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[OM] Olympus digital SLR

Subject: [OM] Olympus digital SLR
From: "William Sommerwerck" <williams@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 13 Sep 2002 10:35:03 -0700
"Instead Olympus, not having the need to support legacy SLR lenses, will
offer a truly new design. If it takes 11.1MP to compete meaningfully,
remember than digital electronics doesn't *have* to spread those 11.1MP out
over 24mm x 36mm. When you have a smaller image area required, the lenses,
bodies, and overall camera system can all be smaller also."

But a large sensor has (for a given number of pixels) the advantage of being
more sensitive and having less noise. Size matters -- especially if you want
the sensor to have truly useful "speeds" of ISO 400 equivalent and faster.


"Because of the smaller image sensor area, some incredible lenses can be
designed, including very small lenses faster than the OM "f/2s" and zoom
lenses like you won't believe. For a clue, look at the lenses available for
16mm movie cameras... the frame size there is about the same as a 4/3"
diagonal image sensor."

True -- in theory. We'll see.


"Olympus will rattle some cages with the lens lineup for their digital SLR
body. If you want my prediction of what inspires the Olympus digital SLR
design IMO you need to look at the Olympus Pen F series. The Pen F body,
lenses, everything is smaller, but just as sharp and useful. Imagine a Pen F
body with an 11.1MP image sensor... Take a look at the size of the Pen
lenses, even compared with OM series lenses... much less any Nikon or Canon
lens from the mid '60's... or any Nikon or Canon AF lens now."

Believe it or not, the Pen F body is only a teensy, tiny bit smaller than
the OM body. There is no meaningful difference in body size. Only the lenses
are smaller.


"Olympus is going to do it again... and if you don't already have a bag full
of legacy Nikon or Canon lenses, you're not stuck having to buy that huge
EOS body or D100 body to go digital. The Olympus digital SLR stuff is going
to be 1/3 smaller, much lighter, and just as sharp and high quality for
images... what do you want to carry around all day long???"

The reason I switched from Nikon to Olympus was the small body and tiny
lenses. When I traveled, I carried a body with a motor drive, six or eight
lenses, and a flash, in a case (which I still have) whose outside
measurements were only 10" long by 5" wide by 6" tall. The OM system is
still extremely compact -- by any standards.

Sorry, but Olympus is going to have to come up with something absolutely
incredible to get me to forgive them for not supporting their legacy
products -- something so amazingly amazing that I would buy it even if they
_were_ supporting their legacy products.


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