sangsara.net

A couple of developments in the photography world caught my eye this week.

Olympus is apparently giving up on their camera business and looking to sell it off, which is not entirely unexpected, but still staggering news. Perhaps it’ll find new owners willing to make their products authentically, or at least have their IP absorbed into another Japanese camera maker’s portfolio. The worst outcome would be for it to go to a licensing outfit that will churn out unrelated nostalgia merchandise or even more mediocre cameras than they’ve put out themselves lately. I can’t help but fear Ricoh-Pentax will be next.

Update: It seems one Japan Industrial Partners will buy Olympus over, like they did Sony’s VAIO business at one point, and “continue to offer high-quality, highly reliable products; and also continue to provide supports to the imaging solution products that have been distributed by Olympus.”

Sigma is adding an L-mount to three existing APS-C lenses, giving users of Leica’s CL/TL series cameras three pretty easy purchase decisions to make. These are fast prime lenses (f1.4) equivalent to 24mm, 45mm, and 84mm lengths. They’re compact, significantly lighter than their German counterparts, plus support autofocus and in-body IBIS (which no Leica APS-C camera even has yet). As the Macfilos blog notes, you can buy all three lenses for less than the price of a single 23mm f2 Summicron. I’ve been wanting the 35mm f1.4 Summilux for awhile but haven’t been able to square the bulk with the price. This Sigma model looks close enough to be a no-brainer.