The nerds behind the red dot

Text article

Feb 12

Article in cooperation with fotointern.ch

A bit of history

The history of photography is everywhere in the Leica headquarters in Wetzlar: photojournalists have captured decisive moments in history with products from the brand with the red dot. And this year, Leica celebrates its 100th anniversary. However, the story began before 1925: In 1914, Oskar Barnack, then head of film camera development at Leitz, developed a “miniature camera”. Because of his asthma, the keen nature photographer was unable to carry the heavy plate and large format cameras. So he tinkered with a lightweight, compact camera that he could load with the perforated 24 mm film. He rotated the film 90 degrees to achieve the 35mm format familiar to us today. To compensate for the much smaller film format compared to the large-format cameras, he invested in the quality of the lenses. To this day, the quality of Leica lenses is legendary.

*After Oskar Barnack constructed the Ur-Leica in 1914, the “Leica 1” was introduced in 1925 (Press photos Leica)*

Ups and downs

Many internal discussions followed whether Leica should dare to produce this camera in series and to bring it onto the market. The whole back and forth ended in a meeting in June 1924 with the legendary sentence of Ernst Leitz II: "I hereby decide: It is risked." And then, exactly 100 years ago - 1925 - the first Leica was introduced on the market. She revolutionized photography. Leica was in one fell swoop (the word is a combination of Leitz and Camera) mera) in the camera area technology and market leader. But it didn't take long for the Japanese competitors to replicate the rangefinder camera concept. And in 1936 the first SLR camera was presented at the Leipzig spring mass: the “Kine Exakta” from Ihageee from Dresden. This gave the rangefinder concept serious competition, and the sold quantities of this camera construction decreased rapidly. The SLR camera, thanks to which you could see the image through the lens (such a kind of Wysiwyg), had various advantages with its structure. Leica struggled to start the SLR world: It was only in 1964 that the Leicaflex company presented. And then Leica granted the Japanese camera manufacturer Minolta access to the auto focus patent, which gave him a competitive advantage. It became even more difficult with the start of digital photography: Because of the small camera body, it was much more challenging to bring the Leica-M cameras into the digital age without changing the structure and iconic design.

Shortly before the bankruptcy

At the beginning of 2000, Leica was in economic difficulties, and without the courageous intervention by Dr. Andreas Kaufmann would almost certainly no longer exist. He acquired the majority of the company and missed the company a drastic cure: within a few years the company caught up with its technology residue, and thanks to skillful alliances that Dr. Kaufmann Schmiedete, the company can also install the most modern technology into its cameras as a niche player.

Leica was always undisputed as a lens manufacturer. I think it is not exaggerated to say that Leica is one of the best lens manufacturers in the world - even the best for many.

The niche player with the market leader image

Without having an insight into the internal processes, I assume that Dr. Kaufmann significantly shaped Leica's new strategy: the company flourished, and the name Leica again developed into a synonym for top quality and outstanding solutions. The rangefinder camera line-the Leica M-is still the figurehead, but the fully manually operated camera without autofocus is definitely not for everyone. In my opinion, there would have been a risk that Leica would have remained a marginalized player if you had only put on the M. But here, too, Dr. Kaufmann and his team visionary: In addition to various compact and instant models, Leica has launched three other camera lines over the past few years: the Leica Q- a compact camera with a fixed focal length, simplest operation and the highest image quality; The Leica SL - the mirrorless system camera, the highest quality, easy usability and flexibility for hard and versatile photographer life combines and the Leica S - the middle format system, which is the flagship of Leica in terms of recording quality. In terms of the number of pieces produced, Leica is a niche player, but the name and the products are important for photo enthusiasts that normally has a market leader.

I have been photographing the Leica SL system since 2015, and meanwhile the Leica Q and Leica S have also been added. A connection to the developers of Leica has emerged over the years, and in regular exchange I try to give useful feedback to their cameras, which can then flow into the development of new camera models. I am only one of many voices logically, but the seriousness with which Leica records the feedback from me and other committed photographers is honor and obligation at the same time.

In September, I was able to take a look behind the scenes of the production process together with a small group of people on the occasion of a meeting. I was allowed to take a few pictures where photography is normally prohibited, to give you an insight into the world of Leica production. I realized the photos with the Leica SL3.

*From here, photography is usually prohibited. But I was able to realize some pictures to give you an insight into the world of Leica manufacturing.*

Start of the Factory Tour

Everything breathes history here. Large -format prints that document the world events adorn the walls. In the foreground a picture of Steve McCurry, one of my favorite photographers.

The nerds

Every person I met and meet at Leica fulfills their task with great pride. Above all, the aim is to build a product of the highest quality. Each production step is checked two or three times. What is not 100% flawless goes back to readjust. There is no sample control in Wetzlar, but every camera and every lens from the production is checked. In the end, the person who carried out the final test sets their name underneath and thus stands for a perfect product.

For outsiders, meticulousness may look almost pathological in production and control, but this is the only way that every product that leaves the production site in Wetzlar meets Leica's requirements. The nerds check everything twice and triple and have my great respect.

A little anecdote in passing: shortly before my visit to Leica, I bought an SL fixed focal length. These lenses are checked by Grit Thümmler, who you can see in picture 8. We talked for a while and I found out that she may well have checked my lens before it left the factory. It was then a colleague of hers, but the fact that there are flesh and blood people here with a name who do the final check on every product is something that, for me at least, earns the Leica brand some bonus points ;-).

Photo Grafare

The word "photography" comes from "photo grafare", which means "painting (or drawing) with light". A wonderful description of what happens when we press the camera's trigger. The lens captures the light, bundles and channeles it for the film or the sensor. This is of course a purely physical-optical process, but for me there is always some magic when I imagine how a large live scene is compressed to a 36 x 24 mm field. The lens is one of the most important criteria for image quality and image effect. Extensive tests that I carried out together with my friend Christian Habermeier (see. "Test the Best"), show that the lens has a greater influence on the image effect than, for example, the sensor.

Leica works with over 50 types of glass to build the best lenses possible. To do this, the company pushes the limits of what is physically possible, sometimes going to great lengths that could almost be described as insane. We learned, for example, that there are cine lenses from Leica for which the grinding of a single lens – and a lens can easily have ten single lenses – on the CNC machine takes a whole day. Each lens is ground and polished to an accuracy of 0.1 micrometers, which is 1/1000 mm (!). This precision is a major factor in giving Leica images their high-quality, three-dimensional effect, which photo enthusiasts refer to as the “Leica look”.

Some of the glasses used are so sensitive to air that they would quickly oxidize after grinding. Therefore, the sanded lentils are provided with a protective layer if necessary (see photo 3), which is then only removed shortly before removing it. After the remuneration process, the glass can no longer oxidize. In certain cases, the remuneration of a lens not only serves to improve the quality of the image, but also to protect the lens. Incidentally, photo 4 shows a stack of glass, which is remunerated in the middle and is untrusted on the outside. The difference is striking.

The outstanding lens calculations, the extreme manufacturing precision, the quality of the materials used for both the lenses and the lens housings, the willingness to push the limits of what is possible, and the inspection of each lens are all factors that contribute to the extremely high quality of Leica lenses. Once you have seen and understood this process, you can appreciate why these lenses carry a rather hefty price tag.

Individualization

Because Leica is a factory, you can customize your camera on request - for example with an engraving or your own belub. For example, we would be with an individual extension in the color "Vamp"?

What's next at Leica?

After our Test month with the Leica SL3-S In September 2024 Christian Habermeier and I personally brought our pre -series cameras back to Wetzlar. Together with Urs Tillmanns, the founder of fotointern.ch, we took the opportunity to discuss with some key persons from Leica what will come from the company with the red dot in the future. Of course it is not the case that Leica chats all the secrets, but a few summary thoughts from the conversation are noted here:

In general, the interaction between hardware and software is something that Leica pays a great deal of attention to. This means that an image is far from finished when the sensor stores the colored pixels. The processing of the image data and the importing of this data onto the computer have an influence on the image file. Even a RAW image is already an interpretation of the photo taken. At Leica, a lot of thought is given to how this workflow could change in the future and how the familiar Leica look can be created in the digital age. The software possibilities (keyword: AI) are becoming more and more sophisticated and offer more possibilities for combining them with the hardware.

But the process always starts with the lens: as the first link in the chain, it plays a crucial role. Leica is constantly optimizing lens calculations, the materials used, autofocus technology, the precision of the production process, etc. This is necessary because the lenses have to keep pace with the ever-increasing sensor resolutions: after all, what use is a 60 MP sensor if the lens “only” resolves 40 MP? In addition, the demands on autofocus are constantly increasing. Only with precise focusing can the high magnification potential of the new sensors really be exploited. The mirrorless systems give Leica engineers more leeway in lens design: because we never see a truly optically generated image with the electronic viewfinders, but always an image that has already been electronically processed, certain optical corrections can also be made by calculation. This means, for example, that lenses with the same performance characteristics can be built more compactly. The Leica M is also a mirrorless system, because a rangefinder camera never directly displays an image generated by the lens.

In addition, further functionalities in the camera would be conceivable. One example is the perspective correction introduced by Leica in 2020, with which you can correct the falling lines directly in the camera. The advantage is that I see on site how much of the image I lose through the prospect of perspective. I know that Leica is about further exciting functionalities intensive thoughts.

The development of the four lines - Q, M, SL and S - continues permanently

With the Q recently the version with the 43 mm lenses came onto the market, and I speculate that at some point new Q-Monochrome models will follow.

At the beginning of 2022, the M11 and, a good year later, the M11 Monochrom were presented. There is wild speculation on the internet as to whether the M12 – whenever it comes – will have a hybrid viewfinder. This would make sense because it would increase the precision of manual focusing for high-end sensors. “No comment” was the response at our meeting.

With the SL line, Leica has brought both SL model lines up to date with the SL3-S. The SL3-S in particular shows that Leica takes the often-addressed problem of autofocus performance seriously and has it under control. The further development of autofocus will continue to have high priority in the future – whether that's via firmware upgrades or with more powerful processors and AF technologies when launching new camera models. Furthermore, the SL3-S shows that the topic of “filming with a DSLM” is highly rated in Wetzlar. Various software and hardware solutions are in development, but it's still a bit early to talk about them. I think (also) in this area, Leica will surprise us positively in the near future. Whether there will ever be a “pure” film camera in Leica's upper quality segment is anyone's guess. Sony and Canon offer corresponding cameras, and Fuji has also announced a film camera – notably for the GFX system. It would not be out of the question for Leica to establish itself in this area as well, but that is just my personal opinion and speculation.

The Leica S3 is currently no longer in production. It was clear from the outset that only a limited number of S3 cameras would be produced. This limit was already reached in the course of 2023. Leica has confirmed - also from Dr. Kaufmann himself - that they are working on a successor model. Those responsible at Leica have also remained largely silent on the subject. Following the logic, I will now simply say that the camera will be called S4, that it will be a mirrorless camera with a resolution of around 100 Mpx and a massively improved autofocus compared to the S3. High compatibility with the M and SL lens lines would also be desirable. The task for the developers of the next S camera is not easy, as the S3 has set the bar very high in terms of image quality. But here, too, I trust the brand with the red dot to make the almost impossible possible - always and with all camera lines with the aim of providing us with great instruments in the future, with which we can perfectly capture the light of world events or even the very banal, only important to us, on the sensor.

Sometimes you read, the pictures that are taken with a Leica, even the cameras themselves, have a soul. The view behind the scenes shows that in any case so much passion flows into every camera and every lens that it could be that way ...