Leica D-LUX 4 10.1 Megapixel

This camera is almost too good to be believed. Loaded into a machine that will easily fit into any reasonably ample pocket (I keep mine in my shirt pocket with the strap around my neck once I take it out of the fanny pack to shoot), is a serious photographic tool, whose ease of use may fool you into not taking it seriously. That would be a mistake; this is, to quote a contribution to a Leica forum, "a serious piece of kit." Indeed it is. Changing settings on the fly is fast and quickly becomes intuitive. White balance can be set to various shooting condition presets or even color temperatures, and then fine tuned to add or subtract magenta/green, yellow/blue. Color printers from yesteryear will quickly recognize that these parameters include red/cyan. One can also white balance by reference.
If you've waded through the menus of some other cameras, the ease and speed with which almost any setting can be changed on the d-lux 4 will quickly win you over. As always, my personal preference for automatic shooting is aperture priority, a habit I developed in the 35mm days when the kinds of subjects I shot required more control over depth of field than shutter speed. Whatever your preference, though, the D-lux will certainly have it. Aperture and shutter priority, full manual, program, snapshot, and more scene modes than I'll ever use, give anyone from the pro to the rank amateur plenty of options. Exposure compensation is a breeze, The one scene mode I have used, night scene, produced a flawlessly exposed shot of an urban street: lighted signs held full information, and the shadowy sidewalks held detail. An impressive performance that would have required a series of decisions about exposure and contrast on a manual photographers part -- unless, of course, he knew his way around night photography.
This camera has the same hardware as the Panasonic Lumix LX3. Same sensor, same lens, same box. Only the firmware and included software are different. Why, then, was I willing to pay a $200 premium for the Leica, and why are some willing to pay an even greater difference. There are three reasons. Leica jpegs are said to be superior, not an issue if you only shoot raw, but for many of us, who shoot raw + jpeg and need a quick jpeg out of the box before even loading the raw files into the development software, jpeg quality can be important. Not to mention the majority of shooters who never go near a raw file. Further, the Capture One software included with the Leica, a $130 full working version that will process other manufacturer's proprietary raw formats, is clearly preferable, to me at least, than the SilkyPix included with the Panasonic. SilklPix is well thought of, but I've tried it and just don't much like it. The third reason is the two year parts and labor Leica warranty vs the 90 day Panasonic.
After years of lugging around 35mm kits and, indeed, 4x5 monorail cameras into the wilderness, a bad back, arthritic shoulders, and an increasing awareness that suffering for one's art is overrated, have had me looking for a perfect little camera to keep with me at all times. I still cherish my Olympus DSLRs, and carry them when I KNOW I'm going to use them. But I like always to have a camera on me. And even though the 24-60mm vario-summicron lens (35mm equivalent) has no telephoto range, it performs to exacting standards, will take a crop, and produces some of the best digital pictures I've seen, and not just from a small point and shoot.