Ricoh GR2 user review Part 1, 18 January 2019

With the GR3 due to arrive soon,  this may seem like an odd time to be posting a review of the GR2 which was released in 2015. In fact the GR2 was only a mild upgrade of the GR-with-no-number of 2013.

The background to this is my never ending search for the ideal compact camera, if there ever could be such a thing.

I had a Lumix LX100 for a while then updated to the LX100Mk2. But the Mk2 proved not to be much of an upgrade over the original. 

Also I got  the “wants” for a sharper lens. Not that the LX100/100Mk2 has a bad lens, I just wanted sharper if possible. The grass might be greener somewhere else.

In addition my interest in street photography is growing and many users have reported that the GR compacts are very suitable for this.

Many years ago, way back in the not-so-good days of film I had a Ricoh GR1v with a fixed 28mm lens. At that time I was not comfortable with the wide angle view so I did not keep it very long.

There have in fact been 11 models to date with the GR naming prefix including the original GR1 of 1996.

In the process Ricoh has created some very fine cameras and also a fine old naming muddle which continues.

As it has been on the market so long there are many reviews of the GR2 out there so I will not bore the reader with details which have already been reported.

However I do want to discuss the significance for the process of making photos of some features of the GR2. In the process I hope to better understand why the GR  has acquired cult status as a street camera.

The famous photographer Robert Capa is often quoted as having said

The whole point about the wide angle lens is that it makes me get closer to what/who-ever I have selected as the main element of my photo. 

It is so easy to get lazy with a zoom lens, keeping a an psychologically safe distance from the subject simply by turning the zoom ring.

I find that working with the wide angle is more challenging than with a zoom but also potentially more rewarding.

The “two foot zoom” gets plenty of use.

Sharpness/resolution:   The lens in my copy of the GR2 is very sharp all the way into the corners right from f2.8.  It is one of the sharpest lenses I have ever tested.

It gets slightly sharper by f4 with peak sharpness being around f4-5.6.

Out-of-focus rendition: I often find myself shooting at f2.8 indoors. So the character of the near and far out of focus rendition becomes very important to the appeal of the picture.

The GR2 lens produces smooth out of focus rendition both in front of and behind the plane of sharp focus. This allows me to let subjects close to the camera or just beyond the focal plane go out of focus knowing they will still be rendered in a pleasing fashion in photos.

Others:   There is minimal barrel distortion, minimal chromatic aberration and minimal purple fringing, never causing a problem with photos.

Flares:  The only issue which I have found which could sometimes be a problem is a tendency for the lens to flare strongly with a very bright light source just inside or outside the frame edge. This is uncommonly troublesome but is worth being aware of.

Small light sources such as light bulbs and reflections of the sun off foliage are not a problem and are rendered with sharp clear edges.

I am old enough to have grown up with cameras which you focussed by turning a marked ring on the lens barrel to the required distance mark. With a bit of practice learning to judge 2, 2.5, 3 and 5 meters distance this proved a highly reliable focussing method which never made a mistake. I might misjudge the distance but the camera always focussed where I told it to.

In the digital era I have long bemoaned the loss of this focus-by-scale capability in modern autofocus cameras and lenses.

The electronic equivalent of focus-by-scale is snap focus.  It works. It is brilliant.

It is the best focusing option ever invented for modern autofocus cameras. It means I can direct my attention to an event unfolding before me and fire the shutter as appropriate, never having to wonder if the required bits of the scene are in focus and never having to fiddle about moving the AF area box and checking focus status.   Of course I have to practice judging distances by eye but that is part of the experience.  Anything less than about 1.5 meters away requires specific focus as the close-in depth of field gets a bit thin.

Why do they not ???   It is an abiding mystery that as far as I am aware the Ricoh GR cameras are the only ones with this feature.

Actually the recently released Fujifilm XF10 has a dumbed down version of snap focus but limited to just two distances and apertures. This implementation is nowhere near as useful as that in the GR cameras.

Everything on the GR is pared back to the essentials.

The marketing folks at Leica are forever babbling on about “less is more” and “simple is good’ and suchlike slogans, while continuing to produce more or less unusable, eccentric products with serious deficits in capability and ergonomics.

By way of contrast Ricoh gets it right. The GR2 is a pleasure to use. It is easy to carry and hold and easy to drive with just enough properly located dials and buttons for full control by a competent user.

No EVF and no way to fit one.  There are two main aspects of this issue.

The first is practicality. I live in Sydney and travel around Australia where direct, hard sunlight is the norm. This can make viewing on the monitor difficult if the sun is shining on the monitor and even more difficult if the sun is shining towards the lens. In that case my face is brightly lit and reflected in the monitor, making the preview image difficult to see.

There are strategies for managing each of these situations, including cupping my left hand over the camera to shade the monitor and moving my head to one side to remove reflections.

I did consider getting a clip on optical viewfinder but decided against this as these things are quite large, totally change the compact size of the unit and are prone to damage.

The second is engagement with the subject.

When I view through an EVF this action separates me from the subject. The camera comes between me and the subject and prevents me from seeing and responding to peripheral subject elements.

Viewing this way also signals clearly to people “there is a person taking your picture” which may not always be welcome.

This cognitive separation may be exactly what I want for instance when I am photographing sport/action with a telephoto lens.

But the GR cameras are for close up, street and documentary style photography in which I need to be engaged with the people and actions around me all the time.  Monitor viewing encourages this.

Fixed monitor  This is another of those features without which I thought I would not manage the photographic process.  But I have managed.

Yes the fixed monitor does place some restrictions on viewing options. But it also simplifies the viewing process. The absence of an articulated monitor means there is no need to fiddle around doing the articulating.  The monitor is decently visible with the camera held above my head and down to about mid chest level.  That is good enough most of the time.

No touch screen  I am no great fan of touch screens on cameras so I don’t miss this feature on the GR2. The GR3 will have a touch screen and the reviewers will all say that is a wonderful thing. But I often end up turning touch screen function off with most cameras because it often causes the AF area to go walkabout.

Poor video  I have briefly tested the video on the GR2 and it is not impressive. This does not concern me as I use the camera for stills.  Some users will be hoping for improved video in the GR3. They may be disappointed though. The specs for the GR3 show just full HD 1920x1080 60p with no 4K.  I suspect that Ricoh knows its GR users are mainly interested in stills so the lack of 4Kis probably of little concern to them.

No auto panorama  I really miss this feature which works well on several  Panasonic models. I have been practicing the old fashioned click-click-click….>>>Photoshop method which works OK.

No image stabiliser   All my cameras for the last few years have had an image stabiliser either in the lens or the camera body or both simultaneously. So I thought the lack of a stabiliser in the GR2 would be a problem.

But that has not been the case. Here is the reason:

On, say, my Lumix G85 or LX100 cameras IS allows me to hand hold down to about 1/15 second. This is fine for static subjects but people moving end up blurred. So I have to increase the shutter speed to about 1/60 second which is the speed I use with the GR2.

The GR3 will have a sensor based stabiliser (IBIS) which will be a worthwhile insurance policy against camera shake but not essential.

* Number one on this list is shorter blackout time after each shot, together with quicker shot to shot time.  Compared to more recently released cameras the GR2 is a bit slow. I timed 10 Raw shots in 7 seconds with monitor preview and AF on each frame. That gives a shot to shot time of 0.7 seconds which was probably average in 2013 when the GR was released but is decidedly off the pace today, especially for this camera’s intended use.

* I would like the monitor to be easier to see in bright sun.

* Ricoh needs to re-think their approach to the AF rectangle box GUI. On the GR2 if you want a larger than standard AF area you get a choice of four strange looking patterns around the actual box. I found all of them confusing and unhelpful so switched them off.

I also think that allocating the smallest AF area to a separate “Pinpoint AF” position on the AF menu is clumsy. I want to be able to adjust the AF box size over a range from very small to large with one dial.

* I want to have more ability to adjust lightness, contrast and color balance on the monitor.

* Auto panorama would be nice. I see no reference to this in the published GR3 specs though. This seems odd to me as the Ricoh Theta is built entirely around the auto pano concept.

* More confident low light autofocus would be welcome.

* Less high ISO noise would be welcome. This will hopefully come with the new 24Mpx (presumably Sony) sensor. The antiquated sensor in the GR2 has, on my tests one EV step more noise in the ISO 3200-6400 range than the Lumix G85 M43 camera.

I suspect one of the reasons for the GR3 might be that the old 16Mpx Sony APS-C sensor is no longer available.

More pixels is not on my wish list but the new sensor has them anyway. That will be fine if  dynamic range and high ISO noise are also improved.

* The lens in the GR2 is really excellent. The new lens in the GR3 is a different design having fewer elements. I sure hope it is just as good. Actually it needs to be better to cope with the 50% increase in pixel count.   If it is not,  a band of  unhappy GRists will protest loudly.

And a bit less flare would be welcome.

I have already referred to the pixel count. DR and high ISO noise are more important to me.

The GR3 has less width than the GR2 which will make the touch screen more viable for those who like this feature because the right thumb has better access to the screen.

The GR3 loses the built in flash. This is of no concern to me as I never use it but some reviewers and commentators will make a fuss.  People always complain louder about something lost than something not gained.

Combined on chip PDAF and CDAF. This is a technical issue. As long as the AF works reliably and quickly and does not cause banding or other image artefacts or problems I don’t care what technology is used.