pixii rangefinder

[aizan]

I would buy it if it was $1300-1500 and had framelines for 21mm and 24mm (32mm-e and 36mm-e). If the wireless image transfer, 3rd party programmability, and custom color profiles are well executed, this could be the Lomography/personal diary camera that a lot of people have been looking for.

This is the Fujifilm X100, Leica Q niche. One of the few niches left, and a useful complement to a smartphone. If you’ve been whining about the Fujifilm X100 series’s manual focus implementation (me), a camera with an M-mount will be very attractive. And if you’ve been griping for a normal lens (not me, usually), here you go, finally!

People would be more positive about the Pixii if it was full frame. Nobody wants to put up with the lens limitations and mismatching that an APS-C sensor causes in the critical 28-35mm-e range that most people want on this kind of camera. That alone casts a shadow on the rest of this camera’s potential usefulness. But I would be ok using the Pixii with the Voigtlander 21mm f/3.5 Color-Skopar...if only it had the viewfinder and framelines for it!

 

[f.hayek]

What I don’t understand is why they chose such a poor performing CMOS sensor. Might have had appeal to someone with a CCD sensor for that cost. Or a monochrome.

 

[jsrockit]

I would buy it if it was $1300-1500 and had framelines for 21mm and 24mm (32mm-e and 36mm-e). If the wireless image transfer, 3rd party programmability, and custom color profiles are well executed, this could be the Lomography/personal diary camera that a lot of people have been looking for.

That`s a big IF... but that is just it....at $3500-4000 it can`t have these shortcomings.

 

[kshapero]

I wonder how the Pixii files will compare

with the 6MP Epson RD

and the 10.3 MP Leica M8

-- both of which seem to still have plenty of fans

Just saw a mint Epson RD1s for $1600 on Ebay. I would get that before the Pixii. Come to think of it, I miss owning that rig. What was I thinking when I sold it?

 

[boojum]

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”/Let us go and make our visit.

Now it seems the naysayers have been proven wrong for the most part. This is partly due to the camera evolving into what the clamor was about.

This team is a start-up. They have never built cameras before. And before anyone gets too excited with that remember that NASA was a rocket startup. Yes, they did bring in Nazi tech help. Pixii has brought in Barbier from GoPro. Who the hell ever wanted one of those, until after they showed up? They are not building another Leica, thankfully. Using a similar form factor, but just about all cameras look alike, with the M mount for pissed-off Leica owners, and a whole new design philosophy. They have fixed what was broken and left the unbroken alone. The company seems to be taking off with lag time for a camera gone from two weeks to three weeks. I doubt they will ever displace Leica but they sure look like they can muscle their way to a place at the table, and do it with finesse.

Yes, I am a Pixii fanboy. Hopefully it will get worse after the camera gets here. LOL

 

[jsrockit]

Now it seems the naysayers have been proven wrong for the most part.

Well, in all fairness this thread is about the 1st version, not the 2nd version.

 

[boojum]

Well, in all fairness this thread is about the 1st version, not the 2nd version.

Agreed. However the naysayers assumed that what they saw was it, period. Perhaps they are too accustomed to the glacial progress over there in Wetzlar. ROTFLMAO OK, one hundred lines on the board in Latin, "I will not pick on Leica."

 

[jsrockit]

Well, nobody was a second version coming so quickly after the first, not even the biggest Pixii fans. They truly did the impossible.

 

[boojum]

Well, nobody was a second version coming so quickly after the first, not even the biggest Pixii fans. They truly did the impossible.

If you look at their team page you see some young folks, kind of Silicon Valley types, good education and good work experience. But they are serious, they are committed and, so far, they are successful. https://pixii.fr/the-team This is a git-er-done crowd. A small, fast team.

For me this means that the collection of lenses I have for Leica will transfer. For me this means I no longer have to be an Untermensch in the Leitz universe. No more of that. Now I have a choice in more than lenses. And the Pixii is tested and in Burling shows to give great images. Gonna be burning up the pixels when that puppy shows up on my door.

Just now from their web page: "Technology is developing fast and so are we developing Pixii. The camera has been designed from the ground up as a computational photography platform, tapping into the smartphone ecosystem to stay on top of technological advances."

 

[nzeeman]

still too expensive for aps-c camera. i would still prefer xe4. inwould get pixii 2 only if its same price as xe4. for money they ask now - its too expensive even for full frame. so i am still not a fan - to be sincere i also think leica digital rangefinders are nonsense. paying extra money for rf added and inferior everything else is insanity.

 

[M.B]

The rangefinder mechanism alone cost about €1000 to manufacture. So the same price as the X-E4 is not gonna happen. Even if they made it in Indonesia like the X-E4 it still wouldn’t be possible at that price.

 

[ranger9]

still too expensive for aps-c camera. i would still prefer xe4. inwould get pixii 2 only if its same price as xe4. for money they ask now - its too expensive even for full frame. so i am still not a fan - to be sincere i also think leica digital rangefinders are nonsense. paying extra money for rf added and inferior everything else is insanity.

Fair enough. So what digital camera do YOU use, and for what kinds of photography? Always like to keep track of what the discerning purchasers are selecting.

 

[boojum]

I had an uncle who used to say, "We can't all love the same woman" and this is the bare bones truth. The Pixii is not the "Everyman Camera." Their attitude, design and on-website manifesto make it clear this is not a camera for the masses. This is not the present day answer to the Argus C-3. It will appeal to a certain few photographers and a few arrogant bustards like me.

 

[nzeeman]

Fair enough. So what digital camera do YOU use, and for what kinds of photography? Always like to keep track of what the discerning purchasers are selecting.

i use fuji xe1 for digital and just with chinese lenses - i used few fuji autofocus but didnt feel like they give me any enjoyment. canon p and russian rangefinders for film. sometimes canon demi as well. i think in film world rangefinder is really superior to slr for many reasons - mostly quality of lens designs. i used leica m4 before but i didn't see point of having it so i took canon p and sold leica and i dont see any leica advantage at all. also my wife still use her m6 but only because she wears glasses and she see patch only on that one - if not she would convert to canon too. in digital i use xe1 because i had xe3 and difference in quality is too small.l so no use of having more expensive one. and as for pixii and leica - i really think their image quality is just ok and nothing very special to pay extra. i even saw many awful things in leica images - they still have some color cast very often. so yeah its good if someone like it - just not for me.

 

[nzeeman]

The rangefinder mechanism alone cost about €1000 to manufacture. So the same price as the X-E4 is not gonna happen. Even if they made it in Indonesia like the X-E4 it still wouldn’t be possible at that price.

1000? so how did cosina make rangefinders like bessa r for 200$ - they were losing koney on each body? please dont believe leica propaganda machinery...

 

[M.B]

1000? so how did cosina make rangefinders like bessa r for 200$ - they were losing koney on each body? please dont believe leica propaganda machinery...

I was talking about the Pixii.
if you can build a factory from scratch and start making rangefinders for $200 I suggest you go for it. You would sell tons of them.

 

[nzeeman]

I was talking about the Pixii.
if you can build a factory from scratch and start making rangefinders for $200 I suggest you go for it. You would sell tons of them.

exactly what cosina did - they had only slr production and made rf from scratch. so its same investment - but ok its your right to be ripped off if you like that.

 

[jsrockit]

Ok when Cosina did that it was 20 years ago, it was not digital, and they used parts from a cheap slr to make their first one. They were in the camera making business for other manufacturers, so it was not from scratch. Also it was not $200 and film camera manufacturing was mature.

Now, in 2004, the Epson RD1 came out for $3000. You should look at that instead of a relatively cheap film camera. And even that was not truly from scratch.

 

[das]

I always wondered how many R cameras that Cosina was able to sell during its approximately 15-year run. At the time, people were like "meh, I would rather play with digital." Who would have guessed that the Rs would sell today (used) often for more than they cost new? And I don't know if those bodies were crap otherwise. Cosina certainly knew how to make a functional and reliable cheap camera. It was pretty impressive that Konica and Cosina were able to develop rangefinder mechanisms (apparently from scratch as the last Konica camera to have one was the 1973 Auto S3) during the late 1990s / early 2000s for the Hexar RF, the Rs, and the Zeiss Ikon. Given the complexities of Japanese industry, maybe it was all subcontracted out to a specialized shop . Regarding the Pixii, I would personally pass on anything not full-frame, but I wonder what the market actually is for sub-M10/M11 digital rangefinders. It definitely does not include me.

 

[M.B]

Expecting a startup with 4-5 employees to build a factory and start making rangefinders as cheap as an established camera manufacturer did 20 years earlier is.. let’s say optimistic.