Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2012/11/24
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I still have three XA's in various iterations. However, I've come to terms with carrying an M; if I want smaller I will mount a 35 2.8 Serenar which is really thin making the M pocketable. I just won't give up the precision and repeatability of manual focusing. On Sat, Nov 24, 2012 at 3:49 PM, Bill Pearce <billcpearce at cox.net> wrote: > While I understand that the size of the XA is probably too small to house > both a FF sensor, electronics and a battery of useful size, It wouldn't > take much more. The FF Sony compact is a good example, and , at a more > affordable price could be the deal. It would seem that we have reached a > time when the FF sensor compact is a possibility as the flange to film > plane distance problems seem to have been solved. I would think that > applying the same solutions to the E1 and 3 would make them truly > competitive. That camera was probably a little too soon and that was what > made it too similar in size to conventional DSLR's. > > -----Original Message----- From: Richard Man > Sent: Saturday, November 24, 2012 1:29 PM > To: Leica Users Group > Subject: Re: [Leica] Olympus XA (OT) > > > The XA was my first camera out of school. I still have it. The rewind crank > broke so a few years ago, I bought another one, just because > > As I said earlier, I think the RX-1 is too little, too late, but if they > make a digital full frame XA, I will buy it, for up to 2012 $1500. > > > On Sat, Nov 24, 2012 at 9:03 AM, Howard Ritter <hlritter at bex.net> wrote: > > Reading early releases on Sony's forthcoming ultrapremium-priced non-SLR >> non-interchangeable, non-zoom-lens finderless full-frame digicam, the RX1, >> I couldn't help but think about its nearest film equivalent, and one of my >> favorite past cameras, the little Oly XA. I'll bet a lot of LUGgers past a >> certain age used this little gem. How many of you still have yours? Use >> it? >> When I think about it, it just annoys me that this new, smallest FF >> digicam >> is twice the depth and box volume of the XA, and not pocketable. And that >> the smallest "serious" digicam, the Sony RX100, is the same size as the XA >> and yet can't manage a sensor that's more than one-third the dimensions of >> the XA's frame. >> >> [For those too young to have seen one, I'll describe it as the size of a >> pack of cigarettes (remember that antiquated comparison?), rugged plastic >> construction, sliding door covering the integral 35mm f/2.8 Zuiko lens, >> rangefinder focusing with a lever on the bottom of the lens, aperture >> selected with a vertically sliding tab on the front of the body, and >> aperture-priority autoexposure?with the shutter speed indicated by a >> needle >> in the viewfinder. But you had to set the ASA yourself. Powered by a watch >> battery in a recess in the bottom, and it takes a screw-on flash unit on >> one end if you need it. And it took full-frame 35mm pictures. The camera's >> almost exactly the same size as my Sony RX100, which has a collapsible >> pancake 3x zoom lens and is a few mm shorter?but which has a sensor that's >> about 35% of the linear dimensions of a 35mm frame and about 14% of the >> area. I started wondering where mine was and when I had used it last?must >> have been 10 years. I got it over 30 years ago when I was stationed with >> the USAF in Wiesbaden, Germany, and so many of my fellow members of the >> Wiesbaden American Ski Club got one too that it became the "official" trip >> camera of WASKI. Then, I came across it yesterday quite by accident while >> searching for something else somewhere entirely different. Serendipity. No >> film in it, unfortunately, but the battery still powers it up. So it's off >> to Walgreen's we go...] >> >> So I'm thinking, if anyone other than LUGgers would be willing to accept a >> non-zoom, integral-lens manual-focus camera with no built-in flash, in >> return for maximum pocketability, how small could a FF digicam be? Why >> can't it be the size of the XA and even include a RF? Obviously it would >> need a lot of electronics that the XA doesn't, but then the XA has all >> that >> space in the film cassette and takeup-reel chambers for circuitry and a >> big >> battery. The need to have light rays strike the sensor at as steep an >> angle >> as possible apparently imposes certain constraints on lens design, and >> therefore size, but then a FF CMOS sensor is so sensitive that you could >> obviously settle for an f/4 lens, as is the case with FF DLSRs with >> typical >> zooms, and maybe correct for the light fall-off far from the axis in >> software, which should loosen the constraints. The Sony RX1 is a step in >> this direction but the body is about 1 cm larger in height and width than >> the RX100, and the big lens gives the camera twice the depth?without being >> interchangeable, or a zoom, or f/1.4. >> >> I'm just sayin'. >> >> ?howard >> >> ______________________________**_________________ >> Leica Users Group. >> See >> http://leica-users.org/**mailman/listinfo/lug<http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug>for >> more information >> >> > > > -- > // richard > <http://www.richardmanphoto.**com<http://www.richardmanphoto.com> > > > > ______________________________**_________________ > Leica Users Group. > See > http://leica-users.org/**mailman/listinfo/lug<http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug>for > more information > > ______________________________**_________________ > Leica Users Group. > See > http://leica-users.org/**mailman/listinfo/lug<http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug>for > more information > -- Don don.dory at gmail.com