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Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

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Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#361

Post by dr_zoidberg »

numpad0 wrote: post #282
dr_zoidberg wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some 10 years ago, they refurbished a PowerShot A75 of mine that my father had bought in 2004. 5 years after fabrication, they identified a couple of batches that had been produced with bad sensors, and the cameras affected died a strange death. I had lost all warranty papers, but my local photography shop insisted that I contacted Canon. Had to leave the camera on the official service office, and a month later I had…

I think in that instance Sony wanted bad sensors back as many as possibly could, maybe to study or to stop any bad reputations. I had the same experience with a Sony camera, they took it and replaced the sensor for absolutely free. According to articles from that timeframe, issues were found in Sony CCDs manufactured between 2003 to 2005 surfaced from autumn 2005 to spring 2006, that moisture intrude through either s…

I don't know if it was the same, but this link [0] is full of people describing what the problems with these cameras (and others) were and how Canon managed it. I don't know if Canon used an in-house CCD or if it was from another manufacturer.

[0] https://www.fixya.com/support/t114938-canon_digital_camera_r...

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#362

Post by nradov »

slantyyz wrote: post #357
nradov wrote: post #84

As a casual underwater photographer I hope the Olympus TG series rugged compact cameras live on under the new owner. I know compact cameras are a dying niche market in general. But no one has figured out a good solution for using smartphone cameras underwater (there are waterproof housings but the controls are terrible and they don't really work with strobes or wet lenses). The housings for DSLRs and similarly sized…

Have you had a look at the Nikon 1 AW series? I think there are only two lens options, but apparently they are very good, and should be pretty cheap now, since they were a niche offshoot of an already niche (and discontinued) product line.

The Nikon 1 AW1 was discontinued years ago and it is technically inferior to the Olympus TG-6. Lens options are moot anyway for underwater photography because you need special wet lenses that attach to the waterproof housing.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#363

Post by [deleted] »

drummer wrote: post #353
macintux wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are far more constructive ways to engage in discussion here than “LOL” at someone’s assertion and denigrating someone else’s knowledge.

I'd say it's certainly more constructive to go actually take a look at Canon's lineup and compare it to Sony. Now is also a good time to start selling any Sony gear you own while it is still worth something before Canon annihilates them in a few weeks.

[deleted]

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#364

Post by sudosysgen »

rimliu wrote: post #339
sudosysgen wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They really got their ass handed to them by Sony, Fuji and Panasonic more than anything. The market for high quality interchangeable lens cameras hasn't gone anywhere and isn't going anywhere, but Sony and co really shook it up by modernizing it, and made a lot of Olympus tech obsolete. I'll never understand how Olympus decided to sell a camera with a sensor a fourth the size of an A7 at the same price. That said, th…

Oh boy, there is way more to photography than sensor size. Olympus was a pioner in many of that and not surpassed in some of that. They have the best IBIS, some innovative computational photography stuff and amazing weather proofing. I am glad Olympus decided to sell M43 cameras, as those are you actually take with you.

Of course there is more to photography than sensor size. But an Olympus E-MD I was more expensive than a Sony A7ii that also has very good IBIS, can adapt pretty much any lens, and also has solid computational photography abilities.

The Sigma E-MD I that actually has all of the features you're talking about was almost as big as an A7. The lenses were smaller, but if you don't mind horrible apertures that you have to get on M4/3 you can also have very small and light lenses. Even moreso if you go APS-C.

The lens system also has huge pricing issues. The f2.0 zoom on M4/3 is equivalent to the kit lens on a Sony A7ii. That's a ten times price reduction! My A7 with a pancake lens is small enough that I can actually slip it into my pocket (!)

Compromising image quality for portability at such an extreme extent is not a good idea when smartphone are so plentiful. If sensor size and optics doesn't really matter, then why not take pictures on your phone? They have amazing IBIS, innovative computational photography, and so on.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#365

Post by sudosysgen »

foldr wrote: post #324
sudosysgen wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

35mm film already affords you the very maximum in light gathering and blur, though. The kit lens used to be 50 1.8 or 1.4, which really is pretty much the amount of background blur people are looking for today. You didn't complain about lack of aperture or blur because you already had what people today are looking for. Even medium format and large format had pretty much the same amount of background blur and low-ligh…

Yes, but the point is that people rarely if ever used that level of background blur, as it wasn't trendy to, e.g., take portraits where only one eyelash is in focus.

Really? Because even really old portraits had huge amounts of background blur: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/aU4oh69TPgC0JrujNVvk... for example.

Now of course, it wasn't trendy to take portraits with only one eyelash in focus, but the vast majority of people even on FF don't do that. On my 50 1.4 (a lens made for film cameras, btw) if you want to take a picture with such an extreme amount of blur you need to have your subject quite close to you. And there is virtually no one with a lens faster than f/1.4 nowadays.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#366

Post by lm28469 »

Polylactic_acid wrote: post #227
cialowicz wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue that cameras don't really ever go obsolete, given the artistic nature of photography (as long as you can get the image out of the camera and onto a medium). Any great photo that you've ever admired was take on either previous or current generation gear.

In my eyes a camera is obsolete as soon as the average phone can take a photo as good. My parents got a $300 sony camera recently but other than zoom, I just can't see why you would carry it around when your phone takes the same photo.

15 years old camera with 50 years old glass: https://i.imgur.com/lcVh2dc.jpg

Pixel 3: https://i.imgur.com/Tl9Qjhj.jpg

Phones are good snapshoters but for everything else a dedicated camera will be superior in every way besides size.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#367

Post by ksk »

coldtea wrote: post #311
ksk wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think its quite accurate to say Canon sensors hold anyone back. Canon photographers continue to win awards, continue to create world-class images, etc, etc. Canon gear is very well represented in the professional photography community. They wouldn't be using the gear if they couldn't get their work done. There are several gear "measurebators" online arguing about base ISO DR and +6EV exposure recovery, who pr…

> I don't think its quite accurate to say Canon sensors hold anyone back. Canon photographers continue to win awards, continue to create world-class images, etc, etc. Canon gear is very well represented in the professional photography community. I don't think photography is where the concern lies these days. All medium/flagship cameras from major brands today are more than good enough for photography, commercial, spo…

Agree. Even with video we're spoiled with tech to the point where it takes hundreds of YouTube channels to explain what the heck the tech does and how to best use it. Reminds of a quote - "We are not limited by our tools, just by our imagination". On a related note, I recently re-watched the original Jurassic Park, and the movie quality still blows me away.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#368

Post by ksk »

arghwhat wrote: post #345
sudosysgen wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sony does make DPAF capable sensors for phones, but for some reason (probably IP!) they don't use them on their FF cameras.

The wonderful world of patents. On an unrelated note, I do believe that Canon has also pulled a patent on quad-pixel AF. Patents being awful aside, quad-pixel AF would be awesome: every pixel becomes a cross-type focus sensor. (For the uninitiated, focus sensors are usually either horizontal or vertical, and cannot detect features that are perpendicular to them. Cross-type sensors are a combination of the two to incr…

Not disagreeing, but just to counter your point a bit, the Sony A9 has zero cross type sensors, but it has the best on-sensor PDAF system currently on the market. Conceptually, I totally agree with you that cross type sensors are BETTER than non cross type sensors, and dual cross-type are even BETTER, but its rarely as simple as that in the real world.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#369

Post by centimeter »

notJim wrote: post #218
centimeter wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not as simple as "FF has lower noise". There's a reasonable argument that once you factor in everything, most sensor size differences come out in the wash. In the case of low-light performance, you have situations like: APS-C + 35mm f/1.4 ~ FF + 50mm f/2. Yeah, you need a larger aperture in f-stop terms for equivalent optical properties, but the cost of that is probably offset by the cost of APS-C lenses being o…

I am already stacking the shots, as are the photographers I'm comparing to. It is also objectively true that noise is lower on FF cameras, specifically at higher ISO. You can see many comparisons of this online. The A7sii has larger pixels that gather more light compared to either the A7rii or an APS-C sensor.

> It is also objectively true that noise is lower on FF cameras, specifically at higher ISO.

This is a meaningless statement - there are too many free variables you’re ignoring.

How large the pixels are is not all that relevant for how much light can be gathered - the actual physical constraint is (the angle subtended by the sensor & lens * physical aperture diameter)^2.

Re: Olympus quits camera business after 84 years

#370

Post by makapuf »

sudosysgen wrote: post #314
killjoywashere wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are sensor fabs functionally similar enough to CPU fabs that if China tried to take back Taiwan, or just made it hard for Taiwan to ship chips to the West, the Japanese sensor fabs could retool for chips?

Absolutely not. The lithographies, processes, and packages are completely different. Some sensors are still made on 300nm processes, useless for modern CPUs. 45 nm is considered cutting edge for imaging sensors, but would be a huge setback for computing. Intel, GlobalFoundries and even IBM fabs would be much better.

Sure. But in th he grand scheme of things 45nm is intel core2quads Q9400. My main pc has this cpu and the only thing I miss is not enough ram.
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