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From: Paul Furman on 15 May 2010 00:03
RichA wrote:
> Bruce wrote:
>> RichA wrote:
>>
>>> WHO will be the company to release...a COMPACT FF camera??!
>> Leica already did it with the M9. Wikipedia says:
>>
>> "The Leica M9 is the second digital camera in the rangefinder M
>> series. It was introduced by Leica Camera AG on 9 September 2009. It
>> uses a 18.5-megapixel Kodak KAF-18500 Full Frame CCD image sensor."
>>
>> Next question?
>
> It costs $10k with a 50mm lens. NEXT!!!

The new Sony AP-S super-compact is aimed at the mass market P&S crowd
who are leery of a big expensive DSLR. Full frame won't appeal to them
because the sensor alone would be too expensive. So it won't happen for
the same reason nobody ever came up with an inexpensive 8x10" camera.

An exception might be the the 4x5 Polaroid cameras. Those used medium
format with rather expensive film because the negative was eliminated,
the print had to be fairly large, but they were not usable for more than
test shots for pros. The motivation was instant gratification which any
digital provides, so you'd need another motivation in today's market and
that would be low light performance and/or extreme wide angle. The mass
market doesn't actually care about large prints (in spite of the
megapixel wars) so you are left with low light performance and people
just aren't willing to pay for that. I would, but I'm not most people.

--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam
From: dj_nme on 15 May 2010 03:08
Paul Furman wrote:
<big snip>
> What I don't understand is why the Sony 16/2.8 is so big considering the
> small front element???
> http://a.img-dpreview.com/previews/SonyNEX5/Images/NEX-5_with_16mm.jpg
>

It's probably more of an aesthetic choice by the designer to "blend" the
lens tube into the mount; it would probably look a little odd to see a
"stepped-in" or (perhaps) a conical shaped lens tube.
From: Robert Spanjaard on 15 May 2010 05:01
On Sat, 15 May 2010 17:08:28 +1000, dj_nme wrote:

>> What I don't understand is why the Sony 16/2.8 is so big considering
>> the small front element???
>> http://a.img-dpreview.com/previews/SonyNEX5/Images/NEX-5_with_16mm.jpg
>>
>>
> It's probably more of an aesthetic choice by the designer to "blend" the
> lens tube into the mount; it would probably look a little odd to see a
> "stepped-in" or (perhaps) a conical shaped lens tube.

Probably true. And it _is_ stepped down a bit. Check the filter thread/
hood mount.


--
Regards, Robert http://www.arumes.com
From: Bruce on 15 May 2010 07:47
On Fri, 14 May 2010 21:35:45 -0700, Paul Furman <paul-@-edgehill.net>
wrote:
>
>'Prime' lenses can be quite small, and good quality, and reasonably
>fast. Many large format lenses are small, although a lot of that is
>because the extension is taken up by the bellows.


The main reasons why large format lenses are small are:

1) There is no need for complex retrofocus designs

2) Maximum apertures are kept relatively small (compared to 35mm
format DSLRs) because limited depth of field is a serious problem.

For these reasons, the lenses are quite tiny.

The fact that retrofocus designs are not needed means that optical
quality can be high even with relatively simple optical formulae.

From: Bruce on 15 May 2010 07:52
On Fri, 14 May 2010 21:35:45 -0700, Paul Furman <paul-@-edgehill.net>
wrote:
>
>What I don't understand is why the Sony 16/2.8 is so big considering the
>small front element???
>http://a.img-dpreview.com/previews/SonyNEX5/Images/NEX-5_with_16mm.jpg


I think it is for aesthetic reasons. The designers clearly wanted the
lens diameter to be greater than the height of the body for all NEX
lenses. Personally, I think it is a grotesquely ugly design, but
"handsome is as handsome does".

The choice of a 16mm focal length is quite a courageous choice for a
fixed focal length lens in today's market - it is the equivalent of a
24mm on full frame digital or 35mm film.

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