Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/02/03

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Above AF
From: "Peter Su" <psu@jprc.com>
Date: Tue, 3 Feb 1998 13:51:29 -0500

> Not only that, but in a manual mode, a series of gears and levers would be
> necessary, further adding to the bulk,  intricacy of the mechanism and the
> weight. >>
>
>The Contax AX uses a system where the film plate and mirror assembly rides
>back and forth on a ceramic guide rail, powered by an ultrasonic motor.

The point being, that you focus the lens manually as before. You don't focus
manually by moving the film plane. Only the AF moves the film plane.

I too, am not so sure how useful this is compared to what the fast Canon and
Nikon bodies do. It seems to me, if you want AF, you want it for moving
things, so you want the speed and flexibility of the Canon or Nikon systems.
For anything that's not moving, AF isn't all that useful, so it doesn't
really matter if you have it. I find that I don't use AF all that much for
what I do, but I use a modern Nikon for its other features (fast flash
synch, nice viewfinder, etc).

Pete