Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

By Hamish Gill

This morning, Pixii – the new smartphone connected digital rangefinder – has just been officially announced as available to order from their website here!

Pixii is a camera I have been fascinated in since I first heard about it a few years ago. I must admit, like many people I did spend some time doubting that it would materialise… That was until a few months ago when the David Barth, the man behind the camera, got in touch with me to ask if I would like to beta test it. Since then, I have been enjoying using the camera as well as getting involved in the latter stages of the development.

This whole process has given something of an insight both into the camera itself, but also David’s motivations when it comes to building it, and indeed his plans for its future.

I am yet to write a full review of the camera, not least because the various versions of it that I have been using haven’t been final production cameras, but I did write something of a primer into the camera, which can be found here.

I had a quick chat with David this morning, he’s pretty excited to finally be announcing the Pixii’s availability, has been thrilled at the amount of attention the launch has already had, and is already trying to deal with the issues of coping with demand – in his words “It’s a good problem to have, and the one we secretly wished for”.

I’m excited for him too! This thing has been a long time in the making, and frankly, I’m beyond impressed that he’s made it this far. I’m just looking forward to getting my hands on the final production camera.

If you’re as excited as me and want to order one of the first batch of Pixii cameras you can do so on their website here

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About The Author

By Hamish Gill
I started taking photos at the age of 9. Since then I've taken photos for a hobby, sold cameras for a living, and for a little more than decade I've been a professional photographer and, of course, weekly contributor to 35mmc.
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Comments

David on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

It is an interesting camera but for the price of the camera with the memory one, I could purchase a Sony Alpha and adapt all lenses, including Leica M and R Lenses which can become autofocus with the proper adapter. Plus the Sony Alpha is a full frame camera and will not have the cropping effect of the APS format.
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

That would be a very different camera

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jeremy north on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

I'm definitely not going to buy one of these. I know R&D is costly but this is unbelievable. €3240 (don't forget that his price has no VAT included) for a camera body with no lens, no screen, no manual controls and a small low pixel count sensor. I like the concept but no-one will go for this. It doesn't even have a card slot.

I know you've addressed some of these drawbacks in your article but where is the value of this product? You'll have a phone with you to link up with it. Why not use the phone to take the snaps which is all this camera is built to do. Sorry to be so grumpy but a £3200 camera has to be special
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

I’m sure it will be special to the tight niche who it appeals to

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Steve Nimmo replied:

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

Yes, exactly. I think this a very special project and the fact that the 8GB version sold out within hours says that a market does exist.

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jeremy north replied:

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

This proves the saying that a fool and his money are easily parted. Just out of curiosity and with no prejudice, have you or do you intend to buy one?

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Laurence Kesterson on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

I really want one of these cameras. However, the price is just too dear for me.
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George Appletree Photography on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

A Leica M-D approach (short sensored) for the price of three or four fujis. E3 for instance.
The rangefinder concept is overvalued.
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BG on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

Quite an interesting concept; I hope it survives! We need risk-takers to evolve.
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George Appletree Photography replied:

Comment posted: 06/07/2020

It just focuses

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Joe Brough on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

#noonecares
#wellmaybejustmiddleclasswankerswithtoomuchmoney
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

Thanks Joe, I appreciate both your thoughts on my socioeconomic standing, and assertions about propensity to touch myself ...

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Mike Watkins on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

It looks nice. I can appreciate R &D costs and tooling costs need to be recouped on small manufacturing runs. It will be an expensive niche product, that's understood.
But. Where are the sample photos online? Dynamic range measurement in DB. What's that in stops at ISO 320 and how does the sensor respond in different lighting scenarious. Without this information and more, early adopters will be limited to people to whom £3.5K is pocket change.

For a project like this I would want some evidence of manufacturing expertise. How many Pixiis were available in the first production run? Are they still tuning their assembly procedures and will the next batch be assembled differently? It's a leap of faith to order one right now.
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

An uncommonly fair and understandable response. David has certainly been looking for the very passionate/interested potential owners for this first run. Now it is a real production camera, and cameras start appearing in people's hands, real life images will start appearing and at least some of these questions will be answered, I'm sure.

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Eric on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

Really struggling to understand what niche this is trying to fulfil that is not cover by Leica. When it was announced I thought it would be priced around 1500 or less. With that price you can get:

1. M8 a summilux lens
2. M9 a cron lens
3. M240 VM/ZM Lenses or a cron
4. M262 VM
5. M-D (262 version) if you dont want screen.

I want to see more true rangefinder cameras and really wish alternative to Leica. But this is just hard to think if it can succeed. It really is not helping much when you are targeting specifically to people who are already own Leica gears rather than convincing new comers like Fuji did with they Rangerfinder style.

Maybe if they can secure the next investment after the first launch they can massively reduce the production cost and price will go down, like the VanMoof S2 --> S3 ebike. But that means a lot of first round supporters will have to suck up to the price.
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

The way I have made the analogy is this. Why would anyone buy this when they could buy this. The answer is simple. If someone want's exactly what the first one offers, that's what they will buy. I have an M10-P, but I am buying a Pixii. Why, because I like what it does and how it makes me feel when I am taking photos

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Mike Watkins on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 07/07/2020

What might be interesting is a relatively successful MK1 version and then a buy out or investment by someone like Zeiss or Voigtlander, who could redesign/upgrade it for less R & D cost and enter the digital RF market. I think it looks quite Zeiss-like, especially with the C-biogon.
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Alex on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 08/07/2020

Man, I feel like I'm the exact target audience for this but the price is too prohibitive. I get that it's a small company but $3000 for a a cropped sensor camera is a very hard sell.
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Huss` on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 08/07/2020

Sold out? Sounds good but how many did they make before they sold out?
5, 10, 100?
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Michael Mak on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 08/07/2020

For what it's worth, I think it's great that in this day an age, in which the camera market is dominated by players with decades of experience and that is declining as a whole due to the advent of smartphone cameras that somebody would still put in the effort and resource to bring something new to the table.

Think it's too expensive? Don't buy it.
Potential image quality not up to par? Great, go use another camera
Issues with the ease of use or practicality? You are not the target market for this product.

At the end of the day, the release of this product will impact 100% of the whiners in 0 negative ways. I always find it interesting that people spend so much time and effort to B$#@ about things that will not affect them in anyway.

For the tiny niche market this product DOES appeal to, it will have made those people happy.

Rather than celebrating innovation or creativity in a declining industry, we criticize and judge for the audacity for a product to not meet the COMPLETE needs of your own personal requirements.

Guess what? Canon/Nikon/Leica have been trying to cater to the masses for the last 50 years. The result? The camera industry is shrinking faster than ever before.

We have a bunch of arm-chair Bresson's with too much time on our hands to whine about a product they will never use.

The Pixii may fail, it may not. At the end of the day it tried to bring something different to the table and I feel it should be commended for it.
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Hamish Gill replied:

Comment posted: 08/07/2020

This. So much this! Comment of the year! Thanks Michael for being one of only a few people who seems to have the cognitive capacity to see this is such rational light!

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Stephan on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 09/07/2020

In the next day I`ll be around the area where the Pixii is located in France. I wrote them already and will try to get an first hand impression. I`m in the market for a M-D these days, but I appreciate the idea of the Pixii and try to get my own impression. Sure, the price is steep and the company is new, but at least there are still some people trying to start something new. ANd I love the uncluttered way of taking pictures a lot more than more and more buttons and options. Thanks for your review Hamish!
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Zoltan on Pixii Connected Digital Rangefinder Available to Order!

Comment posted: 12/07/2020

Thanks for the excellent review @Hamish.

I would love to hear about what the SDK / API offers on a Pixii, since you wrote: "it has a developer interface that gives access to the whole computer system".

Sometimes I use the live histogram on my camera to set exposure to the highlights (see here Sean's excellent description for details: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJ7QGZYdJns)
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