Re: [Leica] Minolta made R9

[Dave Yoder <leica@home.com>]

I was hearing the same stuff in J-school fifteen years ago. Back then it was
only two or three years away, and here it's just now beimg imposed on me, at a
great compromise to quality. Sure, computers have made leaps and bounds in the
last five years but digital imaging is a different ballgame, and though it'll
doubtless be improving, film is technology is improving too and all I've seen
the ccd do so far is suck in comparison to film.

And I haven't heard a thing about magical new ccd technology. Perhaps I'm not
in the right circles. But if it's that far along and that close to commercial
release I'd expect to be seeing something in Popular Science or Jane's 'cause
you can bet the military will already be using it in their satellites...

Dave Y.

Javier Perez wrote:

> R9?
>
> Who cares!
>
> According to what I've heard, experimental CCD
> technology is two thirds of the way to 25 Ektachrome
> in terms of resolution. When it gets there, at a reasonable
> price it's the end of photography as we know it.
> With CCD, picture taking will start to look more like image
> designing with each image corrected on a PC or perhaps even onboard
> for color abberations and distortion and evenness of illumination
> Lens designers will change their priorities away from striking a
> balance between all parameters towards a design philosophy that stresses
> resolution and to hell with everything else. (except speed) Infact
> resolution
> will be the sole parameter that CCD technology will not be able to
> compensate for, except with cheat schemes like interpolation and contrast
> expansion. Of course you'll be able to use the old wetzlar artillery with
> CCD and might even be able to design or download all sorts of correction
> schemes. Most of them don't require much more than mouse clicking and
> some highschool algebra to produce. But you'll still be short on
> resolution....
> Other things will change too Motor Drives, Shutters, Databacks will all be
> obsolete
> Althoug the fP shutter may still be employed occasionally to produce the
> motion effect!
> ETA 5 years.
> Now then,
> Do we really care about the R9???
> A lot of money for a potential CCD to lens coupler
> with built in mirror box and focusing screen for which you won't be able to
> get any film
> ANYWHERE!
> Also with the constantly size and price of ram everyone will be able totake
> as many hirez
> zillion color pictures as he she or it possibly can everyone will become a
> fantastic
> photographer and there will be much rejoicing
>
> This also drive home the point that Leitz can only survive by servicing the
> I/O
> That's to say lennses and eventually color printers maybe projectors.
>
> See Ya
> Javier
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Larry Kopitnik <kopitnil@marketingcomm.com>
> To: <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>
> Sent: Friday, August 20, 1999 10:28 AM
> Subject: Re: [Leica] Minolta made R9
>
> > >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
> > --> If and when Leica comes out with a next generation SLR,
> > you can be sure I'll try my best to understand how they
> > went about to circumvent Japanese autofocus patents.
> > Like Nikon AFS  (microwave cavity resonance collimator),
> > Leica's way to get into autofocus is either going to have
> > something to do with existing patents or be some pretty
> > wild "third degree" technology because, it seems, the
> > wise Japanese ( not cynical here) have pretty much cornered
> > the potential patents and reverse engineering pathways
> > to an autofocus system. I just can't wait to see what Leica's
> > AutoFocus system is going to be related to, technology wise.
> > <<<<<<<<<<<<<<