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f2 (!) zooms from Olympus: 14-35, 35-100 f2 ...

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Jogger

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http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_section/cpg_pressDetails.asp?pressNo=388

snippet:

Lenses Are the World's First to Offer f2.0 Over Full Zoom Range

The Zuiko Digital 14-35mm f2.0 (28mm –70mm equiv.) and the Zuiko Digital ED 35-100mm f2.0 (70mm-200mm equiv.) will be the first lenses in the world to feature an aperture of f2.0 over the full zoom range. The goal of their design is to maximize the full potential of the mobility of the lens zoom range while making the most of the brightness offered at f2.0. In combination, these two lenses will give photographers the freedom to use the f2.0 aperture over focal lengths ranging from wide-angle 14mm (28mm equiv.) to telephoto 100mm (200mm equiv.).

These two lenses use Super ED or ED lens elements to allow each wavelength of light to strike the sensor evenly and at the same time eliminate chromatic aberration to the maximum possible extent at aperture f2.0 and deliver excellent edge-to-edge image quality with superior sharpness, definition, and color fidelity.

--
-pat
 
When the E1 first came out, and Olympus representative told me that this was the direction they were headed in: fast lenses. Since they're designing lenses for only one sensor size, and a smaller one at that, they can make faster lenses w/o having to make them so large, heavy and expensive.
Jogger said:
http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_section/cpg_pressDetails.asp?pressNo=388

snippet:

Lenses Are the World's First to Offer f2.0 Over Full Zoom Range

The Zuiko Digital 14-35mm f2.0 (28mm –70mm equiv.) and the Zuiko
Digital ED 35-100mm f2.0 (70mm-200mm equiv.) will be the first
lenses in the world to feature an aperture of f2.0 over the full
zoom range. The goal of their design is to maximize the full
potential of the mobility of the lens zoom range while making the
most of the brightness offered at f2.0. In combination, these two
lenses will give photographers the freedom to use the f2.0 aperture
over focal lengths ranging from wide-angle 14mm (28mm equiv.) to
telephoto 100mm (200mm equiv.).

These two lenses use Super ED or ED lens elements to allow each
wavelength of light to strike the sensor evenly and at the same
time eliminate chromatic aberration to the maximum possible extent
at aperture f2.0 and deliver excellent edge-to-edge image quality
with superior sharpness, definition, and color fidelity.

--
-pat
Click to expand...
--
----------------
Robert A
Canon 20D
 
Well... we will see about the expensive part... I really like th E system, but the lens prices are way out of line.
 
I think Olympus has missed the boat again. A f/2.8 or slower with IS type technology will be just as usable as f2 without IS. It will be smaller and cheaper too since no need for big expensive fast glass.
 
Xoom said:
I think Olympus has missed the boat again. A f/2.8 or slower with
IS type technology will be just as usable as f2 without IS. It
will be smaller and cheaper too since no need for big expensive
fast glass.
Click to expand...
IS will help with camera motion, but not with viewfinder brightness, shallower DOF, or subject motion.
 
SeanU said:
Well... we will see about the expensive part... I really like th E
system, but the lens prices are way out of line.
Click to expand...
Out of line . . compared to what? Are you implying that the top grade lenses from Canon and Nikon are inexpensive? Professional quality lenses tend to be pricy, no matter who makes them.

You need to think of lenses as a long term investment. The advantage of 4/3rds is knowing that the camera's imaging sensor will always have the physical dimensions, so that lenses bought today can be used with 4/3rds cameras of the future. If other members of the 4/3rds consortium such as Kodak, Fuji or Panasonic manufacture their own 4/3rds camera bodies in the future, it is reassuring to know you can switch camera brands and still keep using the same lenses you already own.

The concept of lenses being a long term investment does not apply so well to the products of manufacturers yoked to legacy 35mm camera lenses. Canon for example makes EF-S lenses which can't be used on their professional cameras. And the Canon legacy lenses have zoom focal length ranges which deny good wide-angle coverage on the consumer grade dSLRs. Moreover, Canon doesn't make any EF-S lenses of "L-Series" quality. In summary, a Canon dSLR owner can't know which lenses to buy unless he at the same time knows whether his next dSLR will have a 1.6X or 1.3X crop factor or a full-frame sensor.

In the long run, a 4/3rds camera owner will buy fewer lenses than the owner of a dSLR system that uses legacy lenses. The 4/3rds dSLR owner can be confident that all lenses available for his camera have been optimized for digital imaging and will perform well at all apertures - unlike the many 35mm legacy lenses which aren't well suited for use with dSLRs.
 
Donald Chin said:
Sound good but not the case in the real world, see the price for
the new EFS IS zoom and you will know what I meant.
Click to expand...
Good lenses are not cheap, and cheap lenses are not good. What will the owner of Canon EF-S lenses do with them if he decides to upgrade to a 1DMlII or 1DsMkII, because they won't fit the professional camera bodies? Perhaps you've heard the old saying, "if you buy cheap, you buy twice."

Canon dSLR owners may do better to buy the more expensive and higher quality L-Series lenses, even though most of the zooms with the useful focal length ranges don't feature Image Stabilization either.
 
The problem is that image sensors are not a "long term investment". Yes, Olympus has committed to the 4:3 size, but it has yet to be widely accepted in the marketplace. All the other camera manufacturers are still playing with various other sizes from 1.6 to 1.0. Until things get standardized, like 35mm was, there is no such thing as a long term investment in digital.
Nabal said:
SeanU said:
Well... we will see about the expensive part... I really like th E
system, but the lens prices are way out of line.
Click to expand...
Out of line . . compared to what? Are you implying that the top
grade lenses from Canon and Nikon are inexpensive? Professional
quality lenses tend to be pricy, no matter who makes them.

You need to think of lenses as a long term investment. The
advantage of 4/3rds is knowing that the camera's imaging sensor
will always have the physical dimensions, so that lenses bought
today can be used with 4/3rds cameras of the future. If other
members of the 4/3rds consortium such as Kodak, Fuji or Panasonic
manufacture their own 4/3rds camera bodies in the future, it is
reassuring to know you can switch camera brands and still keep
using the same lenses you already own.

The concept of lenses being a long term investment does not apply
so well to the products of manufacturers yoked to legacy 35mm
camera lenses. Canon for example makes EF-S lenses which can't be
used on their professional cameras. And the Canon legacy lenses
have zoom focal length ranges which deny good wide-angle coverage
on the consumer grade dSLRs. Moreover, Canon doesn't make any EF-S
lenses of "L-Series" quality. In summary, a Canon dSLR owner can't
know which lenses to buy unless he at the same time knows whether
his next dSLR will have a 1.6X or 1.3X crop factor or a full-frame
sensor.

In the long run, a 4/3rds camera owner will buy fewer lenses than
the owner of a dSLR system that uses legacy lenses. The 4/3rds
dSLR owner can be confident that all lenses available for his
camera have been optimized for digital imaging and will perform
well at all apertures - unlike the many 35mm legacy lenses which
aren't well suited for use with dSLRs.
Click to expand...
--
----------------
Robert A
Canon 20D
 
Robert A said:
Olympus has committed to the 4:3 size, but it has yet to be
widely accepted in the marketplace.
Click to expand...
That could change quicker than you may suspect. Sometimes, all it takes is trying out an Olympus dSLR for awhile. Personally, I had no reservations whatsoever about ditching my Canon 10D and 1D while switching to the Olympus E-1. Every year photographers retire or die, and newer, younger people enter the camera buying market to replace them. We have people shopping for dSLRs now who have never shot a frame of film in their lives - and don't own any legacy lenses, or have any prejudices or loyalties associated with the companies that made them.

For some people, it will only make sense to buy into a dSLR system where "all" of the available lenses are optimized for digital imaging. And it doesn't hurt for those lenses to be smaller and lighter than legacy lenses.
 
Robert A said:
When the E1 first came out, and Olympus representative told me that
this was the direction they were headed in: fast lenses. Since
they're designing lenses for only one sensor size, and a smaller
one at that, they can make faster lenses w/o having to make them so
large, heavy and expensive.
Click to expand...
There may be benefits in viewing and focusing, but the speed of these lenses seems from an exposure standpoint gets used up making up for the noisier (at higher ISOs) sensor.

I really want to like the E1 system, but the lenses are pretty pricey, and the cameras are hardly what I'd consider small. I don't think the lenses are that small either last time I checked. Its good stuff, but I don't see how it is delivering a clear advantage.

--
Jay Turberville
http://www.jayandwanda.com
 
Robert A said:
Until things get standardized, like 35mm was, there is no such thing as a long term investment in digital.
Click to expand...
With digital SLR's, the only standardization needed is between sensors and lenses for the same lens mount system, and the amount of choice within that system. It does not matter much if different incompatable DSLR systems use different formats becasue no-one is tied by the desire to buy film in a common format.

Olympus, Nikon, Fuji, Pentax and Konica-Minolta all seem to be reassuring their DSLR customers that they will be able to use current lenses on future bodies, and vice verca.

Cross brand standardization would help a bit with third party lens choices, but I suspect that the last thing most SLR makers care about is making it easy for people to use third party lenses!
 
Jay Turberville said:
There may be benefits in viewing and focusing, but the speed of these lenses seems from an exposure standpoint gets used up making up for the noisier (at higher ISOs) sensor.
Click to expand...
Or to put it in reverse, the ISO speed advantage of using larger pixels and larger sensors gets used up making up for the slower minimum f-stop of the longer focal length lenses needed, wich require using higher ISO settings to achieve the same shutter speed.

The middle ground is this: usable shutter speed is ultimately limited by APERTURE DIAMETER, since that determines the total amount of light gathered from a given subject during a given exposure time, and total quantity of light is the ultimate limiting physical factor in signal to noise ratios.

Different formats with proportionately different pixels need the same aperture diameter to get the same shutter speed (and same DOF), which means f-stop changed in the same proportion as format size.

With the same pixel count in 4/3 and Canon's 1.6x format, the 4/3 pixel size is smaller by a factor of 0.78 (5.3 microns vs 6.8 in the 8MP sensors), and smaler by factor 0.73 compared to Nikon/Fuji/Pentax/Minolta 1.5x. Since f/2 is lower than f/2.8 by a factor of 0.7, the new Olympus lenses in fact have a slight edge in light gathering power:

the 4/3 sensor will receive about 10% more light at f/2 than a 1.6x sensor at f/2.8 and each pixel of the E-300 will receive about 10% more light at f/2 than those of the 20D or 350D at f/2.8.
 
Just look at the new 60/2.8 macro. That lens means business. Still no L EF-S lenses, though.
Nabal said:
Donald Chin said:
Sound good but not the case in the real world, see the price for
the new EFS IS zoom and you will know what I meant.
Click to expand...
Good lenses are not cheap, and cheap lenses are not good. What
will the owner of Canon EF-S lenses do with them if he decides to
upgrade to a 1DMlII or 1DsMkII, because they won't fit the
professional camera bodies? Perhaps you've heard the old saying,
"if you buy cheap, you buy twice."

Canon dSLR owners may do better to buy the more expensive and
higher quality L-Series lenses, even though most of the zooms with
the useful focal length ranges don't feature Image Stabilization
either.
Click to expand...
--
http://www.4-3system.com/
http://jonr.light.is/
http://getfirefox.com/
 
But what happens if and when Optical SLRs become Electronic SLRs (EVF)? I think that the olympus 4/3 lenses would become obsolete as they would not work for these next generation type of cameras requiring no mirors. It would probably require a new type of lens just as Canon had to create EF-S type lenses for their new, smaller dslrs.
Nabal said:
SeanU said:
Well... we will see about the expensive part... I really like th E
system, but the lens prices are way out of line.
Click to expand...
Out of line . . compared to what? Are you implying that the top
grade lenses from Canon and Nikon are inexpensive? Professional
quality lenses tend to be pricy, no matter who makes them.

You need to think of lenses as a long term investment. The
advantage of 4/3rds is knowing that the camera's imaging sensor
will always have the physical dimensions, so that lenses bought
today can be used with 4/3rds cameras of the future. If other
members of the 4/3rds consortium such as Kodak, Fuji or Panasonic
manufacture their own 4/3rds camera bodies in the future, it is
reassuring to know you can switch camera brands and still keep
using the same lenses you already own.

The concept of lenses being a long term investment does not apply
so well to the products of manufacturers yoked to legacy 35mm
camera lenses. Canon for example makes EF-S lenses which can't be
used on their professional cameras. And the Canon legacy lenses
have zoom focal length ranges which deny good wide-angle coverage
on the consumer grade dSLRs. Moreover, Canon doesn't make any EF-S
lenses of "L-Series" quality. In summary, a Canon dSLR owner can't
know which lenses to buy unless he at the same time knows whether
his next dSLR will have a 1.6X or 1.3X crop factor or a full-frame
sensor.

In the long run, a 4/3rds camera owner will buy fewer lenses than
the owner of a dSLR system that uses legacy lenses. The 4/3rds
dSLR owner can be confident that all lenses available for his
camera have been optimized for digital imaging and will perform
well at all apertures - unlike the many 35mm legacy lenses which
aren't well suited for use with dSLRs.
Click to expand...
 
Xoom said:
I think Olympus has missed the boat again. A f/2.8 or slower with
IS type technology will be just as usable as f2 without IS. It
will be smaller and cheaper too since no need for big expensive
fast glass.
Click to expand...
My "bread and butter" lenses, with a 1.5x crop Nikon camera, are an 85mm f1.4 and a 135mm f2.0.

The subject motion stopping ability is worth it.

Now, all Oly needs is a faster shooting, faster AF pro body...

--

Salvage troll posts! When you see a thread started by a troll, post something useful to it. It will drive the trolls up the wall. ;)

Ciao!

Joe

http://www.swissarmyfork.com
 
When given the choice between IS and fast glass, ALWAYS go for the fast glass.

Take the Canon 17-85 f/4-5.6 IS. It's $100 worth of optics with $500 worth of IS. Look at the price of a typical 28-135 f/4-5.6 lens to see where I got this from.

I had one of these lenses. It was a big disappointment. Not really good for low light photography, as the dark aperture made composing, focusing and stopping motion difficult. IS helped steady the picture, but it wasn't worth $500, at least not in this lens. The optical quality of this lens is about what you'd expect from a $100 5:1 zoom lens.

Professional photographers always gravitate toward faster lenses. The new Oly lenses look pretty impressive. If only they were mounted in front of better sensors...
Xoom said:
I think Olympus has missed the boat again. A f/2.8 or slower with
IS type technology will be just as usable as f2 without IS. It
will be smaller and cheaper too since no need for big expensive
fast glass.
Click to expand...
 
Nabal said:
Donald Chin said:
Sound good but not the case in the real world, see the price for
the new EFS IS zoom and you will know what I meant.
Click to expand...
Good lenses are not cheap, and cheap lenses are not good. What
will the owner of Canon EF-S lenses do with them if he decides to
upgrade to a 1DMlII or 1DsMkII, because they won't fit the
professional camera bodies?
Click to expand...
Many non-pro photographers have no intention whatsoever of buying a $4,000 - $8,000 DSLR body. Which is what Canon DSLR bodies that can't use EF-S lenses will cost for the forseeable future.
Nabal said:
Perhaps you've heard the old saying,
"if you buy cheap, you buy twice."
Click to expand...
Perhaps you don't appreciate that many people do not consider photography to be a $10,000-$15,000 hobby.
Nabal said:
Canon dSLR owners may do better to buy the more expensive and
higher quality L-Series lenses, even though most of the zooms with
the useful focal length ranges don't feature Image Stabilization
either.
Click to expand...
The focal ranges of Canon "L" zooms are designed for 1.0x (FF) crop factor. It is debatable wisdom to spend lots of money on a lens that with a sub-optimal focal length. Unless you have immediate plans of getting into the $10,000-$15,000 club.

Wayne Larmon
 
Robert A said:
When the E1 first came out, and Olympus representative told me that
this was the direction they were headed in: fast lenses. Since
they're designing lenses for only one sensor size, and a smaller
one at that, they can make faster lenses w/o having to make them so
large, heavy and expensive.
Click to expand...
I'm pretty sure that the f/2 zooms are going to be expensive and would'nt be surprised if they're large and heavy; the things probably have at least 14 elements and be made to very tight tolerances if they're going to work at all.

It's not trivial to make a fixed 14mm (like a 28 for 35mm film) f/2 that's good wide open in the corners. It's totally berserk to make one that zooms to 35.

--
Leonard Migliore
 
BJL said:
With the same pixel count in 4/3 and Canon's 1.6x format, the 4/3
pixel size is smaller by a factor of 0.78 (5.3 microns vs 6.8 in
the 8MP sensors), and smaler by factor 0.73 compared to
Nikon/Fuji/Pentax/Minolta 1.5x. Since f/2 is lower than f/2.8 by a
factor of 0.7, the new Olympus lenses in fact have a slight edge in
light gathering power:
the 4/3 sensor will receive about 10% more light at f/2 than a 1.6x
sensor at f/2.8 and each pixel of the E-300 will receive about 10%
more light at f/2 than those of the 20D or 350D at f/2.8.
Click to expand...
This doesn't make any sense to me at all. How much light the sensor sees is a function of the fstop, not of diameter. You seem to be trying to create some sort of S/N metric, but your terminology is all screwed up. The sensor will have X amount of light hitting it, determined by the fstop of the lens and the shutter speed. This will not change from sensor to sensor when using the same lens. Any difference in sensitivity due to pixel pitch should be accounted for in the ISO setting in the camera. If we assume that ISO ratings are similar across different brands and sensors (which I'm not quite sure that they are), then the sensor with an f2 lens in front of it will receive 2 times the amount of light that an f2.8 lens can deliver. Keep in mind that this has nothing whatsoever with what it will look like, it has only to do with proper exposure. In addition, S/N has many more componets to it beyond pixel pitch. The 20D shows that not all sensors are created equal when it comes to S/N ratios. Take a look at the original 1Ds, it's S/N doesn't look so hot as even compared to the 10D, let alone the 20D. The Kodak 14N was lambasted for terrible noise characteristics, but some of that was due to Kodak trying to wring every last bit of dynamic range out of it as possible. My point is that it doesn't make any sense to try to combine fstop, pixel pitch, and S/N ratio together to try to determiine how much light the sensor "sees". It is much easier to look at properly exposed shots and comparing the outputs of the whole system.

Isaac

--
See my pictures here:
http://www.homepage.mac.com/isaacc7
 
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