Chuck
Not to worry - - - offence not taken. Edwin Pitt in his website explains it
very well when he put the question of whether the E-1 would be Oskar
Barnack's camera of choice. Kodak also published a semi-technical article on
the impact of the Four-Thirds ratio silicon imaging photo sensor based on
the KAF-51XX architecture.
The issue is very difficult to explain, I guess and like anything that is
brilliant and groundbreaking, there will always be those who simply love it
and those who would feel affronted by it. The emergence of the Four-Thirds
open architecture is a threat to Canon and Nikon. Yes, it's true that they
have ignored it so far. And yes, it is true that they will continue to
ignore it. And here is where Olympus is betting the house on their future
here and opening the architecture has now produced the DMC-L1 and hopefully
others will hop in. Tamron is in discussion now to join largely because
Sigma has made a fairly big splash about its new Four-Thirds lenses.
I know that I might be going a little off-course here in my reply but I
write all these with one purpose and that is to suggest that explaining the
credibility of the Four-Thirds design isn't easy. Many have tried and some
have prevailed. Edwin Put's article is one of the superb ones. I encourage
you to get hold of it because it is very well written even though he is a
Leica and Canon user. I appreciate his unbiasness as a result.
K.
On 30/08/06, Chuck Norcutt <chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Welcome Khen. I'm one of those who couldn't wait for Olympus any longer
> and jumped ship to a Canon 5D after 30 years of OM ownership. I stick
> around here because of the wisdom and cameraderie and because I still
> own (and sometimes actually use) OM gear.
>
> Don't take offense that my first response to you personally on the list
> is to question your statement but I think the following is hard to
> defend and needs clarification at least. You said:
> "Remember this and remember well, the Four-Third's sensor does not
> require the same number of megapixels to beat a full-frame 35mm sensor."
> I'm not a proponent of the megapixel race and I can read a lot of
> things into this statement apart from the megapixel race so please tell
> us precisely what you mean.
>
> Chuck Norcutt
>
>
> khen lim wrote:
>
> > On 30/08/06, Winsor Crosby <wincros@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>Welcome. Nice to get an insider contributing to the list.
> >>
> >>I worry about the price. The E-1 seems obviously designed to a higher
> >>price point and in fact was at a higher price point and drastic price
> >>cuts were made, apparently to sell it. I worry about an expensive E-3
> >>doing the same thing.
> >
> >
> >
> > Demographic anomalies exist with the E-series. It does very well in
> Europe
> > spurred on by a very matured structure and a sophisticated and
> well-thought
> > out professional programme. In Malaysia, it's been in oblivion and sales
> are
> > generally disastrous not helped by a local mob that knows NOTHING about
> > promoting it. The E-3 will be more or less in a similiar price bracket
> as
> > what the E-1 began albeit a little higher. That's the forecast I
> understood
> > from Shinju-ku although this applies to UK because the first price
> > structures they work on are for Europe then followed by North America.
> >
> > One wonders whether Olympus will again go into
> >
> >>the no development mode they did with the OM when margins and sales
> >>are too small to justify it.
> >
> >
> >
> > No, Winsor, no more. And in fact, Olympus did not intentionally go into
> a
> > no-dev mode during the OM days. I was there. We were gobsmacked -
> stunned in
> > fact - by how Minolta was taken to the cleaners and back with
> Honeywell's
> > successful but damaging lawsuit. The whole market was reeling from the
> > effects. After that, Olympus went back to the drawing boards to redesign
> > their passive AF system and that meant losing a lot of ground to Canon
> and
> > Nikon. If it weren't for the lawsuit, pretty much what you've been
> seeing
> > today with Olympus' market position wouldn't have been there. We tried
> to
> > salvage bits with first the OM-707 (77AF) followed by the OM-101PF but
> we
> > failed. In fact the OM-101PF had a cavity under the mirror box ready for
> an
> > evolutionary upgrade to AF but that didn't happen for obvious reasons.
> The
> > fact though was that the OM-101PF's focus-by-wire technology was and
> still
> > is utterly brilliant because it was truly digitally velocity-sensitive
> and
> > you will see it relivened soon. OM days weren't predicated by poor
> margins
> > and sales so much as they were hampered by the fact that Maitani's
> > suggestion for the OM-5 did not pass the mustard with the board. We were
> all
> > very disappointed. For better or worse, the loss of the OM-5 changed
> > directions for the entire company, prompting Maitani to eventually
> retire.
> >
> > I hope the E-3 will at least be competitive in the MP count because
> >
> >>that is what people seem to buy. Even those of us who realize that
> >>there is not much difference between a 4/3 5MP and an APS-C 6MP are
> >>not tempted by 5MP when there are sub-$1000 8 and 10MP cameras
> >>available, no matter how well made the E-1.
> >
> >
> >
> > The E-3 will be extremely close to an effective Mpix count of around
> 10.2 to
> > 11Mpix. No, the E-3 will not compare directly with its natural rivals if
> one
> > were to use Mpix as a yardstick. It's pretty much uncannily similiar to
> the
> > battle between AMD and Intel in the computing industry where the former
> > might have a 'slower' clockspeed but in effect, runs as fast as the
> latter.
> > Remember this and remember well, the Four-Third's sensor does not
> require
> > the same number of megapixels to beat a full-frame 35mm sensor.
> >
> > What happened to the E-2?
> >
> >
> > It's there. :) .... I apologise but I really cannot disclose much
> about
> > this just yet. But it's there. It sure is there. And there are other
> > E-series DSLRs very much ready to be unleashed. At least one of them is
> > consumer-grade and two are prosumer-grade.
> >
> > I agree with your statement the brand loyalists if you are talking
> >
> >>about the people on the forums. I have concluded that the worst of
> >>them are psychotic and are amused by the responses they elicit.
> >>
> >>Not sure what you mean by base-reference zoom.
> >
> >
> >
> > This term is used internally to refer to lenses designed more for
> > consumer-grade consumption such as those meant for the E-xxx range of
> DSLRs.
> >
> > Winsor
> >
> >>Long Beach, California, USA
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>On Aug 29, 2006, at 11:46 AM, khen lim wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>>Eeeerh.....spectacular? yes.....cheap? no, Winsor, they won't be
> >>>cheap.
> >>>On a slightly brighter side, base-reference zoom lenses are on
> >>>their way.
> >>>Soon.
> >>>10MP Sony A-100 won't be too much of a problem eventually as sales
> >>>will
> >>>level out in Q1 2007. Right now, yes, because when the A-100 was
> >>>launched,
> >>>no prime competitor was launching. Sales figures spiked
> >>>unrealistically for
> >>>June-July figures especially in Japan (courtesy of figures from Ali ~
> >>>thanks) but they will subside. Remember, Canon just released the
> >>>Rebel XTi
> >>>(still don't like it, anyway) and Nikon, the D80. Both came AFTER
> >>>the A-100
> >>>but still to early to register any big sales figures yet.
> >>>By very late this year, the A-100 will begin to be hit big. That's
> >>>when you
> >>>see the E-3.
> >>>
> >>>K.
> >>
> >>
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> >
> >
> >
>
>
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