The Red Bull Illume edition of Leica's exciting new D-LUX 5 premium compact camera is now available for purchase world-wide through the Red Bull Shop.
Priced at €699, this top-of-the range camera is a tribute from Leica to their involvement in the world’s biggest action sports photography competition. After providing Chris Burkard €30,000 worth of high-spec equipment including the Leica S2 for his winning photo, the D-LUX 5 is for anyone who wants professional results with a compact size and price.
Finished in matt black design with silver colored Red Bull Illume engraving, the camera’s sophisticated features, super fast lens and potential for creative on-the-spot photography make it a perfect fit for action sports photographers and amateurs looking for a portable solution.
The “Red Bull Illume Limited Edition” is the first ever camera made by Leica to be dedicated to a photography award.
These handcrafted, meticulously manufactured special editions are only made by Leica to mark historical occasions and are always produced in very limited numbers. Only 250 cameras have been produced, a number specially selected to honor the 250 photographs featured in the Red Bull Illume Photobook.
Revealed at Photokina 2010, the D-LUX series marks Leica’s exciting entry into the compact digital market. The versatile D-LUX 5 offers a broad spectrum of photographic options, from macro and wide-angle architecture and landscape photography to reportage and portrait photography.
“Thanks to its ultra-fast image processing, simple handling and compact form, the Leica D-LUX 5 is a truly unique compact camera with system character,” says Peter Kruschewski, product manager for digital compact cameras at Leica Camera AG.
“It offers users endless opportunities for creative photography and allows photographers to capture the most spontaneous, fleeting moments as unforgettable pictures.”
The compact also has a comprehensive range of features and manual settings.
Super fast lens
The D-LUX 5 has a 10Mp 1/1.63" sensor, a wide angle 3.8x optical zoom lens (24-90mm) with f/2 - 3.3 aperture, making it an ideal camera for "available light" photography.
Brilliant image quality
The D-LUX 5 features a newly designed 1/1.63"-CCD image sensor that is particularly large for a compact camera. Even at the standard resolution of 10.1 megapixels, this contributes to a significant increase in image quality, guaranteeing brilliant high-contrast images with natural colour rendition and superb sharpness in 4:3, 3:2, 16:9 and even 1.1 formats.
Creative freedom
Thanks to its manual setting option for subject distance, aperture and shutter speed, the D-Lux 5 opens up a whole vista of creative opportunities for discerning photographers to take complete control of image characteristics. It also offers numerous automatic functions for effortless photography that guarantees the user perfectly exposed and sharp images by simply pressing the shutter release ideal for less experienced photographers.
Classic design
Classical elegance meets premium quality materials. The D-LUX 5 has elegant matt black throughout, with sparse accents in chrome and uncomplicated distinctive lines.
Professional image processing
Registered owners can also download a copy of Adobe Lightroom to process the camera's DNG raw files. White balance, exposure, sharpness, tonal balance, color saturation and many other parameters can be modified during post-processing to get any desired result.
Video in HD-Quality
Record 1280 x 720pixel HD videos in memory-saving AVCHD-Lite format.
Upgrade accessories
Thanks to an optional electronic viewfinder and detachable flash unit, you can not only expand your photographic options, but also the range of your creative freedom.
Click on the link for videos of the Leica D-LUX 5.
Priced at €699, the camera can be ordered online at the Red Bull Shop in English and German (www.redbullshop.com).