Several months ago, on a whim, I purchased a Leica V-Lux 4. I had read about it, thinking that it would be a great little light-weight camera for hiking and vacation fun pictures. I used it very little, until we decided to take a few days off for a weekend trip to Fredricksburg. It is a little more than a point and shoot. It has 12MP, 25-600 equivalent zoom lens, f2.8 aperture, fast auto focus, and an easy to see viewfinder, plus a bunch of other great features. I am still playing with it and what fun it is. There are many shooting modes, including built-in HDR, 3D, Panoramic, among others.
On our little trip to Fredricksburg, I used it exclusively. Here are some sample shots.
World War II B-25 Bomber – Nimitz Museum, Fredricksburg, Texas. 1/15 sec at f2.8. ISO 1600. Hand held, No flash
Field of Flags, Nimitz Museum Compound. 1/200 sec @ f4. ISO 160
My best friend,click Shannon, goofing off with yours truly. 1/250 sec @ f4, ISO 100.
On Friday morning, I decided to take out into the field for some wildlife images., for comparison. Here is a distant shot of a Great Blue Heron, approximately 250 yards away. Top photo with my Canon EOS 7D and 100-400mm lens at full length. The bottom photo with the Leica V-Lux 4, at it’s 600mm extent.
Great Blue Heron – Canon 100-400mm lens at 400mm.
Great Blue Heron – Leica V-Lux 4 at 600mm equivalent. Hand-held.
There was a noticeable lack of birds to photograph, but we did see these White-tailed Deer fawns.
White-tailed Deer – fawn – 1/500 sec. @ f2.8 – ISO 320
White-tailed Deer – fawn – 1/80 sec. @ f2.8 – ISO 125
What I liked most was the light weight of the camera, and the fact it was easy to hand hold for those long range tele-shots. For birders that want something a bit better than the ordinary point-and-shoot, this the answer. For a complete overview of this amazing camera, click on the link in the first sentence of this post. Also, click on any image to see some enlargements.
Texas Tweeties by Bob Zeller 