On Fri, 26 Mar 1999 16:53:05 +0100, Richard Schaetzl <Richard.Schaetzl@stud.u
ni-hannover.de> jammed all night, and by sunrise was overheard remarking:
> Giles schrieb:
> > John Hudson wrote:
> > Pentax have the best lens coating technology of any manufacturer. They
> > hold the
> > basic patents for the most effective MC formulation.
> It is not the only company who hold patents in this field of technology.
And patents only last 17 years. It's also been fairly common for camera
manufacturers to cross license patents more freely than you see in many
other markets (like Minolta having some of the basic OTF patents).
Also, "best" can chang from time to time. The point of a patent to make a
technology protected, yes, but also public. So everyone knows what
Pentax, or whomever, is doing in the way of coatings once the patent is
issued (or some time before, in the case of most non-US patents), and can
build on top of this, even issuing their own patents which improve on
someone else's.
> The catch is that I believe, that Olympus has changed more than the
> coating with some lenses, so SC and MC versions might not be comparable
> in this respect.
Probably true -- during the same years, lens design went from a craft
done by "old masters" types to a CAD-assisted process done by engineers.
--
Dave Haynie | V.P. Technology, Met@box AG | http://www.metabox.de
Be Dev #2024 | NB851 Powered! | Amiga 2000, 3000, 4000, PIOS One
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