Given its price tag, some readers may be scratching their head when they see the Leica S-E (Typ 006) ($16,900) described as competitive in price, but it's a bargain in the medium format space. Of the models available, only Pentax offers medium format cameras at significantly lower prices, but the 645D and 645Z don't support leaf shutter lenses, which are essential for many studio photographers. If you don't need the high ISO capability that the latest CMOS models deliver, and you're intrigued by Leica's wide-aperture Summarit and Summicron lenses, the S-E is worth strong consideration, especially at this price. It is an integrated system, which lacks the flexibility of a removable back. If that's more your speed, consider the Mamiya Leaf Credo 50 or Phase One IQ250; both are significantly more expensive, but offer a modular design that an integrated system like the Leica S-E can't match.

Editors' Note: Leica provided an S (Typ 006) for review. From an image quality and performance perspective, it is identical to the S-E (Typ 006).

Design and Features
Unlike most medium format camera bodies, the S-E takes its design cues from 35mm SLRs. At 4.7 by 6.3 by 3.1 inches (HWD) and 2.8 pounds, it's not that much larger than the Nikon D810 (4.9 by 5.8 by 3.3 inches, 2 pounds), even though its 30-by-45mm image sensor is larger all around than the 24-by-36mm sensor used by full-frame 35mm cameras. Leica has long been a 35mm company, with strong ties to the format, and the S-E maintains the 3:2 aspect ratio that is rarely seen in medium format systems. Most other medium format digital cameras, including the Pentax 645D (4.6 by 6.1 by 4.7 inches, 3.3 pounds), are based on the 645 format, which has a 4:3 aspect ratio.

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The S-E borrows its color scheme from the Leica M-E (Typ 220), which is similar in that it's also a low-cost version of a previous-generation model. Its body is black, but the top plate is a cool, steel blue shade that Leica describes as anthracite. You won't find a ton of controls on the body itself. The top plate houses the shutter release and shutter speed dial, but there's no mode dial. Instead, you'll just need to press the rear control wheel into the body in order to toggle through Program, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, or Manual shooting modes.

Other rear controls include a small joystick that's used to navigate through menus, and four buttons that surround the rear LCD. The buttons aren't labeled, as they perform different functions depending on if the camera is set to capture or play back images. When capturing photos, the left buttons give quick access to the camera menu—the top is labeled Camera and the bottom Image on the LCD—and the right buttons take you to image playback or to the third segment of the main menu, Setup. When playing back images, the buttons are used to jump to the menu, delete, or protect photos from accidental deletion. It's a pretty intuitive system once you spend a little bit of time with the camera.

The only other control switch of note is the power switch. It's got three settings—Off, FPS, and CS. FPS sets the camera to use the focal plane shutter and CS is used to utilize the leaf shutter of Central Shutter lenses. Even if you have a CS lens attached, you'll still be able to use the focal plane shutter if desired. The presence of just one control wheel does mean that you'll be diving into the camera menu to change many shooting settings, which can be a turn-off depending on how often you find yourself wanting to adjust things like ISO, exposure compensation, the drive mode, focus mode, and metering pattern. You'll need to use the menu to adjust any of those. The rear buttons do a good job of quickly taking you to the right place in the menu, but a programmable front control dial and a few extra rear control buttons would be welcome to cut down on the time spent using the menu system.

The S-E's large image sensor also means that its optical viewfinder is larger than the ones you'll find in full-frame 35mm cameras. The finder covers about 98 percent of the frame at 0.86x magnification, and the focus screen has a matte finish that makes in-focus parts of the frame pop. I found that manually focusing was a bit easier than with focus screens that are optimized for fast autofocus performance, like you'll find in SLRs like the Nikon D810 and Canon EOS 5D Mark III. Aside from a central circle and crosshair that mark the autofocus area, the finder is clear of any overlays.  A strip of information runs along the bottom below it in orange showing the current aperture, shutter speed, exposure compensation adjustment, metering pattern, and ISO. There's also a small two-axis digital level and a display letting you know how many shots you can save to the memory card. The viewfinder has a built-in diopter adjustment so you can adjust the camera to match your eyesight. The depth of field preview button, which stops down the lens to the shooting aperture so you can see what's going ot be in focus in your shot, is located to the left of the lens mount.

The rear display is a 3-inch LCD with a 921k-dot resolution. It's quite sharp, even though it doesn't pack quite as many pixels as the 1,150k-dot touch-screen display that you'll find on the Credo 50 and IQ250 backs. I had no issues with using the LCD outdoors in the mid-afternoon on a winter day, and it's sharp enough to verify critical focus when images are magnified. The lack of a touch screen requires an extra step to magnify images—you need to hit the press the rear control wheel in during playback and then turn it to zoom in, but you don't have to wait for the image to render on screen as you do with the Credo 50 and IQ250. To scroll through various parts of a magnified image the rear joystick is used. The joystick can be pushed in to show blown highlights, a histogram, and EXIF data.

The only technical difference between the older S (Typ 006) and the new S-E (Typ 006) is GPS. The S includes it, but the S-E drops that feature. The S (Typ 006) is still available for purchase for about $22,000, but I don't think the GPS is worth spending an extra $5,000.