New Camera

Last weekend my family and I took a trip to Nami Island, a small island about an hour and a half northwest of Seoul. This tourist destination is dotted with cafes, galleries, and public art. It is featured prominently in the 2002 K-Drama “Winter Sonata”, probably the most influential Korean drama series ever. Visitors from the Philippines and Japan, lucky recipients of the Korean wave that was spurred by the show, were out in droves. The island was also a really cool place for viewing the fall colours. My kids absolutely loved playing with the leaves.

Nami Island declares itself a micronation, and its designation was reflected in the micro-international vibe of the place. There were signs in different languages. a UN Library, a prayer room, and restaurants that catered to Halal restrictions. And also, roaming peacocks.

This was also a chance to get some outdoor shots with my new Leica Q2. I’m absolutely loving this camera. It feels just right in my hands, and the picture quality is what I’d always expected from a digital camera. Because I grew up with mechanical SLRs, the “perfect” camera for me has to have some heft, a clean design, relative compactness and great image quality. Over the past 9 years I’ve loved shooting with my Fuji x100s and X-T2. There will always be a special place in my heart for Fujifilm, and I’m sure I’ll pick up one of their cameras again. But despite the retro looks and image quality, they still didn’t quite approximate my ideal camera as well as the Q2 does.

I’m very particular with how I want my photos to look. In fact most of the time I can tell what camera was used to take a specific photo out of the 114,000 in my Lightroom catalog. Regardless of people’s opinions about the existence of microcontrast, Leica colours, and full frame quality, I see a difference. To answer the often-asked question “is it worth spending that much on a camera?”, my answer is if you know what you want, and it’s pretty close to your idea of a “perfect” camera (it doesn’t exist), and you have the means, then go get it and be happy. Probably applies to a lot of things in life, too. You just have to be creative with how you’ll finance it 🙂

Today’s tools: Leica Q2 with a fixed Summilux 28mm.