Leica M8 review update
Reid Reviews (pay site) have posted the second part of their Leica M8 review.
It a sizeable review with a lot of images, including 100% crops of test shots. It’s compared with a Canon EOS 5D and stands up very, very well. The image quality at low ISO is stunning (helped by excellent quality lenses) and the noise performance is excellent up to 1600 ISO.
At 3200 ISO there is quite a lot of noise, but nothing that doesn’t benefit from a dose of noise reduction and certainly stands up to comparison with a lot of other digital SLRs at the same ISO rating. The good news is that Leica don’t impose heavy noise reduction and so very good detail is retained. As Sean says, the levels of noise are much lower than scanned film at the same or lower ISO.
It’s interesting to note that Sean Reid’s test indicate that the Leica’s ISO speeds are actually faster than indicated. As I’ve said above, “excellent up to 1600 ISO”, but the camera indicates this as being 1250 ISO. Quite why Leica have decided to under-rate the ISO is unknown, but it does seem to be a common trait with digital cameras. Testing differences perhaps?
Sean is very complimentary about what really matters though, how good the camera is in use.
If you are considering buying one of these (I’d love one, but my bank manager would tell you otherwise) I strongly recommend that you sign up and read this review (there are other M8 articles to follow). Plus you get to enjoy some of Sean’s excellent street photography. 
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