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[OM] OM non-obsolescence?

Subject: [OM] OM non-obsolescence?
From: William Sommerwerck <williams@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 24 Sep 1998 20:03:59 -0700
"When you change designs frequently for marketing purposes, then you may
not have the time to bring out every lens for that camera. Later on when
a particular new lens design becomes "hot", say like a 35-80/2.8, you
can use it on your camera if it is a new, current Canon, Nikon whatever,
but not on your older F1, F2, whatever. On an OM you can. When you
prefer an older design lens like a 135 which is no longer "hot", if you
have a new Oly competitor you can't always get a current 135 design and
have to settle for an older one that while "interchangeable" functions
completely differently than your other lenses on your new camera.

One wonders whether Oly has not decided that their method is a superior
way to develop an in-depth system for a camera which is so elegant in
providing the essentials for good photography that it does not need
frequent "improvements"."


These remarks are not wholly correct, and don't make much sense, either.

The Nikon F was the first "modern" 35mm SLR. * It was introduced in
1958, and set the standard for "system" SLRs. The remarkable thing about
the Nikon F is that almost any Nikkor lens ever made can be used on any
Nikon camera, including the F5. It won't have all the modern features
(of course), but it _fits_ and the auto-diaphragm works. (I'm not sure
if the older lenses with the external coupling prong can be modified to
provide full-aperture metering on the newer cameras. Someone please fill
me in on this.)

This is simply _incredible_ for a 40-year-old camera system. NO OTHER
SLR has kept this degree of compatibility. Everyone else -- except
Olympus -- either went out of business or made substantial changes to
their lens mount.

The continued compatibility of the Nikon lenses is no accident. Nikon
surely knew what it was doing when it gave the lenses an oversized mount
and the aperture-coupling pin.

As for Olympus... The OM System (or more specifically, the lenses)
remain "compatible" precisely because Olympus _has not_ updated it. By
_not_ producing an autofocus camera **, Olympus has "protected" the
investment of those of us who own a sustantial number of Zuiko lenses.

It is therefore ludicrous to compliment Olympus for maintaining
compatibility, when that stability is largely due to the fact that the
system hasn't been updated in a decade! If the writer of the above
wanted an autofocus OM body, he'd be _condemning_ Olympus for their
failure to add features to the system. You can't have it both ways.

Although the OM System was an unqualified success, it never undermined
the position of Nikon or Canon, the two leading "professional" SLRs.
This mitigated against any major (ie, obsolescence-inducing) changes to
the Olympus product line, precisely because there weren't enough owners
to permit it. ***

Indeed, the true success of the OM system lies in its influence on other
camera lines. Their manufacturers recognized their cameras had become
unwieldy, and gradually made them smaller. Had they _not_ done this, no
doubt more OM cameras and lenses would have been sold, and Olympus would
have been in a better position to make substantial modifications to
their system. ****

The OM System was obviously intended to be the "SLR equivalent" of the
Leica M RF system, and at that it succeeds very well -- it's compact,
precise, and of good optical quality. It's truly unique, and really
meets the need of those photographers who want an elegant camera with
elegant features. Hopefully, it will be meeting those needs for many
years to come. (I switched from Nikon almost 25 years ago, and have
never had any good reason to regret the change.)

* The box read "fully-automatic SLR." 40 years ago, "fully-automatic"
meant that advancing the film simultaneously cocked the shutter (thus
preventing double exposures), and that the aperture opened and the
mirror flipped down _without_ having to cock the shutter.

** Yes, there _was_ an autofocus OM camera. It was awful.

*** If this isn't immediately obvious, think of it this way: if there
were, say, 10 times as many OM owners, Olympus could easily justify
introducing an autofocus body and the matching lenses, while still
continuing to manufacture manual-focus products (at least for a few
years). But there aren't, so any conversion to autofocus would require a
fairly rapid phase-out of the manual-focus products (ie, Olympus could
not profitably maintain a dual inventory). This _could_ cause the
defection of Olympus's core user group.

**** IF necessary. I agree that the OM System is _extremely_
well-thought-out. Maitani, et al., pretty much got it right the first
time. (Actually, the _second_ time. Their first full-frame 35mm SLR was
an unmitigated disaster, precisely because it was a wildly UNimaginative
"me-too" camera.)

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