The Sony-Olympus partnership makes it possible for Olympus to joint the FF world. While I don’t know if this will happen (and if it makes sense at all) the people on the web is already starting to dream their Olympus FF cameras. So here is the first Olympus E-7F designed by one of our 43rumors readers. Feel free to send me your Olympus FF designs if you want them to be posted here!
203 Responses
Dear Santa…
agree (thx for this best posting ever 🙂
LOL, i is on, agian 😉
Is anyone aware, will the Panasonic Lumix DMW-MA1 4:3 to m4:3 adapter work with the EM-1 and provide correct lens meta-data info specifically when using Olympus full size 4:3 lenses?
I think it should – it fully follows both standards so should have no problems… but i have never evon tryed a 4/3 lens anywhere!
Dear Santa,
This is not what I want for Xmas this year, next year, or any year ever. Olympus is going to kill itself by starting something like this, and it is already very sick even without this.
Ew why in the old plasticky 4/3 body though…
Sorry, but the E-3/5 bodies make Nikon’s D600/610 look like the rubbish they are.
Haha Olympus will get roasted in the full frame market
stick to corporate fraud and your tiny four thirds OilyLimpPuss
troll anonymously is a great way of life… congrats! 😉
so a question for you, who makes the best full frame then?
Sony/Nikon
And medium format is the emperor 🙂
Although not desirable, this might be possible. In fact Olympus might decide to invest into a mirrorless FF and develop a full set of FF lenses sharing Sony’ mount to mitigate development cost and widen the potential market. Unfortunately, such scenario would imply the drastic reduction of m43 development if not its’ death.
Admin, how can we keep rubbish away from this site?
rubbish? What do you mean?
I vote for banning the trolls. I like a good debate, but things are going worst.
+1 but it won’t happen: trolls help adding comments to the site..
Back to the topic: an Oly FF would be welcome, though I hardly imagine what would differ it from other FF cameras. IBIS will be one thing, a shock/dust/weather/freeze proof body could be another quality. Then we can talk about lenses (big? Heavy? Expensive?) and price compared to the offers around.
olympus would provide us with amazing lenses, great IBIS and phantastic build quality. I am still surprised what I can squeeze out of my tiny EPL5. would sony as a partner support oly in going FF mirrorless since they’ve got their own A7 line now… I think the experience of olympus in building great cameras would make this a great option.
IBIS becomes more difficult when the sensor becomes bigger because:
– sensor also becomes heavier, making it more difficult to move quickly
– bigger movement is needed for the same amount of correction
Not saying its totally impossible to do, but making it as effective as with a smaller sensor will be a real challenge and very likely a significant increase in cost.
Why not just put all of that effort into sensor technology and KEEP MFT SMALL and make it BETTER?
Tend to agree there Bob. An option without doing much in changing fundamentals would be to take advantage of the larger image circles provided by many lenses used on m43. This could be done by fitting an oversized sensor still 4/3 format (say Canon APSC size its only 1.9mm bigger and nikon 2.5mm) and giving the user a switchable choice of standard m43 or legacy lens image circle. Similar to using some lenses on the Sony a7, the user has a choice of using standard Sony APSC or using the larger image circle of some lenses.
Another point is Sony has embraced addons such as metabones adapters and actually gives them as a redemption choice in Australia. Olympus has not as far as I can see accepted any third party addons at all. Maybe re-badging Metabones or Mitakon speed boosters/turbos would gain a wider acceptance, thus allowing more research into refinements and image quality.
It would have the side benefit of killing the APSC trolls and developing the system to a wider user base.
He means the trolls. Why don’t you ban them!!!???
Because I would have to work all day to do that. I am trying to ban some of them when I have time. Anyway, the final solution could be the redesign. people will have to be a regular member to comment. This will allow me to ban the real worse cases once for all.
Indeed, freedom is the best option. Since Steve Huff adopted the login I rarely comment there. Keep banning those more evident trollers and leave the rest with us… 😉
Make Almarac a moderator 😉
Agree – login to comment is lame, cant be doing… its easy to ignor the comments you don’t like – problem is most people can’t ignoor them and flame them into a problem. This does not need moderation or login… just a slightly thicker skin.
bullshit
login is inevitable if the adjustment to moderation is ever to be reached
if people are too lazy to login, fuck em who cares what they think
there is no valid reason not to expect a login here or anywhere else
there are probably very few of them
clearly one particular IP is flipping nicks all the time, as u rarely see them twice
nobody else has the need to change nicks like that all the time
this makes it seem harder than it is
block that IP just as you would for spam and the problem is over
@Riley , I posted one polite comment that corrected him on a cock up and it was instantly removed. I am a mFT fan and agree with a lot of what he says but man he goes over the top a lot.I have heard from others that every single post that is not 100% on message with his “view” is gone by dawn lol
Sorry. I mean ‘trolls’
I wouldn’t be so negative, although the dummy looks like an E-7, and only that will bring the Pavlovian love of the 4/3 lamers.
More seriously I put my hope in a m4/3 version of the Sigma Foveon – same resolution of the A7r.
Comparison here:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3586753?page=2
You keep your lenses and say good bye to Sony and its wannabe grandeur – without suitable lenses.
Admin, be good, spare us other 4/3 revanchism 🙂
“Pavlovian love” is not bad 😉
I agree: a new step would be the Foveon sensor optimized on m43 system, with high ISOs problems solved. Great resolution + portability. Wewould need more sharp lenses to match that resolution.
if you only shoot at base the Sigmas can deliver results but they fall apart from 400 ISO with performance at high ISO that would make most P&S users blush. Since it came out the same problems have blighted Foveon. Plus the real resolution is hugely exaggerated.
That’s why I wrote that its high ISOs performance needs to be fixed.
It would be great, if it happened, but how (and how much) could Foveon’s high ISO performance be improved, if the limitation is a matter of laws of physics, rather than technology?
Panasonic and Olympus seemed to overcome physics of their smaller sensor.
That is hilarious even for you posting to a fanboy exchange on the idiot forums that are DPreview as a “source of data” just about sums you up.
Dude, I can’t understand your sentence.. I have read it three times and it makes no sense: can you please write it in a more appropriate way? Perhaps using some commas and full stop?
I suspect that this trolling post was aimed at Amalric and not you :-)though it doesn’t make a lot more sense.From my skills deciphering what my 4yr old writes .I think the point looks to be that DPreview forums are not necessarily a great source of evidence in support of his point :-).
Joking aside I never like when the grammar police jump in,firstly there are posters from all over the world here and English may very well not be their native language.I would not like to use my rudimentary understanding of Japanese to post in a Japanese forum. Secondly for those who are interested in such things there are a veritable cornucopia of grammatical errors, in almost all posts including mine.:-)
I know, but using commas and full stops will help also those like me who are not native English speakers! 🙂
That, right there, is the logical next step for m43.
yes, and the m must stand for massive 4/3. If the word ‘full’ caught so many people, imagine massive
🙂
I am talking about sensor tech, it should not be difficult to do a Faveon m43 sensor. I could care less for FF.
This debate is so flogging the dead horse and the topics image example proves it … “next logical step?” To make a 3:2 ratio sensor body/system? Why?
Any venture into the mislabelled world of FF should go beyond it’s own self-imposed limitations, a 4:3 ratio – Medium Format sensor that is larger than 135 and skip the archaic 3:2 ratio format while they are at it. 16:9 and 4:3 are the only ratios that make sense, add to that the ability to select 1:1 square and you cover the lot. Just as in lenses you have Wide, Standard, and Tele crops.
3:2 is an anachronism that can be held onto for nostalgic reasons and sentiment.
Hmm. Panasonic buying up Sigma for the Foveon technology is not a bad idea. The detail and look from that sensor is astounding. Plus, Panasonic will get a range of budget lenses that are getting better and better (the “Art” range) in the bargain, which they could perhaps modify for m4/3 mount.
They are already there for m4/3 I use the Sigmas daily, with great resolution. That is why I believe that it would be v. easy for Sigma to transpose its Foveon for m4/3.
Since I have other bodies I can also tolerate lack of performance at high ISO. I would use Foveon for Landscape and be happy at low ISO. FF35 resolution without any need to change lenses!
Err, dont know why this response. Where did I mentioned FF or 2:3 ratios in my post? I was only agreeing with the person above me that investing R&D in sensor tech (like Sigma’s Faveon) is the way to go.
Would be interesting to have a 4:3, ie 26 x 34.6mm, or multi-aspect 43.2mm diameter sensor to use with legacy 135 format lenses. They could call it the “mega four-thirds” format.
That actualy a good idea but I do not want to see Olympus do this they will lose much money. Better sony.
Why?
The world does not need more bricks. There are plenty of bricks made by plenty of other companies that are perfectly capable of taking decent images.
Then there are these things called lenses. You put them on the front end of bricks. Although some people call them lenses, most of them when sized to suit a brick are themselves really just rounded bricks, so you end up carrying two or more bricks.
Lenses that are like bricks often cost as much as if they were made of silver. I should know, I have a pelican case full of them. Manufacturers of bricks have to spend a lot of time and money to make round bricks to go with the much easier to make rectangular bricks.
The world does not need more bricks with a name on them starting in O. They wouldn’t be meaningfully different from the existing bricks with names starting with other letters of the alphabet.
“The world does not need more bricks”
but my house does 😉
You can’t say that here its total opinionated and bombastic. It could be construed as Trollish.
But! I agree with you completely.
Exactly. There are 2+(2X1/2) companies (I count Alpha and Leica M as 1/2 companies, given their market share and/or niche status) active in the 35mm sensor market. They offer mature products, with long life cycles, and a huge variety of lenses, to cover every imaginable need. R&D costs are already sunk and recouped. They have even started recycling technology, in smaller bodies, with better manual controls and backward compatibility with (still excellent, and cheaper, particularly if bought second hand) legacy lenses (think Df). Those who actually need a brick body and a brick lens, have also already heavily invested in lenses and are unlikely to be willing to throw them away in favour of a new collection of bricks: how much better would the new bricks have to be, after all (and how should they be priced), to justify the investment? Actually, considering the size, price, and weight of the (few and far between) native lenses for the A7, mirrorless 35mm sensor cameras seem to me to be just niche Leica-alternatives for M-mount manual lenses. A choice that makes sense for Sony/Zeiss (particularly if they are optimized for Zeiss glass), but not for anybody else.
It makes absolutely no sense to start a FF line with the necessary development of a new line of lenses for Olympus. It is financially reckless, if not idiot, to step up the competition with Nikon and Canon.
Shut up and take my money!!!
Aside from certain people’s obsession with the size of their sensor, micro four thirds is actually a very good sensor size digital. Most people who shoot for fun would be silly to buy full frame. Why would you want to lug a tank around with you when you’re taking photos for pleasure? Especially when the micro four thirds cameras are just as capable, from an amateur standpoint. Sure, there are niches where full frame will get you a better picture, but there’s becoming increasingly rare.
If barely more than one stop of depth of field and low light performance is actually that big of an obstacle, and you’re willing to spend twice the money to carry four times the weight, you’re probably not really going to care whether there’s a 100 gram mirror in there or not. And there’s little doubt that technique and skill are going to get you better pictures every time than a slightly better camera will.
Just my take on this foolishness.
I agree that olympus shouldn’t try to jump back to 35mm. They ruled that out for good reasons when 4/3 was created. Just handled the EM-1 and unfortunately this little brick is too small for my hand, which feels far more comfortable in the GH3. So some brickyness would be good; maybe the battery grip improves that – just where can you trial that nowadays…?
With Olympus’ experience in going mirror-less they should be able to deliver a mirror-less medium format body (or MMF) in a package of a 35mm body and nice matching small primes. That would be far more interesting for landscape or architecture while m4/3 deals for the rest and/or backup.
I agree. An easy to handle mirrorless medium format camera would be very nice for some particularly types of photography. It should be possible to make a very small MF with a very large sensor.
It’s probably a pipe dream because to get fast optics for medium format without serious peripheral illumination problems, they would always need be be quite large, although maybe not as large as SLR medium format lenses. Some of the slower primes in TLRs (old-school “mirrorless”: they had a mirror but it wasn’t between the film and taking lens) were actually pretty good. If you’re doing landscape, that might be a sacrifice you’re willing to make.
It’s still a hard sell because it would probably have a very high price tag (big sensors cost a heck of a lot to make) and limited consumer appeal. And as you point out, what they already have is good enough for everything else, in the right hands.
Weight and size is a personal thing, but a lot of it is what you’re used to. After using the E-M5 without the grip for about a year, I find anything heavier is distracting.
The sensor could be indeed the problem: the Nikon 800e already caught up with the Pentax 645D as the EM-1 with the Canons. http://www.pentaxforums.com/reviews/nikon-d800e-vs-pentax-645d/introduction.htm lf sensor tech evolves at that speed it will be hard to recoup R&D on such a niche item. Unless the sensor was spherical or something and allowed superior optics – you see it’s also a pipedream of mine.
Curved sensor might be a possibillity in future?? as there is starting to get a good momentum to the flexible electronics industry.
Yeah right – just when Oly proves Micro 4/3rds can allow a great, professional camera that sells like hotcakes at one end, while Panny shows it can be made as small as a compact at the other, let’s listen to the camera forum measurebators and go full frame, so we can ‘compete’ in a market already dominated and saturated by two very well established players. That makes a whole lot of sense!
That would be totally exciting! With Panasonic more in bed with Leica these days and Olympus more in bed with Sony these days, this actually makes sense.
Olympus working on the FE mount with Sony would be fantastic. While Sony makes intriguing cameras, they have been behind in releasing good lenses for the E mount. If Olympus made some high-end FE lenses (with the same quality as their 75mm for m43, 12-60mm for 43, etc.), this would be a win-win for all.
But please, Olympus… Make your sensor 35mm full-frame sensor 3:2 instead of 4:3.
I prefer the 4:3 much above the 3:2. I am now busy with the layout for a magazine project which will be printed via blurb.com, my older 3:2 files are not happy with full page or spreads, as you will need to crop your photos. This is not the case with 4:3 ratio.
I tend to think 16×9 has more future in it than either
I find 16:9 more a compromise format, a mix of cinemascope and old TV format.
As a format for stills it might attract maybe landscape photographers. Purely from a point of personal preference I love 1:1, but for practical reasons I “choose” for 4:3, as it stays close to my square ideal framing and printing purposes.
many of you says that Oly do or will do help Sony with lenses but I didnt saw not a single rumour or spec what Oly exactly did or plans to do?
who needs FF when we have SUPER M4/3 ???!!!???!!!
Indeed. With the rumoured Sigma Foveon, there would be no need of a bigger sensor to attain FF resolution:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3586753?page=2
And it wpuld be *even resolution across the frame* contrary to 35mm + short flange, which isn’t. In wides, at least. LOL
If I remember right, the first Foveon sensor was built to fit Hasselblad 6 x 6cm format…..
even right now steve huff prefer m4/3 over FF:
http://www.stevehuffphoto.com/2013/12/03/my-pick-for-camera-of-the-year-2013-the-olympus-om-d-e-m1/
Steve huff is an idiot kid who rants about his latest toys he should stick to ghost busting the “fans” of that are easy to please have a gander at some of the images he posts as “proof” to see how low his evidence base is
He is a guy who has fun and gives his opinion based on gear he actually uses (unlike a lot of people around here). I dont see what is the problem with that, I actually agree with most of what he says (not all), and the EM-1 opinions are spot on.
I bet you are the sane illiterate as above, the guy that can’t write. This time your sentence was a little clearer: at least it’s clear your envy, rant and bad mood. You should have some shutter therapy, as I call it.
Take your camera, small, big, whatever you have (because you have one, right?), also your smartphone works. And use it. (Taking photos..)
Same, not “sane”.
Steve also praised the Nikon 1 and most people, not including myself, think it is crap. Is everyone selling off their gear and getting one instead of their m4/3 gear.
well its a stretch but
heres a strategy
if you use the same perfection on FF lenses that you applied to SHG lenses
and did that on a collaborative system with little in the way of top end feature rich FF (Sony)
you could thrash existing FF systems
Yes its stretch of bloody reality lol It is exactly because of the 4×3 ratio sensor that is a quarter the size of a 35mm sensor that the lenses do so well.Take the worst FF lens you can find and crop its output to 4×3 and you get a very significant jump in performance.
Though FF sensors are still well ahead of the pack,the time is coming when smaller sensors will be more than good enough for all but very specific niche uses.Imagine the E-M1 body size and feature set with a couple of generations of sensor development
actually, Mp for Mp it doesnt prove to be so
even HG (mid tier) lenses defeat Nikon FF for resolution when the Mp is the same
it has nothing to do with the size of the sensor
and more to do with the variety in FF sensors
and the quality (or not) of lenses such as SHG
The Pixel density is the only reason for that as FF pixel numbers increase and they invariably will the only low{ish} MP count FF cameras are the 16mp D4/DF which are rather specialist tools. The significant majority of FF cameras are over 20mp with 24mp the most common and the D800 & D800e have now been joined by the 36mp A7r.
There is already talk of a 41mp sensor for Canon and rumors that Sony is working on a 54mp option.I don’t care about them as I have prioritized size and weight making mFT my current choice. I have tried the experiment cropping the worst of FF and APS lenses to a 4×3 ratio it is sometimes a revelation in performance. Makes you wonder why 4×3 never became more popular for interchangeable lenses cameras though as you suggest the rise of the use of 16×9 [ monitors,TVs etc] may explain this as a 3×2 ratio is better suited to this.
As conventional wisdom (at least on this site) says that m43 has the same IQ as “nasty word” – why waste money on “nasty word” size sensors?
Why dream Admin? Or is it a nightmare?
Sorry for being so mean – just couldn´t help it 🙂
Oly should concentrate on building on the m43 user success and to also make it a commercial success.
An agreement with Sony about version of the Sony FF cameras must have terms deciding which customer segment reserved for which brand. Logically Sony would like Oly to produce for the lower price segment. Subsequently lower profit for Oly.
“Logically Sony would like Oly to produce for the lower price segment. Subsequently lower profit for Oly.”
Having a 10% share in Olympus, it makes absolutely no sense for Sony to want lower profits for Olympus, rather the opposite really.
My take is they want to strengthen the Sony brand. After all Sony aims at challenging the two big elephants in this business. Also more important for Sony to make profit than Oly (100% vs 10%)
But of course I may be wrong.
It is possible also the elephant with wheels to draw… Whether it will go only – a question:)
It might be the next FF shared work sony-oly 5-stab. fixed prime lense, siny sensor and video. Welcome!
you need FF?
go Sony. Basta.
m43 is SUPER
i thought you morns said FF is not needed and you are so happy with smalish sensors and smalish cameras….. no all scream for FF.
you guys are really a joke….
No, 35mm is mostly not needed.
Rather than a mirrorless 35mm sensor a mirrorless medium format sensor would be preferred. The package should be the size of a Dx DSLR but with primes not much bigger than 35mm lenses
I think that if you look at the site comments over time. You will see there is a lot of support for 35mm sensor cameras, with many users having 35mm and m43. On this forum the APSC is the looser though some visitors give APSC the properties of 35mm, when in reality it is closer to m43. In some cases very very close.
I have feeling before Oly Panasonic gets there first.
They will probably design FF 43 format camera (the sensor will be the organic one).
I guess what I have been looking for might be FF version of the GH3.
I guess for now , I will shoot my D800E, A7R , GH3 and GX7, but if Pana comes up with something similar to the A7R with better video , I will get it and sell all my current cameras.
So get out either FF OM-D or FF GH3, I will be all over it.
Sorry, what exactly are you missing on your D800E / A7R – video quality, life bulb, weather seal? And why do you want to upgrade a m4/3 body, when you have already two 35mm – size, mirrorless, EVF, functions, AF?
derek seems to have more cash than the general user here, he, as a consequence, in all probability, makes no real in depth investigations into what he is buying. He just buys it ’cause he likes it. For those that have the cash that’s a very good reason.
If it means sticking with the m4/3 mount, I’m in. But if it means a new mount, forget about it. Any Olympus FF needs to follow the Sony E/FE mount route to make any sense, to me.
That way you get the best of both worlds: small and light with m4/3 lenses (when you’re off duty or travelling), fast and pro quality with FF lenses (when you’re using it for work)… on the same mount.
Although it will be all kinds of cool for those who need it (I dont), after personally seeing the performance of the EM-1 I do believe it has NOTHING to envy from APS-C systems anymore (m43 as a system I mean). A FF system would be a waste of money at the moment, specially now that it is going under a current shift to mirrorless. I would let the “big” companies go at it until I see a trend.
I would stick to m43, R&D the Flavion sensor, I think that is the future to an already close to perfect system.
“close to perfect system”
Well I wouldn’t go that far, we lag behind in image quality, DR,colour depth,high ISO lens ,C-AF,tracking, DOF control. I am getting bad vibes that as we approach 2 yrs since the E-M5 we have had no gain in image quality .
I am sorry to disagree, I see no advantage going with APS-C. If oyu want FF DoF and DR, you chose the wrong system and made an uneducated choice.
Gosh no we are all entitled to our views ,there is no need to be sorry about it :-).I was merely pointing out that there are plenty of areas where our system is far from perfect.Now had you said that the system was close to perfect for you that would have been fair enough.
For me the major some harsh FF fans may say only :-)advantage of mFT is its size and weight. I am aware and have no problem with losing a degree of image quality in exchange for this.
Well, let’s make a thought experiment and assume that in a couple of years m4/3 could reach 24 Mpx, would you still be interested in 35mm 24 Mpx, having to change all your optics in the meanwhile?
That is why T. Hogan warned, I assume, against the danger of the new Alphas being just a way for Sony to extract more money, twice as much, from consumers.
I made the example of Foveon, not because it is needed, but because it might be a much cheaper way to attain the same goal, given you have v. good ‘cropped’ optics in the first place.
The assumption of half frame in film times was always that due to the excellence of Oly lenses, it could rival 35mm.
In digital it gets more complicated: people believe that higher density sensors, thus the smaller ones, are more noisy. But that’s not so: Read Noise can be actually smaller. Thus it’s a matter of technology: if you can increase Mpx density without increasing noise you’ll get more information, and Dynamic Range. That is what actually happened with the OM-Ds. And it could happen again.
So don’t fall prey of the sirens of marketing. At some point you might want to go back, and perhaps you’ll have sold all your lenses, only to discover that it was a strategic mistake.
I agree with what you are saying, and without trying to be nasty to Sony, I can’t work out why there seems to be more noise than expected in the A7 images, even at base ISO. Why aren’t those large photo sites helping? It seems even the JPG’s are being hit with a big contrast curve and crushing blacks to dry and dampen out the noise. Any ideas?
SNR, which is really what matters, doesn’t really depend from the size of the photosites, or not only.
As I understand the yeld might actually be better with higher density sensors, and thus with smaller photosites. This depends, I am told, on the physics of Read Noise.
Additionally in camera denosing progresses from yr to yr, both wit algorithms and computing power, keeping noise lower even in small sensors.
Certainly sensors become v. critical, so in the case of Sony it could be i.e. thermal noise which might be higher, power consumption being much higher. There is much more than brute force. I don’t say that Sony wont refine its new mirrorless, but I am not sure either that m4/3 won’t improve in the meanwhile., without need of changing the lenses, with the expense involved.
People keep claiming they’ll use legacy lenses, but those work badly below 35mm, and I am not even sure that 30 yrs. old lenses can take the new resolution.
Then as time and development go by we get to a point where the camera output is good enough for any reasonable use. At that point to all intents and purposes further development in terms of quality is misspent R&D money. Money that should be spent on cost reduction and customer satisfaction.
Some say that the current m43 cameras are just about there now. I think there is still a little way to go for the most fastidious of users. But for me its close enough to say that it is good enough for my requirements. I rarely use iso above the base 200 and then no higher than 800. the IS saves going any higher in my usage, so noise is not a great factor for me. Well nothing Topaz denoise won’t fix.
So Oly making a camera with a 35mm sensor is not of any interest to me. I would however like to see an oversize sensor in the m43 that would allow the use of larger image circle lenses by choice (same as the Sony a7). Also Oly could gain by giving metabones and mitakon some support as Sony does.
Amalric, I think legacy lenses have a sales potential for m43 that has not been realised by Olympus, there are some very good ones.
The only legacy lenses that could get me interested in FF35 are those for landscape: 20mm and below.
Of course they are the only ones that don’t work, due to distance to flange, and untelecentric corners. Just check:
http://www.the.me/japan-autumn-leaf-viewing-mount-fuji-the-sony-a7r-and-lots-of-legacy-lenses/
So you are down to the native crappy Zeiss 28FE.
It made me laugh hysterically until I discovered that the Sigma Merrill 19mm Foveon has MORE resolution then the A7r, with the slimy Zeiss 28FE. Check again.
Now you can get a Sigma for 400 credits, instead of giving 2800 to Sony and the dogs.
Then I laughed again, quietly.
Hysterical, yes. There is no 28 FE lens. What have been you smoking?
Red herrings….
The most important noise is photon shot noise.
Why do you like to speak about things you have no understanding of?
Errata: Zeiss 35FE
Come on Boooe fill us in on this photon shot noise in the A7
Fair enough 😉
Unless they can make the lenses smaller, I am sticking with my E-M1 for the foreseeable future.
waouh another example of creating a rumor where this is not even one …
and to answer administrator questions : NO , there is no need for it and NO it will not happen. Olympus knows better
Harold
No! I need small camera and small lens. Big sensor = big lens.
A nightmare for me! 😉 I would not like to carry giant lenses…
What is this obsession with FF? M4/3 today competes well with APS-C, which CaNikon were pushing as all we need for long enough. The Megapixel Wars have proven largely pointless so maybe Sony now sees FF as the easiest vehicle to tilt at the big guns. Pros – yes, there’s a reason for optimum IQ and FF but all formats improve in this area. For the majority there can be few good reasons to invest 1000s in new lens ranges, and that is what manufacturers want us to do. M4/3 is still evolving. I shan’t change all my glass for bigger stuff when results are great and I love using the gear.
Well, exactly so. Sony sells what it can do best: sensor and miniaturised electronics. However lenses must follow. Native ones, if they are to match the promised increased in resolution must be v.expensive, possibly big an telecentric. We see that even the 35FE/2.8 , near to distance to flange, is not so, and it is worth 800$!.
The Tuit 55 is much more expensive, and big, and it’s a ‘normal’!
So where is the advantage? A Sigma Merrill, by comparison has the same resolution on a cropped format, with lenses that are ten times less!
One should be v. wary at this point. After all the difference with m4/3 is not per pixel sharpness, it is a crop factor of x2. Is it worth twice the price? I think that NEX people feel desperate and being abandoned. Imagine if this happened to Olympus and Panny. While you knew that they could issue a 24 Mpx in cropped format.
One should be very wary that this isn’t a con operation by a cash strapped camera company.
“One should be very wary that this isn’t a con operation by a cash strapped camera company.”
Very astute observation and probably very close to the bone.
55/1.8 is not Touit. It’s Sony “Zeiss”. It’s size and price is due to it being super-sharp compared to regular 50/1.8 planars. It’s almost as sharp as the Otus, which is three times heaiver, four times expensive and manual focus only.
E-550 would have been a success. Had they made it, I would have bought it. I am not buying the E-M1 and, disappointed and having heavily invested in 43 and m43, I am partly migrating. Sorry. I am buying Pentax to hook the forthcoming Samyang 10mm on it.
Incredibly exciting!
Even Nikon is getting away from the sheer cost of producing a good DSLR. They dumped the D300 body (great body) and introduced the lame D7000/D600 bodies which are CLEAR cases of aggressive cost-cutting on their part. This has put a sheer wall between their consumer cameras and their pro bodies. The idea of another hulking body with a small sensor just isn’t going to happen with Olympus and a FF certainly won’t happen. Olympus won’t allocate the kind of money it would take to gear-up for FF lens production, even if there were some way to adapt old OM lens designs to this.
My humble suggestion to Olympus:
The big boys are fighting it out for FF. Everybody else (including the big boys) wants a piece of the mirror-less and/or DSLR markets…
Where is there a GIANT GAP in the market where a company experienced in optics and great build quality can take advantage?
DIGITAL RANGEFINDERS! This is a niche market, but a lucrative one. The options? MM $8000, M $7000, ME $5500. Body only.
Olympus can use one of the the great Sony FF sensors, or get their help to make a 4:3 “ratio” Full Frame sensor. Stick it in a TRUE digital rangefinder made to the quality of the EM1 for $3000, and make 3 COMPACT manual-focus lenses in the $500 to $1000 range and you have penetrated a market without competitors. (Price-wise)
BUT HERE IS THE BIG SELLER…. Make it Leica M mount! Now you can sell second (and third) bodies to the affluent Leica owners and to all the people who want a rangefinder but can’t part with $10,000 for a camera and lens, plus you have an established ecosystem. Make the Oly branded lenses with some perks (like actual EXIF), lighter, etc., but otherwise join one of the oldest mounts on the planet.
And btw, Olympus had been making rangefinders since the 1930s! http://camerapedia.wikia.com/wiki/Olympus_Standard And they had the Olympus 35, Ace, Pens, and compact RF lines from the 1940’s on… So not some new thing for them.
I think it would turn the Camera market on it’s head, but thats just my opinion. (Or wishful thinking)
great inovative idea for the digital camera marker
* market
How is this different from just being a full-frame mirrorless?
Keep the flange distance short, make a GOOD M-mount adapter.
No offense intended, but if you must ask how it’s different, you’ve never used a rangefinder and don’t really know what you are talking about. Its like saying rear wheel drive cars drive the same as front wheel drive cars.
Rangefinder photography is completely different from DSLRs and mirrorless, which function the same minus the mirror. It’s not that it’s better, just very different. And those who get it, LOVE IT. It’s why Leica can sell $7000 bodies to those who appreciate it (but have no alternatives).
Just like FF has a distinct look, RF photography has a distinct feel.
Genius idea, they could sell literally hundreds, maybe thousands.
Even better would be for them to aim at the range focusing market, they have lots of experience with that (the early Pen EE series and so on). It’s perhaps even more niche than rangefinders!
You can blow off the niche rangefinder market, but Leica is selling every single $7000 M it can manufacture, and is a profitable camera company, in contrast to most.
I’m not looking at this solely from a “I want a Full-frame” camera, but from a strategic financial angle. Where is there a giant gap in the market without competitors? Half-priced Leicas, that’s where.
Keep dreaming.
Oh, no, Olympus, don’t be silly, please, don’t rest satisfied with FF! We need medium or even large format cameras from you, obviously as small ones as an E-PM1 could be. And bright cheap medium format pancake lenses as well.
mmm Olympus FF is not a dream, a panasonic mirrorles FF is a real dream
Ha ha ha! According to m43 (aka Olympus) fanbois, m43 is BETTER than full frame! Why would Olympus want to “downgrade” to Full Frame, if m43 is so much “better” in every which way? If, according to fanboys, nothing is better than their tiny toy Olympus, why go up in size, weight and cost, with a whole new series of lenses? Must be size envy….
Yawn. Quiet day on 43r?
Don’t these photochop people have nothing better to do / go out and take photos with the cameras that actually exist?
HAHA good point u have there. I guess its the weather, its cold and dreary outside, makes people want to stay inside
I find it humorous how Olympus M43 owners dispised anything FF, But show them a render Ikympus camera and watch them go crazy…. hahahahaha!!!
“Olympus” camera
l like a Troll that cares about their spelling and Grammar,
I admire what Olympus is trying to do here, and I would not call it a retreat or a sign of giving up. They are not raising the white flag, there should be no reason they can’t stick with Micro Four thirds as an entry level point, especially for the youth. Then offer a serious alternative for advanced, or dare I say one day even professional users. 3 cheers.
The question is, what mount will it use?
The sony E-mount sharing with their new mirrorless?
An adapted m4/3 mount? (working in the same way the E-mount does for Sony’s new system)
Something completely new?
Or work with the Leica/Panasonic rumoured mount?
I personally can’t be bothered with changing, nor do I desire a FF body/lens size. In my recent trip abroad I was very pleased with how my EM5 photos came out, I never once thought I needed a bigger camera or shallower depth of field.
I hope it uses no mount, because I hope it never happens. Why are we feeding FULL frame trolls with these idiotic ideas? Micro for thirds forum! There are so many advantages to this system and now you want to drag us back to the dark ages!! Why do you want a short flange distance full frame edge smearing colour casting, heavy lensed inferior camera to drag around, we are not SONY!!! You have to crop these cameras images to get a decent photo anyway!!!!
An awful over use of exclamation marks, but you do have a point. With the addition of a DSLR style mirror box these problems would be easily solved.
Well, the design is ok-BUT:
Please dear admin, stop this ‘dreaming’ about Olympus ff on this site. This should be about rumors, not about stupid dreams.
I bet this site know the advantages of they’re system, the rest is trolling or dreaming about a old times of ff cameras…
Now that’s Sony got The ff mirror less system, with Olympus lenses in the future, great! Just stay with the system for everyone don’t need a all cameras to be ff.
so you are against the idea then?
One of the reason why OMD E-M5 and E-M1 are so successful, is Olympus (and Panasonic) started to prove the point, that the image quality from m43 sensors are good enough. Not as goos as full frame, but good enough for probably 80-90% of photographers in general.
Goinf full frame at this time is counter productive.
No it’s not.
My pics from my Canon 6D look SO much better than any M43 camera.
“Counter Productive”… HAHAHA!
Wake me up when M43 is on top of Mirrorless sales and biting into DSLR sales.
Well my pics from my E-M5, E-M1, and GX7 are superior to the Canon 6D. You must be a lousy photographer and just don’t know how to use these cameras. Moron.
HAHAHAHA!!! Yeah, keep lying to yourself… HAHAHAHA!
I would ask you to show and prove, but with the dof of the 6D, it’s not even worth it.
-Do you have BOTH a GX7 AND a FF camera to even SEE the difference? I have Both, and the 6D with the 40mm DESTROYS the GX7 with the 20mm pancake. It’s not even a contest!!
-There’s not one micro four thirds camera that can even hang with the 6D in low light and high ISO’s.
-M43 has it’s place, being smaller, sacrificing image quality. The MAIN reason M43 can survive is being smaller, aside from the GH3 with its great video capture.
-M43 will lose out if APS-C cameras get smaller and/or add features such as weather sealing, dual card slots and Ibis.
Truth hurts when you have no facts and resort to name calling.
Has anyone actually read the caption under the rendition of a supposed E-7f camera???
Just to remind you all.
“The Sony-Olympus partnership makes it possible for Olympus to joint the FF world. While I don’t know if this will happen (and if it makes sense at all) the people on the web is already starting to dream their Olympus FF cameras. So here is the first Olympus E-7F designed by one of our 43rumors readers. Feel free to send me your Olympus FF designs if you want them to be posted here!”
At no point does it say Olympus are going to make or even thinking of making a 35mm framed camera. But for my two pence, why not produce a 45mm square sensor and electronics to fit into an ETRS film magazine.
WWYD…
Option one…Panasonic GX7 with kit lens and 45mm 1.8 (Price: about $1300)
Option two…Sony a7 with kit lens only. (Price about $1500 after discount (brother works for Sony))
I was dead set on option one until I found out about the discount tonight. Damn. I will be using camera for family shots (kids) and the occasional shallow DoF headshot (hence the 45 1.8). I can’t afford an additional lens with the Sony right now if I went that direction.
So again I ask… What Would You Do?
I just went to option 2. I don’t know which promotion you have in each country. In mine, Sony set up very awesome campaign along with credit cards, allowing you to buy A7 kit chapter than E-M1. And..even A7 kit lens! I am blown away with its beautiful DOF of FF when shooting my kids.
I have sold a lot of my camera gear over the past few months. Then the EM1 came into view followed by the a7. I looked at both very seriously. Last week I bought the e-m1.
Why?
It does what I want. There are some questions about my legacy lenses on the a7. File size is important though I have several TB of storage, it affects processing time as well.
Then there is the critical part, lens size. Yes I use legacy lenses, all primes, mostly “M” and CZJ so quite small, but I use zooms when out with the GC or at the zoo or on the harbour. M43 zooms are small and light, I like the 14-150mm.
That’s why.
I was dead set on a7 for the last month until 2 days ago when I saw pics of the 45mm 1.8 in action with it’s shallow DOF portraits. I can’t really do the EM1 because I need the 1080p60 video (this is “masquerading” as my emergency backup camera for my video work which I shoot professionally at 1080p60. My CFO, aka wife, likes the Panasonic cuz it’s cheaper. My photography friend says get the full frame. But then again, it’s not his money.
I find that when looking at a camera or a lens flickr can be, was, good to get an idea. I search by the lens I am thinking of then look at the results. I might narrow it down to the lens and camera but not always. The images found will be from all spectrums of life and show what can be done, or achieved with a lens or body.
Unfortunately flickr has become almost useless with the changes they have made and half ones life is spent waiting for more images, during which time it jumps from ones present images to wherever it wants. Also and totally damning as an application, if one tries to look at an image then its back to repeating the whole search. OK open in a new window is available but that may not always be remembered. It must have the laziest programmers and worst project managers and management an application ever had.
I selected A7. I got A7 set with very nice price. I feel that nowadays the pricing of m4/3 gears keeps increasing while that of FF keeps getting lower.
I also use only prime lens such as zeiss 35/2.8, zeiss ZM, and Voigt M, so the size and weight of FF gears is perfect for me.
The most ugly and ridiculously bulky camera I ever see.
Gross, no thanks. Keep it small Olympus, that’s where your niche is.
Or, should we recant why normal 43 never really caught on?
So they do it. Let’s assume: There is a lot of money in new lenses, assume an average of 1500$ each. Those who have been spared by the downturn can laugh at the expense of those who haven’t.
Question then becomes, same from Sony: what happens to m4/3? Will it be kept same as NEX, whose name has disappeared?
Which will become the main line the bread earner? One can argue that you already have 52 Mpx smart phones, so how can you sell a real camera that has less?
The trouble with this line of thought, entirely made up by marketing, is that it could end in disaster.
According to T.Hogan Oly is selling 650,000 a year. It needs 1,000,000 to reach breakeven. Will it reach it with a FF35? Really?
So please go on laughing. If it’s decision time I find it a sad moment. Wasn’t the 12-40 called a ‘Pro’ lens? Here it is: the screws are attached to plastic:
http://www.mu-43.com/showthread.php?t=56256
So let’s get another Pro line…
I am absolutely shocked! And satisfied at the same time I didn’t go for E-M1 or 12-40 for that matter. I don’t know if my 12-60 is built in the same way, hope it isn’t. Having used the 12-60 for years, I believe it wouldn’t yield to a small impact in the same disgraceful manner … And it costs less!?!? And has longer reach!
That’s pretty nasty, and by the looks of it that is going to happen to a few more people.
@almaric,
That is user error. Every lens on earth will get some damage if you drop it! NO EXCEPTION!!! To be fair, we should blame Olympus since every lens contain plastic parts. Even Nikon’s and canon’s 24-70 also are included many plastic parts.
Olympus is a leader in lens and camera industry. Each design must have a positive purpose. In this case, I think it’s actually clever design in that if you drop it, the damage will be limited only to certain cheap parts rather than whole structure — which is more expensive for fixing.
Sorry for typo .. I mean we should not blame olympus
Dropped my 50-200 SWD on the concrete from 3 feet. Broke the lens cap and the HMC filter. Sent the 50-200 in for assessment. Nothing wrong with it
Totaly agree – that was a unlucky drop – these screws, although into plastic and small will still resist many kg of force before giving like that… and as said, being plastic, very easy to fix!
Attaching the metal mount to the lens using plastic screw studs for the screws should not be a problem if well designed, far heavier and more expensive things have screws going to plastic studs. The main problem they have is unscrewing and rescrewing or using excess torque. Some mounts screw into flimsy bent metal tags and have survived for years.
Here the screws have pulled out or even the studs broken. If it were all metal the shock would have damaged other internals. Maybe that part with the screw studs can be replaced easily and the mount reattached. However I think Oly would decline warranty. Household contents insurance may cover it. Ask them.
If the studs are broken then they may be glued back or replaced with a collar and longer screws used if room, but what other damage?
WOW, that’s Cheap.. that inexcusable. Look how short the screws are, too! Once again, Olympus is cutting costs and charging a premium. Seriously, I dont believe it. That’s poor design.
It could be a good idea. This way Oly could target the pro market with their FF and keep M43 for the amateurs.
Dream on.
Would not be much wrong with a second somewhat larger sensor format.
There are always people (not me) who demand for less DOF and higher low light performance.
But no reason (apart from available snesor size) to make it just the 35mm format (36 x 24mmm d=43mm)
Make it a bit smaller, and make also cameras smaller with hardly any difference in image quality. Or make it even a bit larger, and offer even higher IQ. With mirrorless your cameras can be still smaller than DLSRs.
Just put the sensor size where you think the market would like it most. That would be of course a very carefull longtime decision.
But nothing wrong with the idea of a second sensor size.
I like starry eyed optimism, when investing 1000 $ in *PRO* matériel
So why don’t you have a look at this *PRO* 12-40 cutaway?
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3587554
LOL
Bodes well for the coming 35FF 🙂
You know there is plastic, and then there is plastic.. I’m sure that when selecting the materials for the lens they take into account weight, strength, stiffness, hardness, thermal expansion and cost among possible others. Plastics can be very high tech. Perhaps polymeric material has a better ring to it? Plastic does not equal bad quality or cheap.
You may not have read the pertinent point, it fell off the “couch on to the carpet” and snapped in two.
It didnt break in two, it just cracked the mount, and the camera was attached so no wonder.
I feel some further explanation may be required. A couch is an upholstered and padded piece of furniture which stands a couple of feet from the floor, it something you would sit upon. Carpet should be universally accepted, but just in case it is a woven fabric or fibre floor covering, generally with a soft underlay beneath it.
The “Pro” lens in question fell from the not very imposing height of the couch, and landed gently on the carpet. It broke in half. Not very impressive Olympus, not one bit. It’s quite understandable that people would rather stick with their tried and true “Professional” range of DSLR’s than risk uncertainty with these diminutive products.
Gee, I have had my 14-150 drop from a low table onto the carpet, not once, not twice, but 3 times. Guess what, its totally undamaged, and thats merely a ‘standard grade’ non pro, almost all plastic lens. Luck? surely plays a role, but generally, those lenses will survive such a drop.
But, that 14-150 didn’t have an e-m1 attached to it. I find it interesting how you spend so many words on explaining what a cough is, what carpet is, how far it fell, but somehow don’t mention that tiny little fact of an E-M1 being attached and consequently the mount of both camera and lens having to take the brunt of the impact forces as well as those being bigger due to the larger mass.
The name PRO for this system is a joke. No real pro is going to work with M43 sensor.
i buy ff oly for sure
I swapped from 4/3 to FF Nikon D800E and sold my e5 and all zuiko top pro lenses including 150/2.0 , 300/2.8 and 35-100/2.8. The IQ advantage is there, D800e is fantastic, the Nikon AF with 3D tracking is fast and good. I hiked up a Mountain with over 7kilo’s camera equipment which is crazy. Then I start to Miss my zuiko 12-60mm.
Stop whining over an Olympus FF system. It will be suïcide for Olympus. Their future is micro, a high Quality lightweight pro system with small lenses. If they do it right and build a few m zuiko pro long lenses like 150-350 and a 400mm or 500mm i see many FF wildlife shooters, sports shooters, move to m zuiko pro. Including me. FF long glass is extremely heavy and big. Nothing can beat micro 4/3 as soon they play out their strenghts and start building long glass.
FullFrame? no thx.
µFT + E-M1 + “pro grade lenses” + future developing the system will get my money !
Not my dream.
Exactly! I dont understand this FF nonsense. Oly has proven a high interest in m4/3 future by announcing the Pro line lenses.
I saw images from A7+Zeiss 55/1.8 and I really dont get why so many pics were taken wide open > FF madness continues with a pursuit of the shallowest DOF.
Maybe because you are just a point and shoot kind of person.
If you generously crop those A7 images to get rid of the smeared edges and vignetting they do look quite good.
Maybe, but whats the point of a larger sensor when having to generously crop the image, could as well use a cropped sensor and reduce weight and size of the sensor assembly so ibis becomes easier to implement.
You can’t fight marketing, well all be FF croppers soon.
Who gives a dam if you have to crop the hell outta it you get sups shallow depth of field
And you have no bloody clue! If you crop a colour shafted vignetted Full Frame image to APSC it has the same depth of field as APSC!! I’d you crop a smeared Full Frame Image to micro four thirds you have the same depth of field as micro four thirds!!! Wake up!!!!
Sir, KILL the Noise.. with a FF sensor, you can make necessary adjustments with LR ir Aperature in Raw and still have a better looking picture than any M43 file.
I can’t belive the nonsense here… I think you fanboys are better off talking about M43 vs APS-C IQ. Complaing about a FF sensor is really making you all look like Ignorant Fools! The Sony A7 IS a BETTER mirrorless camera than ANY M43 camera, and that includes your beloved E-M1, AND I might add, a better bang fir your buck. Its similar in price and its FF.
Sony will take over the mirrorless market. Olympus will be lucky to be even a sidekick.
Ok, what year you think Oly will die? 2015? 2018? I dare you if they still exist by then, you swallow your humongus camera with the giant sensor it it. I know you will have no problem though since you have a bigger mouth than a badass medium format camera.
You’re upset… Truth hurts, I know.
Will Olympus go out of business? I don’t think so, but its very possible they’ll be acquired. At least the imaging division. I can see them selling it iff in order to stay in business..
Just because the E-M1 is selling, “supposedly”, they’re STILL losing money. They’re sitting on money that won’t move. Cameras (mirrorless) is a very niche market. And I don’t see Olympus ever selling to the Masses. At least Panasonic has the assests to do whatever. FF, M43, APS-C, they’re in the red as well, but can still manuver and profit down the line.
Cry and get upset all you want, it just shows you’re worried.
Haha… Fanboys.
hi.. i think is gonna be a good new for some peoples, but not for me. i know the olympus partnership with sony might open every possiblity.. but i don’t believe with FF system as long as they don’t change their mounting..
IMHO the problems with FF system is their lens is not design telecentris like 4/3 lens, so they always have vigneting problems and thus will force us to crop the edge of our picture, amd if they gonna make their lens telecentris it mean that the lens gonna be bigger then what see today unless it gonna be mirrorles.. but they cannot cheat the size
I think it was T. Hogan who aired the suspicion that mirrorless FF might not be introduced for an increase in IQ but for an increase in profits by Sony. If Oly or Panny or Fuji do the same, the reason might be the same.
Despite mirrorless doing less badly than dSLR (we saw the graphs in this site) numbers are still falling steeply, possibly being replaced by smartphones.
So it becomes essential for camera companies o switch to high value added items.
We saw that the E-M1 which is expensive, can only go so high. After that there is only FF.
Sony BTW is replicating the printer/cartridge model of marketing with lenses being the milking cow.
As consumers we have exactly the opposite interest: not to throw away a perfectly good series of lenses we already paid for.
That is why IMHO talking about the differences in IQ seems so surreal. Companies are desperately trying to sell pecking orders, IQ a v. distant second.
That is why Hogan suspected a con operation, and I saw at DPR a massive viral marketing across forums. To survive companies need us to throw away entire layers of perfectly good product and buy again.
Micro Four Thirds had a good few years there, it was fun. And no format lasts forever, we’ve learnt that from the Nex guys. Oh we’ll at least we were a part of it, remember fondly.
What the hell are you people talking about? This is a made up photoshopped image of a FF sensor in a made up camera! This was sent in by a reader!! This is not a rumour at all!!! You are all being rediculous!!!
Olympus can get to No.1 DxOMark with top quality FF sensor. Olympus will rule DxO.
they already have this, its called the sony a7
Please don’t make posts like this. This amounts to little more than mental masturbation and protracts pointless discussions on something that will never see the light of day.
It might or it might not. After all it was Oly’s CEO who said they MIGHT make a FF35.
And since they are going to make equipment for Sony, it would be easy.
Now can they afford 2 lines of product, with new inventory, etc? All I know is that m4/3 is the chicken with the golden eggs, more so than NEX for Sony. So Sony might be scrapping it, while it doesn’t look very likely for Oly.
We have a psychological problem: immature people who cannot hold two thought at the same time, and who conceive everything in terms of caranage. There is only one victor, who kills all the rest.
These are also the poor sods who conceive of DxO as their private axe.
It’s rewarding to demystify things for those, showing for instance that WA, can have much, much worse corners in FF35 than in m4/3.
Tried to warn the poor sods, but they are all after ONE GOD, one Fuhrer, One Volk, One Reich… and they usually live in the vast cornbelts between two oceans 🙂
All this bloviating over something that isn’t even an FT1. Don’t you all have something better to do with your time? Like standing in line at walmart.
Amazon has the Canon 6D for $1415 right now… That price cannot be beat for a FF camera.
A Full Frame Olympus camera seems very unlikely, as that market is already well serviced by Canon, Nikon, and Sony.
Considering that sensor technology is still quite immature, within the next 5 years we are going to see a 50 Mpx Micro 4/3 sensor with 14+ stops of dynamic range, so most of the Full Frame advantages are going to disappear soon. ( Fuji-Panasonic will be launching a 14+ stop m4/3 sensor in 2015 )
And FF DOF equivalence can be acheived with faster m4/3 lenses, especially when you factor in the new SpeedBooster technology.
The FF 35mm format made a lot of sense when film was the only media available, but digital sensor tech is already starting to surpass everything film brought to the table, and it will leave film in the dust over the coming 5 years.
I completely agree. We’d have a 14+ stop four thirds sensor now if it used the technology used by Nikon, and we already have 12+ stops, more than you get with any Canon. There are physical limitations, but we’re not close enough to any of them to prevent 4/3 sensors from easily achieving the milestones you mention.
Faster lenses shouldn’t only be possible on micro four thirds…they should be significantly easier to build than for full frame. The future does indeed look bright. 🙂 We already have the only affordable f/0.95 lenses.
Based on the availability of Olympus cameras and lenses right now, the new E-M1 and 12-40 seem to be doing very well. I’ve been trying to get my hands on the 12-40 for a few weeks. So far I can’t find a single one that isn’t back ordered beyond the end of next week. A lot of people have been waiting for pro-level Olympus gear. Now that it’s here I think it’s going to get interesting.
Sensors today have about 50% peak quantum efficiency for each color, which in turn uses only one-third of the spectrum. So 1/6 QE total or 2.5 stops. That’s about the further progress that can be expected. Plus a bit better read noise, but that will mainly go to smaller pixels.
That improvement will make large sensors better by just the same amount as small ones. 35 mm will always stay 2 stops more light-sensitive, and the lenses to cover that sensor will always stay bigger. Only thing is, at some point even the smaller sensors are good enough for most purposes, and we’re getting to that point.
That’s not quite true, as yield problems are far more limiting to large sensors. Fabricating a defect-free FF sensor requires a more conservative design which has already closed the gap with medium format digital and is likely to shrink the gap between FF and 4/3 at an accelerating pace as sensor designs push closer to the physical limitations of fabrication process.
Those of us in the semiconductor industry have seen this coming for years. It’s not something photographers consider because they’re not the ones working out the challenges of designing and building these sensors, but for the engineers who make these sensors a reality, smaller parts make much more ambitious designs not only affordable, but possible!
Why do you think the gap in low light noise performance has closed to barely more than 1.5 stops when the additional area alone should easily allow for a full 2 stops.
One last factor is if you consider cameras with the eyes of a geek, or the eyes of a photog. Certainly if the latter Dynamic Range is the main consideration, if the former than it will be the Mpx count.
Companies, to sell, probably consider both. For me however the new Alphas are the proof that you can’t manage well a landscape’s edges without a retrofocal big WA, so much of the interest has waned. I use a 4/3 9-18 and I already have great performance.
If one adds the relative lack of reactiveness of the new Sony mirrorless, one begins to think that they need a tripod from the start, and it certainly is not my idea of shooting. Never say never, but the hype didn’t last long.
It will be interesting to check the sales at the second quarter, and compare them with m4/3.
A full-frame version of the E-M1 with decent lens support would seriously disrupt Canikon – The technology such as the best IBIS in the world, live bulb/live time and in-camera HDR are serious selling points to a user new to full-frame. For current Canikon owners the investment they have in lenses is probably enough of a barrier to move brands though. Will it ever happen? because of the latter point, probably no. It makes sense for Oly to perfect things at m43 and get some money in rather than try to break the Canikon stranglehold at present. If they were to go FF with a new sensor technology significantly in advance of Canikon then it would be worth it, but anything less isn’t enough to tempt away their existing userbase.
Olympus moved itself into a corner. It has no FF lenses. If I want to run around with changable lenses, I want a bigger sensor which offers more options in regard to DOF. If I want portability and don’t know how to focus and just need sharp photos, compacts and smartphones get better and better.
Personally I moved from phone, to compact, m43, APS-C, and am now on the jump to FF… I skipped the 1inch sensor as it wasn’t available at the time, but m43 looks to be squeezed from all sizes, aeh, sides.