advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe in post-production so there have been some changes to the body of the Q3 we now have four custom function buttons there are two now at the top of the body on the back next to the evf one in the middle of the navigation buttons and of course there's one on the top of the camera in the middle of the rear dial on the back of the camera by default the left function button will change the image crop to simulate the various focal lengths and the right button switches between Stills mode or video capture mode so you can change either one of these what you do is just simply hold the button down for a couple seconds in a list of possible functions will pop up on the back screen and you can reassign them from there another first on the Q3 body is the addition of ports there is finally a USB port that you can use for either data transfer or power delivery there's also an HDMI port for video output which I will go into in a little bit here also on the bottom of the camera you're going to find a small connection port and this is going to allow you for wireless charging through an optional grip I didn't actually have a grip to test this but like I says there will be compatible with any charger above 10 watts this is really a cool solution for if you just want to set your camera down when you're not using it you can set it down on a wireless charger and it will be charged the next time you pick it up also a first on the Q model is the tilting touch screen on the back allowing for both high and low shooting angles and it is a 1.8 million dot three inch touch panel the electronic viewfinder is a brand new 5.7 million dot 120 frame per second evf with a 0.79 x magnification factor which is quite an improvement so for Stills the Q3 is absolutely awesome of course now we have a 60 megapixel sensor this is great for getting really high resolution images I actually like to use the crop modes to simulate longer focal length lenses so you can switch between the standard 28 which is full on you can go for 35 millimeter 50 millimeter 75 millimeter and now 90 millimeter these are very useful especially when you're shooting in the macro modes and you still have enough resolution to get a really good image in the end and of course you have the advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe of course the Q3 also features leica's new Maestro 4 processor I feel like this has added a lot of power to this camera in terms of the way we're now handling phase detection autofocus it's fast it's responsive it also performs really well in low light when you need higher ISO settings and you really won't notice a lot of noise with this in fact I could probably say this for any of leica's processors today of any camera out there they really do handle noise the best and they are my favorites to shoot with in low light you get an enormous amount of dynamic range retained from the sensor and they're just really good at processing the image in terms of ergonomics and handling the Q3 really hasn't changed a whole lot in relationship to the Q2 I think it's really cool and I think what makes this camera really stand apart is the fact that it does become the everyday camera it's a camera that you can pick up take and go and it's fast and it's responsive and I think this one's even better with the new autofocus one thing that I do recommend just like I did with the Q2 is the body is a little bit thin for my taste personally I like to use the thumb grip but actually on the Q3 would recommend going with the hand grip because you're going to get that wireless charging as well anyway ergonomically this camera is awesome it's easy to throw into a bag and use for the entire day I mean this is the whole point of the Q Series and the Q3 is really good at this and by the way the bag that I'm using with the Q3 is the Q bag from oberworth and if you're not familiar with oberworth they're one of my favorite bag companies these bags are handmade in Germany using the highest quality leather and Hardware components that you can find they come with a lifetime warranty as well so these are bags that you're going to use for year years to come I've got several of their bags and the Q bags are really fantastic they're designed as an everyday carry for a small camera and any items that you're going to need for daily use of course these will work great with just about any small Daily Camera that you might be using it doesn't necessarily have to be a cue but like the queue they're designed to carry what you need and they don't take up a ton of space oberworth now has these in color options which is pretty cool in addition to the black queue and the black with red stitching you can also get them in lavender you can get them in kiwi there's Ginger fire red and my favorite which is insane which is a gorgeous deep blue these bags are not over designed they're very simple with dividers you've got a back and side pocket for staying organized and traveling with your brand new Q3 you can find these at retail I'd actually recommend getting your hands on these at your local Leica store or at b h if you're in New York and get a real hands-on experience I think you're going to be really impressed you can also buy these direct from overworth if you like and if you want I can save you 10 if you use the offer Code art 10 on checkout that will get you in a additional 10 off your purchase of any bag that they make so go check them out so let's talk about one of my favorite new features on the Q3 which is the introduction of phase detection autofocus this is the first on any Leica camera and I have to say it's pretty awesome so it works pretty much like the system on the Panasonic S5 II which is kind of why I like it I mean it's dead simple to set up and it just works there are three Focus modes you've got intelligent autofocus single autofocus and continuous you can select between various field modes and the most useful are these three tracking modes so you've got Point tracking you've got I face body and you've got iFace body Plus Animal detection and like the Panasonic S5 II the camera does support animal eye autofocus you're just not going to see it on the rear screen but when you look at your images and zoom in it's clearly focusing in on the eyes and detecting them when you have multiple subjects that are identified in the frame you just use the navigation pad on the back of the camera to select between them all right a few observations here so first of all this is one of my favorite implementation of a hybrid phase detection contrast detection system it works a lot like the Panasonic does and the reason that I'm saying it's my favorite is it's just dead simple to use Sony has an incredible system Nikon has an incredible system so does Canon but there's so many options as soon as you start diving in I like the Simplicity of this so that's the first point that I want to make secondly this is exciting to me because I would imagine this is the same implementation that we're going to see in the next iteration of the SL cameras so with the sl3 or the sl3s those cameras are some of my favorites and I think this will push them over the top now I do want to point out a couple issues that might be a deal breaker for some so first of all autofocus and manual focus are two different things there's no part-time autofocus so in other words the way you engage manual focus is to just detach the little lock on the collar on the ring but there's no way to just kind of Hit the autofocus when you're in manual to do it this is a little bit nitpicky and I wouldn't expect it with this lens just know that that's one issue and secondly there is still no way on the Q3 to set this camera up for a true back button autofocus the problem is is that there's no setting to disengage the half press autofocus from the shutter button so the only way to do this is to actually put it into manual focus which is going to be manual focus but if you want to do back button autofocus where you assign focus on and off to one of the back buttons there's just no way to do it one of the workarounds is that you can use autofocus lock and assign that to one of the buttons that will let you lock in the autofocus but as soon as you fired the shutter once you have to do it again so while this is not ideal this is going to be a thing for a lot of photographers who have been asking for this for a long time but to be quite honest with you they haven't done it on the Queue or the Q2 so I'm not sure that we're ever going to see that on the Q3 just something to consider so since we're talking about autofocus let's go ahead and talk about the lens a little bit and this is one of the things that I think is the highlight of the Q Series so this is the standard 28 millimeter F 1.7 lens that's been on all three Q Series cameras and despite it not being an F 1.4 it still does get the sumolex designation and since it's not an interchangeable lens it is designed specifically for the sensor this is a leaf shutter system meaning the shutter is actually in the lens and so it's going to offer a much higher flash sync than a curtain shutter another thing that you're not going to find on any other Leica lens is the macro setting switch which allows you to shoot at very close distances you'll likely want to do the cropping to simulate tighter focal lengths and this does open up a whole bunch of possibilities that are more involved to do on other Leica camera models and this lens is extremely sharp across the entire frame even wide open it has macro functionality autofocus Leaf shutter is very reasonably sized considering all it has to offer and you're only going to find this lens on the Q cameras another new feature on the Q3 that I think is really interesting is we now have the ability to load Leica looks if you will into the jpeg settings you're going to do this through the Leica photos app I didn't actually have a chance to try this but you essentially connect the camera to the app you'll be able to download looks to your phone I don't know if that's something they're planning on updating when how extensive that's going to be but it is an interesting option for those of you who do like to shoot jpegs and you don't want to do any color grading for the images that you're seeing here I've shot everything in raw and I've applied my own film simulation presets in post this is a project that I spent about two years creating the looks of various film stocks for both Fujifilm and even Kodak last year I decided to make them available for anyone to use so if you want to get the classic looks of Kodachrome Fujifilm provia and many others with all the benefits of shooting digitally you might want to check these out I'll put a link in the show description if you're interested in learning more they work for Adobe Lightroom Adobe Photoshop using Adobe camera raw as well as Capture One highly recommend you check these out if you're interested in getting the classic film simulation look okay so let's talk about video in the Q3 so we have the addition of the new Maestro 4 processor which is going to enable this camera to be much more powerful in this predecessor and this does open up a lot of video options that look really impressive in terms of specs so you can shoot up to cinema 8K video on the Q3 either with internal recording or you can use the HDMI output it's going to be 4208-bit but it's still impressive from this type of camera probably more impressive to me though is that you can do 422 10 bit in L log or hlg with this camera up to cinema 4K 60p which is more than adequate for most types of situations when you want really high quality video being able to crop is actually interesting too and you can even shoot macro video with this camera it's actually a really versatile setup however there are going to be two issues with this that will be deal breakers for people who are serious about video the first issue should be fairly obvious there is no audio input on this camera so that does limit you somewhat having said that the built-in microphones in the camera are adequate but it's not going to replace the need for a shotgun at times or even a lavalier mic if you're doing an interview and so you are a little bit limited there there are a couple workarounds like for instance you could record all of your audio into a separate audio recorder that's dedicated and then sync them together and post production I just think that's an additional step and it's going to be too complicated for the targeted user of this camera you know one thing that could be really cool that Leica could do down the road is to have an accessory kind of like what you see with Sony and Panasonic they both have accessory systems where you can actually plug an XLR input into this accessory and the accessory goes into the hot shoe so you have the problem solved with not having to have cables and ports and it's just a really efficient setup that's something I would really love to see actually not just on the Q3 but on future Leica SL models as well the second deal breaker for people who are serious about videos going to be the fact that we've got a high resolution CMOS sensor so the way that a CMOS sensor works is it scans right to left line by line and so it takes a little while to scan the entire sensor and this is a very high resolution sensor as well and so while the camera does a really good job at pixel binning and decreasing that file size into 8K or 4K or something that you're trying to use because of that lag with the scanning you're going to have that Jello effect so this means if you could do any panning shots you're going to see lines move anything that has a substantial motion within the frame is just not going to be really high image quality and that's just the nature of using high resolution CMOS sensor design but having said that the Q3 is actually really cool because it's a small camera that you can carry around it's fairly versatile if you want to do just some basic b-roll shots that aren't too complicated in terms of motion I would just say that keep your expectations in line with what you're going to get out of this camera if you're really serious about video I still think the sl2s is the much better option with that 24 megapixel sensor and it's got audio inputs one observation that I do think is important to make though I'm very glad that like have opened this up to a really versatile set of options for video I don't personally have a lot of Need for 8K I know it looks really good on a spec sheet and I'd rather them have it in there than not because the one time you want to use it it'd be nice to know at least your camera would do it however I think this is the best way to say this I think when you put those kind of specs on a spec sheet it creates an expectation in the mind of the user of the camera and I don't think that that's like his intention is to say this is a great video camera I think that's what the sl2s is for as I mentioned earlier but I do think it's a really good package I'm glad it's there I just think that expectations versus reality is something that oh some users if you're very video centered you might be a little bit disappointed but just like the specs that I'm talking about I think I've even gotten a little bit off track here and if we look at the Q3 for what it is you have a small everyday carry camera it's got an excellent lens on there you've got high resolution you can take really great quality images you can actually get very decent video on I think that it delivers probably one of the best value packages of any camera available on the market right now Sony were the only other camera that were doing a full-frame integrated lens camera and we haven't seen that updated in a long time and so I think that the Q3 is definitely the winner here and I think this is a a use case for this for just about any kind of photographer which is why it's vica's most versatile camera and when you look at the price point even though it's certainly not cheap I think the value that you get out of it and the fact that you get a body and an excellent lens in it for about half of what you'd get in let's say the M system or even the SL system I think this is an incredible deal and I would love to know of course what you guys think I'm sure you will tell me so drop a comment below and uh when I've had a little more time with this camera I will do a full review this has just been a preview with the short time that I had with it and I actually am very impressed until the next video I'll see you guys then laterforeign so this is the much anticipated Leica Q3 featuring a 60 megapixel tri-resolution backside illuminated CMOS sensor for the first time in any Leica we've now got phase detection autofocus you can shoot up to 8K 30p or 4K 60p or even 1080 120p video it features a 5.7 million.evf and there's a lot more welcome back everyone in this video we're going to be talking about the Q3 Leica we're gracious enough to loan me the camera for a few days and check it out there's a lot to unpack here so let's go ahead and get started so this is now the third generation of leica's Q lineup is a fixed lens mirrorless that Leica is designed as an everyday camera this is a point-and-shoot on steroids and like its predecessors the Q3 is a full-frame camera that now Sports a full 60 megapixel backside illuminated sensor and like the M11 it is a tri-resolution sensor that can shoot both raw and jpeg images at 60 36 or 18 megapixel of course the concept with the Q series is that you have a fixed wide angle lens but you effectively can crop in to simulate three additional prime lenses the screen uses crop modes and the same style that you have on a rangefinder and the Q3 has added the 90 millimeter focal length to this now when you're shooting in raw these files will come in cropped to your photo editor so while you won't have the natural compression that you have on longer focal length lenses this does give you the distinct advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe in post-production so there have been some changes to the body of the Q3 we now have four custom function buttons there are two now at the top of the body on the back next to the evf one in the middle of the navigation buttons and of course there's one on the top of the camera in the middle of the rear dial on the back of the camera by default the left function button will change the image crop to simulate the various focal lengths and the right button switches between Stills mode or video capture mode so you can change either one of these what you do is just simply hold the button down for a couple seconds in a list of possible functions will pop up on the back screen and you can reassign them from there another first on the Q3 body is the addition of ports there is finally a USB port that you can use for either data transfer or power delivery there's also an HDMI port for video output which I will go into in a little bit here also on the bottom of the camera you're going to find a small connection port and this is going to allow you for wireless charging through an optional grip I didn't actually have a grip to test this but like I says there will be compatible with any charger above 10 watts this is really a cool solution for if you just want to set your camera down when you're not using it you can set it down on a wireless charger and it will be charged the next time you pick it up also a first on the Q model is the tilting touch screen on the back allowing for both high and low shooting angles and it is a 1.8 million dot three inch touch panel the electronic viewfinder is a brand new 5.7 million dot 120 frame per second evf with a 0.79 x magnification factor which is quite an improvement so for Stills the Q3 is absolutely awesome of course now we have a 60 megapixel sensor this is great for getting really high resolution images I actually like to use the crop modes to simulate longer focal length lenses so you can switch between the standard 28 which is full on you can go for 35 millimeter 50 millimeter 75 millimeter and now 90 millimeter these are very useful especially when you're shooting in the macro modes and you still have enough resolution to get a really good image in the end and of course you have the advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe of course the Q3 also features leica's new Maestro 4 processor I feel like this has added a lot of power to this camera in terms of the way we're now handling phase detection autofocus it's fast it's responsive it also performs really well in low light when you need higher ISO settings and you really won't notice a lot of noise with this in fact I could probably say this for any of leica's processors today of any camera out there they really do handle noise the best and they are my favorites to shoot with in low light you get an enormous amount of dynamic range retained from the sensor and they're just really good at processing the image in terms of ergonomics and handling the Q3 really hasn't changed a whole lot in relationship to the Q2 I think it's really cool and I think what makes this camera really stand apart is the fact that it does become the everyday camera it's a camera that you can pick up take and go and it's fast and it's responsive and I think this one's even better with the new autofocus one thing that I do recommend just like I did with the Q2 is the body is a little bit thin for my taste personally I like to use the thumb grip but actually on the Q3 would recommend going with the hand grip because you're going to get that wireless charging as well anyway ergonomically this camera is awesome it's easy to throw into a bag and use for the entire day I mean this is the whole point of the Q Series and the Q3 is really good at this and by the way the bag that I'm using with the Q3 is the Q bag from oberworth and if you're not familiar with oberworth they're one of my favorite bag companies these bags are handmade in Germany using the highest quality leather and Hardware components that you can find they come with a lifetime warranty as well so these are bags that you're going to use for year years to come I've got several of their bags and the Q bags are really fantastic they're designed as an everyday carry for a small camera and any items that you're going to need for daily use of course these will work great with just about any small Daily Camera that you might be using it doesn't necessarily have to be a cue but like the queue they're designed to carry what you need and they don't take up a ton of space oberworth now has these in color options which is pretty cool in addition to the black queue and the black with red stitching you can also get them in lavender you can get them in kiwi there's Ginger fire red and my favorite which is insane which is a gorgeous deep blue these bags are not over designed they're very simple with dividers you've got a back and side pocket for staying organized and traveling with your brand new Q3 you can find these at retail I'd actually recommend getting your hands on these at your local Leica store or at b h if you're in New York and get a real hands-on experience I think you're going to be really impressed you can also buy these direct from overworth if you like and if you want I can save you 10 if you use the offer Code art 10 on checkout that will get you in a additional 10 off your purchase of any bag that they make so go check them out so let's talk about one of my favorite new features on the Q3 which is the introduction of phase detection autofocus this is the first on any Leica camera and I have to say it's pretty awesome so it works pretty much like the system on the Panasonic S5 II which is kind of why I like it I mean it's dead simple to set up and it just works there are three Focus modes you've got intelligent autofocus single autofocus and continuous you can select between various field modes and the most useful are these three tracking modes so you've got Point tracking you've got I face body and you've got iFace body Plus Animal detection and like the Panasonic S5 II the camera does support animal eye autofocus you're just not going to see it on the rear screen but when you look at your images and zoom in it's clearly focusing in on the eyes and detecting them when you have multiple subjects that are identified in the frame you just use the navigation pad on the back of the camera to select between them all right a few observations here so first of all this is one of my favorite implementation of a hybrid phase detection contrast detection system it works a lot like the Panasonic does and the reason that I'm saying it's my favorite is it's just dead simple to use Sony has an incredible system Nikon has an incredible system so does Canon but there's so many options as soon as you start diving in I like the Simplicity of this so that's the first point that I want to make secondly this is exciting to me because I would imagine this is the same implementation that we're going to see in the next iteration of the SL cameras so with the sl3 or the sl3s those cameras are some of my favorites and I think this will push them over the top now I do want to point out a couple issues that might be a deal breaker for some so first of all autofocus and manual focus are two different things there's no part-time autofocus so in other words the way you engage manual focus is to just detach the little lock on the collar on the ring but there's no way to just kind of Hit the autofocus when you're in manual to do it this is a little bit nitpicky and I wouldn't expect it with this lens just know that that's one issue and secondly there is still no way on the Q3 to set this camera up for a true back button autofocus the problem is is that there's no setting to disengage the half press autofocus from the shutter button so the only way to do this is to actually put it into manual focus which is going to be manual focus but if you want to do back button autofocus where you assign focus on and off to one of the back buttons there's just no way to do it one of the workarounds is that you can use autofocus lock and assign that to one of the buttons that will let you lock in the autofocus but as soon as you fired the shutter once you have to do it again so while this is not ideal this is going to be a thing for a lot of photographers who have been asking for this for a long time but to be quite honest with you they haven't done it on the Queue or the Q2 so I'm not sure that we're ever going to see that on the Q3 just something to consider so since we're talking about autofocus let's go ahead and talk about the lens a little bit and this is one of the things that I think is the highlight of the Q Series so this is the standard 28 millimeter F 1.7 lens that's been on all three Q Series cameras and despite it not being an F 1.4 it still does get the sumolex designation and since it's not an interchangeable lens it is designed specifically for the sensor this is a leaf shutter system meaning the shutter is actually in the lens and so it's going to offer a much higher flash sync than a curtain shutter another thing that you're not going to find on any other Leica lens is the macro setting switch which allows you to shoot at very close distances you'll likely want to do the cropping to simulate tighter focal lengths and this does open up a whole bunch of possibilities that are more involved to do on other Leica camera models and this lens is extremely sharp across the entire frame even wide open it has macro functionality autofocus Leaf shutter is very reasonably sized considering all it has to offer and you're only going to find this lens on the Q cameras another new feature on the Q3 that I think is really interesting is we now have the ability to load Leica looks if you will into the jpeg settings you're going to do this through the Leica photos app I didn't actually have a chance to try this but you essentially connect the camera to the app you'll be able to download looks to your phone I don't know if that's something they're planning on updating when how extensive that's going to be but it is an interesting option for those of you who do like to shoot jpegs and you don't want to do any color grading for the images that you're seeing here I've shot everything in raw and I've applied my own film simulation presets in post this is a project that I spent about two years creating the looks of various film stocks for both Fujifilm and even Kodak last year I decided to make them available for anyone to use so if you want to get the classic looks of Kodachrome Fujifilm provia and many others with all the benefits of shooting digitally you might want to check these out I'll put a link in the show description if you're interested in learning more they work for Adobe Lightroom Adobe Photoshop using Adobe camera raw as well as Capture One highly recommend you check these out if you're interested in getting the classic film simulation look okay so let's talk about video in the Q3 so we have the addition of the new Maestro 4 processor which is going to enable this camera to be much more powerful in this predecessor and this does open up a lot of video options that look really impressive in terms of specs so you can shoot up to cinema 8K video on the Q3 either with internal recording or you can use the HDMI output it's going to be 4208-bit but it's still impressive from this type of camera probably more impressive to me though is that you can do 422 10 bit in L log or hlg with this camera up to cinema 4K 60p which is more than adequate for most types of situations when you want really high quality video being able to crop is actually interesting too and you can even shoot macro video with this camera it's actually a really versatile setup however there are going to be two issues with this that will be deal breakers for people who are serious about video the first issue should be fairly obvious there is no audio input on this camera so that does limit you somewhat having said that the built-in microphones in the camera are adequate but it's not going to replace the need for a shotgun at times or even a lavalier mic if you're doing an interview and so you are a little bit limited there there are a couple workarounds like for instance you could record all of your audio into a separate audio recorder that's dedicated and then sync them together and post production I just think that's an additional step and it's going to be too complicated for the targeted user of this camera you know one thing that could be really cool that Leica could do down the road is to have an accessory kind of like what you see with Sony and Panasonic they both have accessory systems where you can actually plug an XLR input into this accessory and the accessory goes into the hot shoe so you have the problem solved with not having to have cables and ports and it's just a really efficient setup that's something I would really love to see actually not just on the Q3 but on future Leica SL models as well the second deal breaker for people who are serious about videos going to be the fact that we've got a high resolution CMOS sensor so the way that a CMOS sensor works is it scans right to left line by line and so it takes a little while to scan the entire sensor and this is a very high resolution sensor as well and so while the camera does a really good job at pixel binning and decreasing that file size into 8K or 4K or something that you're trying to use because of that lag with the scanning you're going to have that Jello effect so this means if you could do any panning shots you're going to see lines move anything that has a substantial motion within the frame is just not going to be really high image quality and that's just the nature of using high resolution CMOS sensor design but having said that the Q3 is actually really cool because it's a small camera that you can carry around it's fairly versatile if you want to do just some basic b-roll shots that aren't too complicated in terms of motion I would just say that keep your expectations in line with what you're going to get out of this camera if you're really serious about video I still think the sl2s is the much better option with that 24 megapixel sensor and it's got audio inputs one observation that I do think is important to make though I'm very glad that like have opened this up to a really versatile set of options for video I don't personally have a lot of Need for 8K I know it looks really good on a spec sheet and I'd rather them have it in there than not because the one time you want to use it it'd be nice to know at least your camera would do it however I think this is the best way to say this I think when you put those kind of specs on a spec sheet it creates an expectation in the mind of the user of the camera and I don't think that that's like his intention is to say this is a great video camera I think that's what the sl2s is for as I mentioned earlier but I do think it's a really good package I'm glad it's there I just think that expectations versus reality is something that oh some users if you're very video centered you might be a little bit disappointed but just like the specs that I'm talking about I think I've even gotten a little bit off track here and if we look at the Q3 for what it is you have a small everyday carry camera it's got an excellent lens on there you've got high resolution you can take really great quality images you can actually get very decent video on I think that it delivers probably one of the best value packages of any camera available on the market right now Sony were the only other camera that were doing a full-frame integrated lens camera and we haven't seen that updated in a long time and so I think that the Q3 is definitely the winner here and I think this is a a use case for this for just about any kind of photographer which is why it's vica's most versatile camera and when you look at the price point even though it's certainly not cheap I think the value that you get out of it and the fact that you get a body and an excellent lens in it for about half of what you'd get in let's say the M system or even the SL system I think this is an incredible deal and I would love to know of course what you guys think I'm sure you will tell me so drop a comment below and uh when I've had a little more time with this camera I will do a full review this has just been a preview with the short time that I had with it and I actually am very impressed until the next video I'll see you guys then laterforeign so this is the much anticipated Leica Q3 featuring a 60 megapixel tri-resolution backside illuminated CMOS sensor for the first time in any Leica we've now got phase detection autofocus you can shoot up to 8K 30p or 4K 60p or even 1080 120p video it features a 5.7 million.evf and there's a lot more welcome back everyone in this video we're going to be talking about the Q3 Leica we're gracious enough to loan me the camera for a few days and check it out there's a lot to unpack here so let's go ahead and get started so this is now the third generation of leica's Q lineup is a fixed lens mirrorless that Leica is designed as an everyday camera this is a point-and-shoot on steroids and like its predecessors the Q3 is a full-frame camera that now Sports a full 60 megapixel backside illuminated sensor and like the M11 it is a tri-resolution sensor that can shoot both raw and jpeg images at 60 36 or 18 megapixel of course the concept with the Q series is that you have a fixed wide angle lens but you effectively can crop in to simulate three additional prime lenses the screen uses crop modes and the same style that you have on a rangefinder and the Q3 has added the 90 millimeter focal length to this now when you're shooting in raw these files will come in cropped to your photo editor so while you won't have the natural compression that you have on longer focal length lenses this does give you the distinct advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe in post-production so there have been some changes to the body of the Q3 we now have four custom function buttons there are two now at the top of the body on the back next to the evf one in the middle of the navigation buttons and of course there's one on the top of the camera in the middle of the rear dial on the back of the camera by default the left function button will change the image crop to simulate the various focal lengths and the right button switches between Stills mode or video capture mode so you can change either one of these what you do is just simply hold the button down for a couple seconds in a list of possible functions will pop up on the back screen and you can reassign them from there another first on the Q3 body is the addition of ports there is finally a USB port that you can use for either data transfer or power delivery there's also an HDMI port for video output which I will go into in a little bit here also on the bottom of the camera you're going to find a small connection port and this is going to allow you for wireless charging through an optional grip I didn't actually have a grip to test this but like I says there will be compatible with any charger above 10 watts this is really a cool solution for if you just want to set your camera down when you're not using it you can set it down on a wireless charger and it will be charged the next time you pick it up also a first on the Q model is the tilting touch screen on the back allowing for both high and low shooting angles and it is a 1.8 million dot three inch touch panel the electronic viewfinder is a brand new 5.7 million dot 120 frame per second evf with a 0.79 x magnification factor which is quite an improvement so for Stills the Q3 is absolutely awesome of course now we have a 60 megapixel sensor this is great for getting really high resolution images I actually like to use the crop modes to simulate longer focal length lenses so you can switch between the standard 28 which is full on you can go for 35 millimeter 50 millimeter 75 millimeter and now 90 millimeter these are very useful especially when you're shooting in the macro modes and you still have enough resolution to get a really good image in the end and of course you have the advantage of being able to re-crop and reframe of course the Q3 also features leica's new Maestro 4 processor I feel like this has added a lot of power to this camera in terms of the way we're now handling phase detection autofocus it's fast it's responsive it also performs really well in low light when you need higher ISO settings and you really won't notice a lot of noise with this in fact I could probably say this for any of leica's processors today of any camera out there they really do handle noise the best and they are my favorites to shoot with in low light you get an enormous amount of dynamic range retained from the sensor and they're just really good at processing the image in terms of ergonomics and handling the Q3 really hasn't changed a whole lot in relationship to the Q2 I think it's really cool and I think what makes this camera really stand apart is the fact that it does become the everyday camera it's a camera that you can pick up take and go and it's fast and it's responsive and I think this one's even better with the new autofocus one thing that I do recommend just like I did with the Q2 is the body is a little bit thin for my taste personally I like to use the thumb grip but actually on the Q3 would recommend going with the hand grip because you're going to get that wireless charging as well anyway ergonomically this camera is awesome it's easy to throw into a bag and use for the entire day I mean this is the whole point of the Q Series and the Q3 is really good at this and by the way the bag that I'm using with the Q3 is the Q bag from oberworth and if you're not familiar with oberworth they're one of my favorite bag companies these bags are handmade in Germany using the highest quality leather and Hardware components that you can find they come with a lifetime warranty as well so these are bags that you're going to use for year years to come I've got several of their bags and the Q bags are really fantastic they're designed as an everyday carry for a small camera and any items that you're going to need for daily use of course these will work great with just about any small Daily Camera that you might be using it doesn't necessarily have to be a cue but like the queue they're designed to carry what you need and they don't take up a ton of space oberworth now has these in color options which is pretty cool in addition to the black queue and the black with red stitching you can also get them in lavender you can get them in kiwi there's Ginger fire red and my favorite which is insane which is a gorgeous deep blue these bags are not over designed they're very simple with dividers you've got a back and side pocket for staying organized and traveling with your brand new Q3 you can find these at retail I'd actually recommend getting your hands on these at your local Leica store or at b h if you're in New York and get a real hands-on experience I think you're going to be really impressed you can also buy these direct from overworth if you like and if you want I can save you 10 if you use the offer Code art 10 on checkout that will get you in a additional 10 off your purchase of any bag that they make so go check them out so let's talk about one of my favorite new features on the Q3 which is the introduction of phase detection autofocus this is the first on any Leica camera and I have to say it's pretty awesome so it works pretty much like the system on the Panasonic S5 II which is kind of why I like it I mean it's dead simple to set up and it just works there are three Focus modes you've got intelligent autofocus single autofocus and continuous you can select between various field modes and the most useful are these three tracking modes so you've got Point tracking you've got I face body and you've got iFace body Plus Animal detection and like the Panasonic S5 II the camera does support animal eye autofocus you're just not going to see it on the rear screen but when you look at your images and zoom in it's clearly focusing in on the eyes and detecting them when you have multiple subjects that are identified in the frame you just use the navigation pad on the back of the camera to select between them all right a few observations here so first of all this is one of my favorite implementation of a hybrid phase detection contrast detection system it works a lot like the Panasonic does and the reason that I'm saying it's my favorite is it's just dead simple to use Sony has an incredible system Nikon has an incredible system so does Canon but there's so many options as soon as you start diving in I like the Simplicity of this so that's the first point that I want to make secondly this is exciting to me because I would imagine this is the same implementation that we're going to see in the next iteration of the SL cameras so with the sl3 or the sl3s those cameras are some of my favorites and I think this will push them over the top now I do want to point out a couple issues that might be a deal breaker for some so first of all autofocus and manual focus are two different things there's no part-time autofocus so in other words the way you engage manual focus is to just detach the little lock on the collar on the ring but there's no way to just kind of Hit the autofocus when you're in manual to do it this is a little bit nitpicky and I wouldn't expect it with this lens just know that that's one issue and secondly there is still no way on the Q3 to set this camera up for a true back button autofocus the problem is is that there's no setting to disengage the half press autofocus from the shutter button so the only way to do this is to actually put it into manual focus which is going to be manual focus but if you want to do back button autofocus where you assign focus on and off to one of the back buttons there's just no way to do it one of the workarounds is that you can use autofocus lock and assign that to one of the buttons that will let you lock in the autofocus but as soon as you fired the shutter once you have to do it again so while this is not ideal this is going to be a thing for a lot of photographers who have been asking for this for a long time but to be quite honest with you they haven't done it on the Queue or the Q2 so I'm not sure that we're ever going to see that on the Q3 just something to consider so since we're talking about autofocus let's go ahead and talk about the lens a little bit and this is one of the things that I think is the highlight of the Q Series so this is the standard 28 millimeter F 1.7 lens that's been on all three Q Series cameras and despite it not being an F 1.4 it still does get the sumolex designation and since it's not an interchangeable lens it is designed specifically for the sensor this is a leaf shutter system meaning the shutter is actually in the lens and so it's going to offer a much higher flash sync than a curtain shutter another thing that you're not going to find on any other Leica lens is the macro setting switch which allows you to shoot at very close distances you'll likely want to do the cropping to simulate tighter focal lengths and this does open up a whole bunch of possibilities that are more involved to do on other Leica camera models and this lens is extremely sharp across the entire frame even wide open it has macro functionality autofocus Leaf shutter is very reasonably sized considering all it has to offer and you're only going to find this lens on the Q cameras another new feature on the Q3 that I think is really interesting is we now have the ability to load Leica looks if you will into the jpeg settings you're going to do this through the Leica photos app I didn't actually have a chance to try this but you essentially connect the camera to the app you'll be able to download looks to your phone I don't know if that's something they're planning on updating when how extensive that's going to be but it is an interesting option for those of you who do like to shoot jpegs and you don't want to do any color grading for the images that you're seeing here I've shot everything in raw and I've applied my own film simulation presets in post this is a project that I spent about two years creating the looks of various film stocks for both Fujifilm and even Kodak last year I decided to make them available for anyone to use so if you want to get the classic looks of Kodachrome Fujifilm provia and many others with all the benefits of shooting digitally you might want to check these out I'll put a link in the show description if you're interested in learning more they work for Adobe Lightroom Adobe Photoshop using Adobe camera raw as well as Capture One highly recommend you check these out if you're interested in getting the classic film simulation look okay so let's talk about video in the Q3 so we have the addition of the new Maestro 4 processor which is going to enable this camera to be much more powerful in this predecessor and this does open up a lot of video options that look really impressive in terms of specs so you can shoot up to cinema 8K video on the Q3 either with internal recording or you can use the HDMI output it's going to be 4208-bit but it's still impressive from this type of camera probably more impressive to me though is that you can do 422 10 bit in L log or hlg with this camera up to cinema 4K 60p which is more than adequate for most types of situations when you want really high quality video being able to crop is actually interesting too and you can even shoot macro video with this camera it's actually a really versatile setup however there are going to be two issues with this that will be deal breakers for people who are serious about video the first issue should be fairly obvious there is no audio input on this camera so that does limit you somewhat having said that the built-in microphones in the camera are adequate but it's not going to replace the need for a shotgun at times or even a lavalier mic if you're doing an interview and so you are a little bit limited there there are a couple workarounds like for instance you could record all of your audio into a separate audio recorder that's dedicated and then sync them together and post production I just think that's an additional step and it's going to be too complicated for the targeted user of this camera you know one thing that could be really cool that Leica could do down the road is to have an accessory kind of like what you see with Sony and Panasonic they both have accessory systems where you can actually plug an XLR input into this accessory and the accessory goes into the hot shoe so you have the problem solved with not having to have cables and ports and it's just a really efficient setup that's something I would really love to see actually not just on the Q3 but on future Leica SL models as well the second deal breaker for people who are serious about videos going to be the fact that we've got a high resolution CMOS sensor so the way that a CMOS sensor works is it scans right to left line by line and so it takes a little while to scan the entire sensor and this is a very high resolution sensor as well and so while the camera does a really good job at pixel binning and decreasing that file size into 8K or 4K or something that you're trying to use because of that lag with the scanning you're going to have that Jello effect so this means if you could do any panning shots you're going to see lines move anything that has a substantial motion within the frame is just not going to be really high image quality and that's just the nature of using high resolution CMOS sensor design but having said that the Q3 is actually really cool because it's a small camera that you can carry around it's fairly versatile if you want to do just some basic b-roll shots that aren't too complicated in terms of motion I would just say that keep your expectations in line with what you're going to get out of this camera if you're really serious about video I still think the sl2s is the much better option with that 24 megapixel sensor and it's got audio inputs one observation that I do think is important to make though I'm very glad that like have opened this up to a really versatile set of options for video I don't personally have a lot of Need for 8K I know it looks really good on a spec sheet and I'd rather them have it in there than not because the one time you want to use it it'd be nice to know at least your camera would do it however I think this is the best way to say this I think when you put those kind of specs on a spec sheet it creates an expectation in the mind of the user of the camera and I don't think that that's like his intention is to say this is a great video camera I think that's what the sl2s is for as I mentioned earlier but I do think it's a really good package I'm glad it's there I just think that expectations versus reality is something that oh some users if you're very video centered you might be a little bit disappointed but just like the specs that I'm talking about I think I've even gotten a little bit off track here and if we look at the Q3 for what it is you have a small everyday carry camera it's got an excellent lens on there you've got high resolution you can take really great quality images you can actually get very decent video on I think that it delivers probably one of the best value packages of any camera available on the market right now Sony were the only other camera that were doing a full-frame integrated lens camera and we haven't seen that updated in a long time and so I think that the Q3 is definitely the winner here and I think this is a a use case for this for just about any kind of photographer which is why it's vica's most versatile camera and when you look at the price point even though it's certainly not cheap I think the value that you get out of it and the fact that you get a body and an excellent lens in it for about half of what you'd get in let's say the M system or even the SL system I think this is an incredible deal and I would love to know of course what you guys think I'm sure you will tell me so drop a comment below and uh when I've had a little more time with this camera I will do a full review this has just been a preview with the short time that I had with it and I actually am very impressed until the next video I'll see you guys then later\n"