Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1996/10/06
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]In response to David Morton's lengthy-but-interesting post: a) No one has suggested that there was any great secrecy or exclusivity in the Leitz' use of residual aberrations for enhanced optical effect as developed by Berek. To the contrary, the Zeiss optical types thought it a rather cheap trick and there was a fairly lively discussion of this in the Prewar German optical journals. It was simply the only way that Leitz, as a small company, could compete in the market of the period, and the trick produced lenses which produced a unique quality on the final image. b) No one has suggested that Zeiss, or Nikon, or Canon could not do the same. There are a lot of reasons they don't -- Zeiss, for instance, has always worked (often against market dynamics, meaning price) to produce the ultimate bench-test figures, while Nikon and Canon have emphasized the greatest quality possible, for the most part, at the middle of the price scale. In addition, Leitz never had an interest in zooms, Zeiss and Leica have only recently shown much interest, while Nikon and Canon were producing some nice zoom designs a quarter-century ago. All of these houses are perfectly capable of quite similar products but their corporate policies dictate their product line. Now that Leitz has moved to MTF/OTF standards, expect their lenses to begin performing a bit more like Zeiss optics. c) I doubt if optical scientists spend a lot of time disassembling their competitors' products. The principles involved are too well known -- all of the engineers and scientists, after all, belong to the same societies and share the same journals. While some of the technology (like blank-molding techniques) are patented, most of the techniques are not subject to this protection. Sure, a brand-new lens of unusual characteristic might get taken apart, but I doubt that the normal run of stuff is so examined. And Zeiss, at any rate, is probably too arrogant to really concern itself with the foibles of others -- they seem to feel that, if they didn't develop it, it really didn't need to be developed. Marc msmall@roanoke.infi.net FAX: +540/343-7315 Cha robh bas fir gun ghras fir!