After reading Keppler's article, I found the following related article on the
site's home page. It's more recent, dated August 15, 2002, and (seems to me)
emphasizes what the earlier article says, while casting Olympus's (upcoming)
strategy very favorably.
<http://www.photoreporter.com/2002/08-15/features/the_way_it_is.html>
Odd that it has the same title, but it's a different article.
It still doesn't specifically rule out mounting Zuiko's onto their new digital
camera (that I could tell), but it would seem contrary to their apparent
philosophy--to break away from the compatibility restrictions imposed on DSLR's
when using lenses that also work on film cameras. Their reasoning is why use a
lens that can cover 24mm x 36mm, when you only need to cover 4/3"? It takes
more glass, more metal (or, uh, plastic) and more mfg costs than a 4/3 only
lens would. Sounds like they want to start encourage a movement away from the
large Can*n and Nik*n digital SLR bodies, that are so big and costly because
they are designed to accommodate all those existing 35mm lenses.
Can Olympus succeed in encouraging enough other manufacturer's to make
interchangeable lenses compatible with the new Oly digital camera? If there
becomes enough variety of the new lenses, maybe other manufacturer's will
choose to or have to follow suit and offer digital bodies that can use the new
"Digi-Zuik" lenses?
If Olympus succeeds, in five years or so their DSLR owners will wonder why in
the %&$* anybody would want to use a huge old Can*n "L" series USM lens when
you have dozens of much smaller and (hopefully) more affordable new-style
lenses that offer similar image quality?
And think about if that happens. Right now, people buy Can*n (and etc) lenses
for both film and digital photography, so there is a larger potential customer
base. If in five or so years digital users are buying the new-style
digital-only lenses (that I'm pre-supposing Olympus is going to be showing at
Photokina), that potential customer base for film lenses will shrink. Will it
shrink enough that Can*on and Nik*on can't or won't continue to offer such a
robust line of top-of-the-line 35mm lenses? How long before pro's decide to go
digital just because the variety of (new) film lenses doesn't match the variety
of new digital-only lenses??
I hate to say it, but from what I'm reading here, it just doesn't sound like
Oly's new digital camera is going to have a lens mount that is big enough to
take our Zuiko's. Sounds like they want to get away from that restriction, and
make pro-level DSLR's that are small and light.
These are just my thoughts, inspired mostly by what I got out of reading
Keppler's two articles, and his foreknowledge of what Oly will show at
Photokina. But maybe he'll be surprised!
Sorry for the ramble.
Stuart
p.s. Thanks to whoever it was that mentioned the tip about enclosing emailed
URL's in brackets, I've used that several times recently.
Whoo-Hoo!!! The Big Brown Truck just brought my first OM-4T (recent BIN, thanks
again, Tom), and it looks ok. Time to go take some pictures! (With REAL
Zuiko's!!) One of those 350 f/2.8's SURE would be nice on this... Hmm, maybe I
could trade an OM-10 for one.
At 01:10 PM 8/22/2002, GPaul64@xxxxxxx wrote:
>In a message dated Thu, 22 Aug 2002 8:05:58 AM Eastern Standard Time,
>omtech@xxxxxxxxx writes:
>
>> > Not to trash anyone's dreams, but if this is true, why
>> hasn't
>> > news of this appeared in the USA press?
>
>Herb Keppler writes about the forthcoming Oly digital SLR in the latest issue
>of Photo Industry Reporter. Check this link:
>
>http://www.photoreporter.com/2001/12-01/features/the_way_it_is.html
>
>No word about compatibility with OM lenses, but doesn't rule it out, either.
>
>Best,
>
>Greg Logiodice
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