OLYMPUS selling off camera division

Sad really.

Compare the R5 to the EM1 MK3...

The Olympus is 60 FPS RAW in electronic shutter on the R5, top electronic shutter speed of 1/32000 electronic and 1/8000 mechanical, vs 1/8000 on the R5...CD and PD AF that also tracks and can recognise objects like a car or animals, a stills buffer recording so you can take a chosen number of photos from just before you push the button, or just before and just after, I’m certain it will have better weatherproofing and better IS...ultra sonic sensor cleaning every time you start the camera ( I have never cleaned an Oly sensor in 10 years)....It’s about 1/3 lighter and half the price...

Yes the R5 does 8192 x 5164 Vs 5184 x 3888 but it can do hand held and tripod based sensor shift images to create larger MP shots and has probably got a better performance in really low light, but I do think Oly have always been seriously under rated....

JB
 
Olympus is as much a victim of their own doing as of the cartel and as of history and the technology.
 
Olympus is as much a victim of their own doing as of the cartel and as of history and the technology.

It does seem that the company guys did the right things and made some innovating class-leading products. As I said, it’s sad that the hot new stills camera from Canon is spanked by many of the features in the EM1, despite the fact that Olympus must have about 1/10th the development spend of Canon....

I’m still hopeful some of my friends in Japan will be able to keep doing their good work.

JB
 
Remember this little gem?


Wow that’s from a while ago....

That was the first result of my “official” relationship with Olympus. About a year before that camera was launched Olympus got in touch and asked me to consult on a new project that would turn out to be this camera.

This was the first 24 FPS shooting camera that Olympus had made. For years I’d been sending emails begging them to just add 24 FPS...!!

Olympus have always been very conservative with their video functions. It’s a shame because it would have opened more users up to their system, but I think they also are very loyalty to their existing STILLS user base that value the smaller size and more singular design thinking.

I’ve been saying 10 bit since then too !

JB
 
I’m still hopeful some of my friends in Japan will be able to keep doing their good work.

JB
The entire industry is suffering. The rumor mill is trying to predict the next domino to fall. And, if some thought the demise of Olympus was bad, wait till it happens to someone like Nikon. At some point, even Mitsubishi won't be able to sustain these losses. And Panasonic doesn't care much either way. It's a drop in the bucket in Osaka. They can go too.

And then it's Sony and Canon by default.
 
was that vimeo link film shot on an olympus?

if so, which camera?

btw: a lovely piece of work.

thumbs up.

stay well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc
 
was that vimeo link film shot on an olympus?

if so, which camera?

btw: a lovely piece of work.

thumbs up.

stay well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc

Hi Rob,

Yeah I shot it a few years ago on the EM5 MK2.

I wrote a very long piece about it here, also with some BTS ALSO some IS tests at the end that are really cool and I’d forgotten I’d done. Even back then Olympus were always way ahead on IS.....

https://vimeo.com/118769936


https://johnbrawley.wordpress.com/2015/02/01/olympus-comes-in-from-the-filmmaking-wilderness/


JB
 
Yet they claim that the problem is that they're not colluding enough:

"Digital camera companies intend to strangle their rivals through excessive competition, but in the end they'll strangle themselves"
 
That spiel was from a decade ago.

And, as I had mentioned, Nikon ain't doing too hot either.
 
All signs point to more companies exiting the space and then the survivors slowing the product refresh cycle way down. Which is ok (the slower refresh I mean, not the people losing jobs)
 
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All signs point to more companies exiting the space and then the survivors slowing the product refresh cycle way down. Which is ok
They have a united "development" cycle already. Which is why BMD just released an 80 MPX s35 camera and Sony can't get above 61 in full frame.
 
Yeah but they come out with new cameras every 1-2 years. They could probably keep costs down by making that every 5 years instead. Dunno
 
Just to dip into the same old analogy - the smartphone market is not only competitive but huge competitive and .... well, just huge. And, in that huge competitive market, Samsung's 108 MPX smartphone sensor is 70mm2 in size. An APS-C/s35 is ~ 350mm2-450mm2 or 5-6.5 times greater. Consequently, in stills where the highest resolution is required in some applications- regardless of whether a particular lens can do the job - 500 MPX could be achievable today. Instead, the cartel is endowing the consumer with 24-26 MPX while 80 MPX seems like a leap for all mankind.

In a fully competitive market, there would be all sorts of specs between different manufacturers and the current market leaders would be far outperforming the Sony led cartel.

In terms of the overall economics, the cartel does keep the profit margins for the individual models but that approach ignores that the photo-video market is being destroyed by the smartphones.

This quote from the article is ripe for the anti-trust investigation. It's promoting cartels as the solution.

"Digital camera companies intend to strangle their rivals through excessive competition, but in the end they'll strangle themselves," Hiroshi Hamada lamented about 11 years ago."

It's also economically ignorant. But par for the course in a very protective Japan.
 
Your view of image quality is curiously, stubbornly one-dimensional.

It's called "market supply and demand". Some like Sigma Foveon; others love Leica, others still love film. A friend of mine just bought a Fuji APS-C with a fixed mount prime. But the bulk of the market is different than its outliers. And the smartphone industry shows that clearly.
 
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