JustAnEngineer wrote:Canon has sold over 60 million EF lenses in the past 25 years. Every one of them is fully-functional with even the cheapest Canon DSLR. Nikon is still gradually converting their lens lineup to electronic auto-focusing AF-S lenses. They've only been at it for the past 3 decades.
That's also a downside. Many of the lenses in their current range have not been updated in over 20 years, and they show up poorly in the digital age.
The Olympus 4/3 telephoto lenses should be fully-functional with the correct micro-4/3 adapter. There wouldn't be much weight or size advantage to designing a telephoto lens for the smaller image circle like there is for wide-angle lenses, which can be much smaller and lighter than the same lenses designed for larger sensors. The few reviews that I read of the 70-300mm lens were very favorable. With the micro-4/3 crop factor, 300mm is a powerful super-telephoto. As long as there is plenty of light, it should reach waaaay out there.
There may not be as
much advantage in telephoto lenses, but don't forget that you don't need as long a focal length to reach the same FOV. Case in point the Oly 14-35/2 and the 35-100/2, which are a full stop faster than equivalent FF DSLR lenses (unfortunately, they also cost up to twice as much as the EF equivalents. Yeowch!). There are advantages to waiting for m43 equivalents, though. Many of the 4/3 lenses are not optimized for CDAF, and the m43 equivalents are smaller yet because Oly had a telecentricity mandate for 4/3 which is no longer necessary, meaning designs can be simpler and more compact.
m43's greatest weakness is in the sensor. Panasonic (the sole sensor supplier) really needs to up its game to keep up with Sony's latest crop of APS-C sensors. Unfortunately, m43 is a much smaller market and has smaller economies of scale, so the difference in performance between a, say, GH2 and a D7000 are greater than you'd expect from the ~60% greater recording surface area on APS-C. Yet most m43 cameras are stll using an even older sensor. Right now the GH2 and AG-AF100 are among the two best solutions for HD video, but that is a niche application and not enough to carry the format among photographers, IMO. And if they rest on their laurels, Canon, Nikon and Sony will surely catch up.
As far as lenses go, m43 is looking pretty good. It has the best legacy lens compatibility among the major formats, and with Schneider, Zeiss, Cosina-Voigtlander and Sigma all signing on to make m43-compatible lenses (the CV 25/0.95 was successful enough to completely sell out its first production run), it's got a promising lens lineup. What they really need to work on now is the sensor.
Wind, Sand and Stars.
