Pixii Really Surprised me

Godfrey said:
I don't know what you understand. There are no "APS-C M-mount lenses" ... M-mount lenses are designed for M-mount cameras, all but three have been FF cameras, and one of the alternative-format M-mount cameras had an EVF which obviates all this frame line business entirely. M mount lenses have largely been designed with 28, 35, 50, 75, 90, and 135 mm focal lengths corresponding to the frame lines included in the M4-P and later M series cameras.

The fact that a couple of lenses exist in focal lengths popular on APS-C cameras does not define them as APS-C lenses, since they cover FF format. They are wider alternatives for M-mount camera beyond the standard M viewfinder's capabilities to display frame lines.

The Pixii is a body designed to be used with existing M-mount lenses, since Pixii is not also creating a set of lenses for it. The frame line selector is set to the focal length of the lens you're fitting. The frame lines show you the correct field of view for those lenses on the Pixii sensor in the Pixii viewfinder.

What's so difficult about that?

It might have been nice if they included a 24mm setting due to the popularity of the FoV that focal length provides on APS-C, but they probably found it difficult to do that, so they leave 24mm and shorter focal lengths for an accessory finder. I bet there are a lot more potential M-mount users who own a 28mm lens than a 24mm or shorter focal length lens.

This entire argument about frame lines and focal lengths simply reinforces the limitations of a mechanically coupled, mechano-optical rangefinder/viewfinder design. EVFs and other TTL designs are far more flexible about being able to present a useful viewfinder regardless of the focal length of the lens fitted, which is why RF cameras largely became obsolete when SLRs were able to be produced at popular prices.

G
Click to expand...

Ah, now you see my point. Yes, Leica doesn't make "APS-C" lenses. But they do make TL lenses, which is exactly the same thing. And the frame line progression on the Pixii is made for 135 format lenses even though it is an APS-C camera.

If they can't design an optical range/viewfinder to accommodate 18mm and 23/24mm lenses, then it means they didn't have the resources (monetary, financial, and technical) to make an electronic one which would have negated the need for external finders.

You read on here a lot of comments about folks who don't care for the 40mm focal length (I'm not one of them), so they won't be hanging a 28mm on the Pixii. So that leaves you with 50, 60, and 75 equivalent frame lines in the finder having the most usefulness. From a marketing standpoint does it then make any sense to sell a rangefinder manual focus camera that cannot give you at least a 35mm focal length equivalent FOV in the viewfinder? Is someone going to design a goggled lens for this camera? Highly unlikely. Leica tried that three times, and except for the Dual Range Summicron 50 it didn't go over too well.

PF
 
No, I don't see your point at all. Seems to me that rather than having any rational point, you choose to disparage this camera and its designers/manufacturer for some unknown reason, or perhaps simply because it's not what you personally want.

The Pixii is designed for people who want a digital rangefinder camera that utilizes existing Leica M-mount lenses. Just like the M-mount camera unit for the Ricoh GXR and the Epson R-D1 were. The *vast* majority of Leica M users have 28, 35, 50, 75, 90, or/and 135 mm lenses. Why not make a camera that uses them and provides the appropriate frame lines for them on its sensor format? It's just a body that can use existing lenses that some folks have in their bag already, not a complete system.

After all, if you want to buy a system camera with this size sensor and want what you call the 'standard APS-C focal length' lenses, fer gosh sake buy a Leica CL and the TL lenses rather than Pixxii body and a set of M lenses. It just makes more sense.

And why on earth should you, I, or Pixii care what some unknown bunch of folks who 'don't really like a 40mm lens' think? They just won't buy the camera. Anyone interested in the Pixii can come to their own conclusion as to whether or not they want to buy it. Enough people most likely will buy it, I'd wager, but if not ... again, why should I care?

Me: If I were to buy one, I'd stick my Summilux 35 on it and be delighted ... that lens is what's on my CL perhaps 90% of the time and provides an excellent normal lens option on APS-C, my usual favorite. If I want wider, the Color Skopar 28 does a nice job of it. I can always stick a wider lens on too if I felt like it ... put a 24 on and use the 28 setting: it'll be close enough for most uses. (I certainly used to do that with my Leica M cameras!)

I'd be entertained to have a Pixii, but I'm not in the market to buy one. I have enough cameras.

The Pixii really don't have to support exactly, identically the classic M 35mm format field of view options, or absolutely perfect framing accuracy, to be a delightful and successful camera. And if it doesn't have what you want, just buy something else rather than complain about it.

Why complain about it?

G
 
I, for one am pleased that there is another rangefinder player in the market. Although I’m not in the market for such a camera, I really hope they do well.

Certainly I like the fresh, clean lines of the body.

If Pixii are not successful and fold, my nagging thought is future support and repairs, especially with the electronics.
 
I use a variety of camera formats and keep a list of my lenses using a standard format on how wide or long. So I can tell you easily that a 75mm lens can be wider than a 21mm lens- if you are using it on a large enough format.

I use 21mm on an APS-C rangefinder (RD-1). I agree with the concept of it having framelines. But that isn't possible with Epson's 1:1 finder. I use 28mm framelines and imagine wider. Try getting a reasonably priced external finder for that!

I don't know the Pixii vf magnification but it's quite possible 24mm isn't available due to magnification. For mine, that's a problem. But the 1:1 viewer is such a delight that Cosina also used it for 35mm film, %#$ the consequences.

There are things with the Pixii that are fixed: vf magnification, aps-c sensor. But the software should be adaptable. So if a 24mm lens could have a frameline marked in, mark it in. If it can't be done, and if that is all that holds you back, get a lower magnification vf installed in the Pixii ii.
 
Just been looking at the Pixii website, and am perplexed by something: the camera appears sealed, so (a) you're limited to its mere 8GB storage and (b) you can't change the battery (holding a tiny 1000 mAh charge).

Is that right, that the camera is indeed sealed? If so, that's totally impractical.

First, when you run out of memory or power, you'll have give up taking photos and go home! It's not practicable to slowly transfer megabytes of data to an external device on the go, nor recharge a battery, especially photographing an event or on holiday where scenes if not captured are gone for good.

Secondly, lithium batteries typically last about 2 years. Pixii says the batteries are built in, not user replaceable. So what happens when they die? Do you send the camera back to France for a new battery!?

Thirdly, a smartphone generation is a short 18 months. So, apps must be continuously updated to keep them working with phone software revisions. If Pixii has problems or go out of business, its app will very soon stop working. What then? You'll just have a very expensive paperweight. (You may say keep an old phone just in case, but phones are supported by their manufacturers for only 4-5 years, so you'll have problems with that too - like being unable to replace dead batteries.)

The last two issues would worry me if the camera were made a major company, but for a tiny start-up like Pixii they become not just an elephant in the room but an entire herd!

Regardless of its interesting concepts and specifications as a camera (all covered in this thread), which I don't have a problem with (perfect for some people, but not all others), from the viewpoint of practicality it seems a disaster... or a disposable toy for rich people.

It's even less practical than a film camera. At least with film you can pop in a a new roll of film yourself and are good to go again!
 
It’s very intriguing.

I agree the price is high but this is a brand new company, and a brand new product.

If they can support this camera, I can see this being a product that can survive.

But then again it’s a rangefinder and it’s not a Leica.

To be fair rangefinder purists have been wanting Leica competition; however, we Leica users are brand snobs.

I hope it succeeds to a second iteration. At that point I might be interested once it gets the kinks out and improved
 
Godfrey said:
No, I don't see your point at all. Seems to me that rather than having any rational point, you choose to disparage this camera and its designers/manufacturer for some unknown reason, or perhaps simply because it's not what you personally want.

The Pixii is designed for people who want a digital rangefinder camera that utilizes existing Leica M-mount lenses. Just like the M-mount camera unit for the Ricoh GXR and the Epson R-D1 were. The *vast* majority of Leica M users have 28, 35, 50, 75, 90, or/and 135 mm lenses. Why not make a camera that uses them and provides the appropriate frame lines for them on its sensor format? It's just a body that can use existing lenses that some folks have in their bag already, not a complete system.

After all, if you want to buy a system camera with this size sensor and want what you call the 'standard APS-C focal length' lenses, fer gosh sake buy a Leica CL and the TL lenses rather than Pixxii body and a set of M lenses. It just makes more sense.

And why on earth should you, I, or Pixii care what some unknown bunch of folks who 'don't really like a 40mm lens' think? They just won't buy the camera. Anyone interested in the Pixii can come to their own conclusion as to whether or not they want to buy it. Enough people most likely will buy it, I'd wager, but if not ... again, why should I care?

Me: If I were to buy one, I'd stick my Summilux 35 on it and be delighted ... that lens is what's on my CL perhaps 90% of the time and provides an excellent normal lens option on APS-C, my usual favorite. If I want wider, the Color Skopar 28 does a nice job of it. I can always stick a wider lens on too if I felt like it ... put a 24 on and use the 28 setting: it'll be close enough for most uses. (I certainly used to do that with my Leica M cameras!)

I'd be entertained to have a Pixii, but I'm not in the market to buy one. I have enough cameras.

The Pixii really don't have to support exactly, identically the classic M 35mm format field of view options, or absolutely perfect framing accuracy, to be a delightful and successful camera. And if it doesn't have what you want, just buy something else rather than complain about it.

Why complain about it?

G
Click to expand...

Why, you say? While you complain about my trying to discuss an issue with a new product? Isn't that what we do here, investigate and question why this or that feature was installed, or whether it is worth the investment?

Come on, if you don't point out certain failings about a new product, then the original CL would not have outsold the M5. You wouldn't get any improvements to the rangefinder flare issue. You wouldn't have IP52 weather/dust sealing on the Q2. And on and on and on.

It is our nature as users of new technology to ask that the functions of a new camera do not deter the ease of use of said product. I'm only saying that if you are going to design and build an APS-C camera, you shouldn't try to use full frame conventions on it just for the sake of marketing. No other manufacturer does what Pixii is trying to do with this camera. It is not a serious camera. It is not capable of standing up to any longtime use no matter how you measure it, whether by ISO range, internal memory (which is the only option), battery life, or rate of transfer to a phone. They are only trying to ride the coat tails of Leica to make money off people who want to walk around with a Leica lens on their cludgy little box.

Cosina would have done a much better job of it. Instead we get a $3300 equivalent of the Yashica Y35. Someone's idea of a photographers camera designed by the marketing department.

PF
 
valdas said:
29 posts and no pictures from this newcomer?
Click to expand...


69 now...

Perhaps it is taking a while to get the film developed etc which is why we haven't seen any pics.

Oh wait, it is a digicam that sends snaps straight to your phone/web/FB page.

Weird.
 
Indeed, the grumps are out in force. The same kind of people who two years ago said the camera wouldn't come out.

Our choice for M Lenses has been so restricted for so long, if you want to use a rangefinder. And this is a rangefinder site.

I'm amazed and happy it has reached production.
 
Paul T. said:
Indeed, the grumps are out in force. The same kind of people who two years ago said the camera wouldn't come out.

Our choice for M Lenses has been so restricted for so long, if you want to use a rangefinder. And this is a rangefinder site.

I'm amazed and happy it has reached production.
Click to expand...

When is yours being delivered? Will you post pics?

Perhaps this will spur Cosina into making a digital Zeiss Ikon.
 
This is a cool project, and I am happy to see it materializing. I didn’t give this a huge chance when first hearing about the plans. I hope they do well enough to keep going and later coming up with updates that are more up to date and relevant.

Having said that, it cannot be easy to make any success of this. The camera is fairly expensive and behind the times in key aspects. An APS-C sensor with 12 megapixels is seriously limiting, and the low-ISO examples look noisy. At least the noise has some charm to it viewing quickly on a tablet. Therefore this could find a niche that moves the project further. What type of niche? Something something mobile users on social media apps. For more traditional photography, an update would be welcome.
 
The resistance to any form of change or anything new be it AF or indeed any new gear runs deep on this board.
It`s a shame because it makes it less interesting .
 
I don‘t think it is resistance.. it is the price that puts a lot of us off (you probably don‘t get your money‘s worth with 12 mpix and the built in battery). Other than that I‘m impressed by the camera but real life pictures would be great.
 
The battery looks to be swappable :
Power
Li-ion 7.4V battery, 1000mAh capacity, model NP-FW50
Integrated USB charger
See the manual here: https://pixii.fr/support

"GETTING STARTED
INSTALL A BATTERY
Using a coin, turn the battery compartment disk. Notice the golden battery socket at the bottom of the compartment. Align the battery termination clips with the socket in the compartment. Push until the cap is flush with the camera bottom and turn the disc back to lock the battery."
 
The price is what makes people react negatively. That’s understandable. However, I’m sure this company knows this too. I’m sure it was not cheap to make as a small company and they didn’t have much room on the price.... with a global shutter and a mechanical rangefinder in a body that wasn’t sourced from elsewhere. It can’t be easy to make this camera without support from a major company.
 
Ah, it has a removable battery.

Let's think for a few moments that it had a sealed in battery: that would be very much like my Light L16, sealed for battery and storage. The concepts of use are different from other cameras with removable storage and battery.

- The Pixii battery is charged in camera. IF you run low when out shooting, you connect it to a portable storage battery and charge the camera. At least with the L16, about 15 minutes of charging nets another 200 exposures. I'm sure the same is true of the Pixii.

- The Pixii files are 12 Mpixel. A 12 Mpixel raw file will likely average to 10-16 Mbytes each (based on looking at my E-5 and GXR-M raw files, with and without lossless compression). The Pixii's storage is 8Gbytes, so it can hold 500+ raw files before its contents need to be transferred elsewhere and its storage reinitialized. For my trips and average style of shooting, that is about enough storage for typically the first week's shooting.

But the Pixii has been designed to optimize wireless transfer of its files to your iPhone and other devices. So the JPEG files can be seen on your phone almost instantly, and you can transfer the important raw files over very quickly. My iPhone (and iPad) have always at least 256G nowadays (1T on the iPad Pro), and I usually have at least half of that as free space. This implies that I can move the full contents of the Pixii to the iPhone for storage 16 times in the course of a trip, or about 8000 exposures. I've never in my wildest shooting sessions over the course of a trip totaled more than 3000 exposures.

(The L16 has 256G storage. ON the long trips I've made with it, it has held 1500-2000 exposures—much bigger data since it's a 50Mpixel plenary camera—and I've not yet had to transfer any files at all in the course of a trip.)

On the basis this, a few things are apparent to me:

- There's enough battery to do a lot if the Pixii is energy efficient (why shouldn't it be? It has no LCD to power and it is only a 12 Mpixel sensor).

- There's enough storage to cover most average shooting needs that it's intended for. It's not a professional camera or a sequence camera that's intended to be making thousands of exposures per session.

- The smartphone and the Pixii app is an essential part of the Pixii use and experience.

- A backup storage battery or two (typically about $15 these days) will be included in your camera kit if you haven't got one there already (I do ... My Hasselblad 907x and Light L16 both charge in camera and I carry two backup batteries so I can recharge them in the event that I'm away from mains power for an extended period of time).

- Speed of WiFi transfer is an interesting question. I set up my iPhone 11 Pro as a WiFi hotspot and used AirDrop to move about 10G of mixed JPEG, raw, and video files from it to my iPad Pro 11" as a test. That took about 2-3 minutes. Wired USB 3 transfer between the two devices took 35 seconds. ON that basis, I don't think the data transfer speed is much of an issue at this point in time. 15 years ago, it would have been.

The concept of the Pixii is getting clearer to me and it's also beginning to make sense why it has only 12 Mpixel. Since the intended output is to smartphone and other portable display device, I only have to look at the results of the 12Mpixel camera in my iPhone 11 Pro to see what the quality on the 11", 12.3" screens of my iPad Pros, or 27" screen of my Mac mini, to visualize the imaging potential of the Pixii resolution. I can't say that I have much complaint about it, and I've printed iPhone 11 Pro photos to 13x19" dimensions without any complaints at all (never mind the output of my other 12 Mpixel cameras in the past like the E-5, GXR-M, etc). The smallish file size makes it handy and quick to transfer files in the field, via wifi or cable. Et cetera.

The L16 has proven to be quite an excellent travel/all around shooting camera. I can only imagine the Pixii will do as well from a similar point of view. As I reflect on it, the Pixii becomes even more appealing. It's still a bit expensive.. The Light L16 cost me about $1100 as a pre-order/backer kit and was about $1800 when it sold retail, and it's a 50Mpixel camera with a 28 to 150 mm eqFOV zoom lens built-in.

G
 
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