A fleeting acquaintance lasting just a day is catastrophically insufficient to fully appreciate the device; it’s like taking candy from a child.
We will soon rectify this. In the meantime, let me share an interesting story about focal lengths and zoom lenses. Since the days of DSLRs, I have been an advocate for bright zooms – they are convenient and significantly speed up the process of long street shoots. Two zooms for all occasions: 24–70 and 70–200. The only problem is they weigh about 2 kilograms and, perhaps, they fall short of primes in sharpness and light.
Camera manufacturers actively encourage users to purchase new products, leading to the release of new brands and lenses. Leica, however, has made an intriguing move: thanks to the enormous resolution of its full-frame sensor, they implemented a simple and obvious cropping function for various focal lengths. You simply see a frame on your screen with a label indicating which focal length it is simulating.
For example, from 28 mm you can achieve 35, 50, 75, and 90 mm – five options in one lens. It’s like a matrix digital zoom at its maximum! Canon, on the other hand, only allows for a crop of x1.6 – and by the way, this often helps reach a bit further at 200 mm.
What’s particularly interesting about Leica’s function is how it works in video mode: there’s some kind of software upscale in the camera that increases the video dimensions up to 8K after cropping. Even at maximum crop, it looks good.
I don’t know why other manufacturers don’t include such options in their functionality – although they do offer you to exchange your shekels for new primes.
PS There is indeed a touch of irony in this text – I realize that no crop will replace a native prime lens. But keep in mind how well Leica’s crop delivers image quality and how much a full setup of five primes will cost you – not to mention mobility. Check out the examples – all of this was shot with a single 28 mm baby.