Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/08/26

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Photokina release
From: Alan Ball <AlanBall@csi.com>
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1998 18:00:35 +0200

Lucien wrote:
> A new R 35-70/2,8 ! (After a 35-70/3,5 and a 35-70/4 !)
> What a nice zoom line !
> IMO, the most banal focals for a zoom.

Piano, piano, Lucien: the GREAT news is that a 28-70 f2.8 is planned for
Photokina 2002. Rumours even consider plausible that a 20-35 f2.8 could
come out around that time. But these are rumours. Leica remains the
innovator it always was, way ahead of the pack. You do not realize that
all the high-end 35mm shoppers were praying for that lens so that they
could at last jump into the R bandwagon. ;-/

Leica knows best, it does not provide hype, it waits till the
technologies are mature and reliable. From today on, the 35-70 f2.8 zoom
type has reached maturity. Before that it was a bells and whistle gadget
for techno freaks.

Okay, easy sarcasm, I know. More seriously, it will probably be the best
35-70 in the industry, that's all, and maybe someone actually cares. Not
me. Two lenses make the R line for me: the 100mm f2.8 APO-macro and the
180mm f2.8 APO. Maybe some exotic longer R tele makes sense to a few
specialists. For the rest, that R line is for me a source of infinite
puzzlement....

> 
> And 14 years for a M6 TTL Flash !! with a 1/50 syncro !
> I was expecting it in 1984 !
> If that's all the improvement they can offer after 14 years.
> And I hear (not confirmed) that it will be a few minimeter taller.
> (If it's true, what about those of us who use the NF 50mm ?)

I can't imagine that the size would change at all. That seems crazy, if
only for production constraints. 
 
> Really, I don't understand.

Neither do I.

> I hope that others are happy.

All this should not affect anyone's happiness, don't you think ? Who are
we to judge ? They have super business people at Solms, and SAP R/3.
They MUST know what they are doing. Let's go back to blind faith mode,
and keep smiling : they are releasing a Fuji consumer grade digital
camera. And it is prettier than the Fuji. That is the way to go : take
the mainstream digital cameras from Fuji and let Hasselblad deal with
Fuji's antiquitated rangefinder offering.

Okay, enough said, when are we going to buy all this ? I AM going to get
the M6 TTL HM AND the 135mm f3.4. What are you going to purchase ?

Friendly regards
Alan
Brussels-Belgium