Getting a grip

The Leica X Vario camera I bought in May last year has been a runaway success. Eight and a half months later, and with 17,500-odd shots taken, LXV is proving itself to be an excellent companion on my days out. It looks good, feels good, and gives me the best results I've ever had from a camera. Its specifications wouldn't suit everybody, but they suit my kind of photography, and that's the thing that matters. 

There was however one accessory I hankered after, to make LXV's handling perfect. That was a handgrip. Leica made one specially for the X Vario, and like the camera itself it doesn't often appear on the used market. Months ago I asked mpb.com, from whom I bought LXV online, to let me know if they ever got hold of this dedicated handgrip. So much time had passed that I felt I was waiting in vain. This handgrip was available from foreign sources, but always at an inflated price, with import duties to pay on top of that. I didn't need one so badly that I was willing to pay so much. But then on 25th January mpb.com finally emailed me to say they'd now got one in stock, and was I still interested? 

You bet I was. Within minutes, I'd bought it. 

It was the right handgrip, in 'excellent' condition. The price was a very reasonable £34 - in fact for a genuine Leica accessory, even a used one, this was a remarkably good price. I suppose that's a reflection on how, even now, nearly ten years after its launch, the X Vario is recalled as one of Leica's Big Mistakes. It has that reputation because it wasn't the camera most people were expecting at the time, and a large pack of disappointed people turned on it with fury. It's amazing how people - I mean male photo equipment experts of the armchair variety - can get so worked up about bits of metal and glass, but there you are. Me, I consider what the thing can do, not what it ought to be. As did the saner reviewers and users. But the poor X Vario, despite its classic design, great build and superlative lens, never recovered from its disastrous launch, and it must have been something of an embarrassing sales flop for Leica. Never mind; they soon launched the Q instead, and the series based on that camera became extraordinarily popular. 

The X Vario has become a footnote model, an uncommon one-off that few in 2023 have ever heard of. But I feel lucky to have one, especially as it cost me only £599 last May. A low price, believe me, for anything made by Leica in Germany! And I certainly don't mind paying a correspondingly low price for one of its dedicated accessories. The delivery charge was almost half the cost of the handgrip itself.

Well, it arrived one day sooner than I expected. Inside the parcel was this.

Hmm! I wasn't expecting a near-pristine original silver-black Leica box. These are something to preserve carefully. I delicately prised it open to reveal the handgrip within. Then held the handgrip to the light.

The pictures so far are taken with LXV. The ones with the handgrip in my left hand are exactly the sort that the handgrip will make easier in future. Handgrips shine in one-handed situations, such as when stretching up to take a shot above one's head, or down by one's shoes, or when holding on with the other hand. 

But this one will also have a vital protective function. LXV is made of magnesium alloy, painted black. That black paint tends to wear off with handling, exposing the silvery metal beneath. It's inevitable, if the camera is much used. The paint usually comes off first at the edges of the top plate, or especially the baseplate. When I bought LXV last May its baseplate looked like this:  

The camera was made in November 2013, and was still looking almost unblemished in May 2022. But by January 2023, despite care, the black paint was rubbing off:

Attaching a handgrip would completely cover and protect the baseplate, preventing any further paint loss. It would also insulate the battery/SD card compartment from damage. Less importantly, but still usefully, it would reposition the tripod bush so that it fell under the lens, instead of being offset. 

The next thing to do was to screw the handgrip onto the camera, and see how it improved its appearance and handling.

As anticipated, the handgrip gave my fingers something to curl around, so that even when the neck strap wasn't around my neck, the camera felt secure enough in my right hand. 

I now had a further option, hitherto denied. I could take the neck strap off, and attach a leather wrist strap, making it almost impossible to drop the camera. I'd bought a Gordy wrist strap months previously, in case this moment ever arrived.

As you can see, the Gordy wrist strap is a stout thing in thick cow hide, with a strong cord wrapping, absolutely unbreakable and capable of tethering the photographer to any camera suitable for use in the hand, regardless of weight. 

But I quickly found there were four snags. First, despite the new handgrip - aided by the wrist strap - my fingers were just not strong enough to carry LXV around for hours on end. LXV had the usual Leica heft, coming in at 811g with the handgrip attached. This was too much for dangling the thing from one's fingers, if you didn't possess a strong man's grip. 

So you immediately came up against snag number two: in between shots, LXV would have to be put away in a cross-body bag, using it as a kind of holster. Meaning that if I used a wrist strap when shooting, I must tote two bags - my ordinary bag, plus a camera bag. I'd be festooned with bags. Not a great look, especially in warm weather. 

Snag three? I found that cow hide a bit stiff and unyielding. It just wasn't soft and comfortable. It would eventually get more supple, but I didn't fancy the months of discomfort until it did. 

Snag four was the killer. It was now much harder to take grab shots, or shoot discreetly, because the camera was stuck in a bag. If something caught my eye, I'd have to open the bag, thread my hand through the loop of the wrist strap, and take the camera out. By the time I'd done that, the moment might well have passed. As for the discreet bit, it's such a giveaway to move one's hands towards an obvious camera bag. It shouts 'Hey, here's someone wanting a shot!' and everyone around is warned. But if the camera is already out, on a neck strap and pointing in the right direction, a tiny surreptitious movement of the shutter-button finger at waist level will get the picture. 

So the Gordy wrist strap has been put back on the shelf. 

Will I stay with the new handgrip, or will it also be discarded? It adds 91g - a couple of ounces - to a camera that already has some weight. 

LXV is heavier than the average mirrorless camera body - for instance, the Fujifilm XT-4. But if you add any but the smallest lens to a mirrorless body, then LXV might easily become the lighter camera overall. I've wandered around with LXV more than once in the last week, and not felt at all overburdened. So I think it will turn out fine. Certainly, I appreciate the surer hold I now have on the camera. And I can't help thinking that slightly more weight steadies the camera better for slow shutter speed shots in dim light, leading to sharper pictures indoors in the evening. But it's the impeccable protection of the baseplate that most persuades me that I must persevere with this new accessory.

My tripod hasn't been used for ages. One night soon I'll try a few night sky pictures. The handgrip, with its better-placed bush, will help.