–Played with the Cremina a bit. Buggered the screw trying to get the steam poppet out. Pried it out later with my package-opening knife. Hard to believe I have no spares for steam internals. I ordered a new assembly (stainless, finally) from Cerini. Will look again for spares. I need to find out what the threads are on the trashed screw to see if I can replace it.
–Played a little more with SL2-S and SL2-S Reporter. Sometimes the Reporter seems to have a little more saturation, but other times the standard seems to be a little sharper. May test again tonight. [edit] Tested. like last night (I BELIEVE) the Reporter really suffers in the dark the speed limit sign is foggy, hazy, low contrast. Using the “denoise” feature doesn’t correct it. Both cameras set up as identically as I could do. Very strange how the Reporter is as good when there’s some light, then degrades in the dark. More testing to follow. [edit 2] Tested again with a shot in back. Same results: the Reporter lacks saturation and contrast compared to the standard. I’ll really hate to give that up, given the eye relief and Leica reskin (and identical daytime photos), but there really does seem to be something lacking in the Reporter at night.