Olympus admits a try at "pro" would gut their 4/3rds system

I think that pretty much sums up what it would cost Olympus if they
made a go for the professional market in meaningful way. The end of
4/3rds as a viable sensor format. They have to go with something like
the 35mm (kudos for Olympus for asking "what does FF mean anyway?"
earlier in the interview) sensor size, no matter what format. I would
personally like to see a 4/3rds proportioned sensor with a diagonal of
40mm as a pro camera. I still dislike 3:2 as a format.

This, from a Dpreview interview:

Dpreview:
But the point is they have the advantage that they can offer both full
frame and smaller sensor bodies, and whether you can persuade enough
professionals that you can offer a viable alternative to the full
frame systems offered by other manufacturers to justify the continuing
development of your professional system. To us the E-620 is represents
exactly what FT is 'about' and the sensor format gives it genuine
benefits over the competition. It's easy to understand its position in
the market and its easy to see its appeal.

Olympus:
MAG: If we were targeting to really lead the professional market this
would be a key issue. So the question is, are we targeting to lead the
professional market in the short term? Today that's not in our plan.
If we really wanted to succeed we would have to look at all the
alternatives, which would most probably break all the work we've done
on Four Thirds.

 

: I think that pretty much sums up what it would cost Olympus if they
: made a go for the professional market in meaningful way. The end of
: 4/3rds as a viable sensor format. They have to go with something like
: the 35mm (kudos for Olympus for asking "what does FF mean anyway?"
: earlier in the interview) sensor size, no matter what format. I would
: personally like to see a 4/3rds proportioned sensor with a diagonal of
: 40mm as a pro camera. I still dislike 3:2 as a format.

You're swimming against a very swift current. Remember that the the 4:3 aspect
ratio (common in early digital cameras) came to the industry from the
television set, by way of the VGA computer screen. Now even TV sets no longer
use 4:3, and it has almost disappeared from computer screens as well.

That said, the history of 3:2 is pretty hard to fathom. It's the ratio
traditionally used in 35mm film cameras, so it's arguably the "right" ratio
for a full-frame digital. But in most of the film era, 3:2 was rarely used for
prints. (In the U.S. the picture postcard is the only common example.) And
though it's been a long time, my recollection is that even slide masks
generally shorted the long dimension. Given all this, the contemporary
reversion to 3:2 is a bit hard to explain. But it's no less real, and I'd be
very surprised if 4:3 makes a comeback in any professional camera product line
in the foreseeable future.

As for Olympus, minaturization has been their schtick for a long time. Their
early film SLRs were a third smaller than those of the competition. Many
serious photographers, even professionals, liked their smaller, lighter
offerings, and they did pretty well. But Olympus didn't have the option of
changing the film size. (What would they have gone to? 110?) So their images
had to be the same size as those of Nikon or Canon (or Exacta or Miranda or
Asahi Pentax or Contaflex or ...). The unstandardized world of digital sensors
freed them from that restriction, for better or for worse.

Bob

 

4 x 6 prints are the most common sized print and those are exactly 3:2.
prior to that were 3.5 x 5 prints and that's almost 3:2.

slide masks are slightly smaller than the frame size but retain the
aspect ratio.

perhaps at first, but the pentax mx and nikon fm & fe were basically
the same size as the olympus om series.

 

Seems to me the aspect ratio should fit the picture, not the paper.

Wally

Wally

 

Hence the term "harvest mode." A lot of semiconductor companies have
lines of products that they make no investment in in terms of updated
products, or sales and marketing, but that provide steady revenue long
after the initial investment has been paid back. You can sometimes build
a pretty good business on these products, there just isn't any growth
opportunity.

They don't have the necessary lenses for many photo-journalist tasks.

The wonderful thing about a full-line manufacturer is that you're not
constantly being constrained by "well most users will rarely need such a
lens (or other piece of equipment)." If you need an odd piece of
equipment it's out there, either to buy or rent. There's no
rationalization necessary.