The Q3 is certainly quirky and I think it could fairly be called a niche product—both characterizations presumably also fit the new Q3 43, which is identical except for having a 43mm f/2.0 lens—and its price seems outrageously steep for a fixed-lens camera, at least beyond the shores of Leicaland. But it works for me as a general "walk-around camera" because it's reasonably compact and tolerably light and it looks like a consumer point-and-shoot. It's actually not much smaller than my Fujifilm X-T5 with a compact zoom attached, but it doesn't seem to attract as much attention: it doesn't announce "I'm an old guy walking around making photographs with my complicated camera." It's not quite like shooting with a cellphone (something I also often do), but it's reasonably close.
I'm satisfied with the 28mm f/1.7 lens. I haven't performed any objective tests, but even wide open the corners are fine to my eye, and I'm pleased with the colors and contrast of the way the raw files appear before any editing in Lightroom. From what I've read, the 60-megapixel sensor isn't superior to the other high-resolution sensors that are available on some other current full-frame cameras. It's a bit noisy at higher ISOs, but Lightroom's new Denoise feature is effective at cleaning up those images without introducing objectionable softness along contrast boundaries; DxO Pure Raw 4 also does a good job. The mechanical leaf shutter is all but noiseless. I haven't tested, but I suspect the electronic shutter exhibits considerable rolling shutter effect during panning because of the resolution of the sensor—although I don't think this is a camera anyone would be tempted to use for fast action.
For someone who is accustomed to using a zoom lens—I don't like to carry multiple primes when walking around—the wide angle always displayed by the (excellent) viewfinder was a bit jarring at first, but I expected that going in and I've more-or-less adapted my shooting style when I'm using the Q3. Besides, as the Leica marketing literature says, with 60Mpx to play with, cropping is quite feasible. And, as it turns out, in addition to a 27-82mm full-frame-equivalent zoom, the lens I use most often on my Fujis is a 15-36mm equivalent. Having said that, I'd prefer if the Q3 had a 35mm lens instead of the 28mm one.
But from my perspective (pun intended), what really stands out in the Leica Q series is the firmware. Modern digital cameras are essentially computers with optical peripheral devices and their designers often seem all too eager to demonstrate how many capabilities they can pack into their firmware. In the software industry, we used to call this "creeping featurism." The Q3 provides the most pleasant shooting experience I've yet encountered in a modern mirrorless camera. After using the menus to set up appropriate "profiles"—Leica's term for specific clusters of settings that the user creates for particular purposes or types of subjects—typically the only shooting adjustments that need to be made after selecting the appropriate cluster are available from the manual controls for focus, aperture, and optionally exposure compensation and shutter speed. The Q menus essentially become configuration tools rather than shooting controls, and the few menu selections that you're most likely to modify are available on a single page that is always available at the push of a dedicated button.
The availability of manual controls that corresponded to those on film cameras is what initially attracted me to the crop sensor Fujis, but the Fuji user agent never achieves the minimalism and clarity of its Leica counterpart. As I recently said elsewhere, as I have gotten older and more irritable, a congenial shooting experience has become increasingly important to me.
