Fuji president: We didn’t want to buy Leica, but we wanted Olympus…and are ready to fight Alzheimer!

The prestigious German journal “Frankfurter Allgemeine” posted a full interview with Fuji president Komori. I translated the most important parts of the Interview for you:
1) We were considering the acquisition of Leica but it didn’t fit within our strategy.
2) We were ready to buy Olympus (yes he uses the past “were” and not the present “are”!). We made an offer to Olympus but I think Olympus is trying to remain independent.
3) Only 1% of our company earnings are made through classic film sales.
4) Komori also talks a lot about the med business: “we are developing a new drug against Alzheimer”. And the film knowledge they have is very useful for the cosmetics industry. The antioxidants we use on films do also work on the human skin!

The overall impression I got from the interview is that Fuji is one of the few Japanese companies that is not in a deep crisis (like Sony, Panasonic or Olympus for example). They are heavily investing in research and at the same time they are enlarging their business on more profitable areas like medicine and cosmetics. That’s why they are more interested in an Olympus partnership than a Leica acquisition. And I think that is indeed an intelligent way of thinking business. There wasn’t a lot of talk about the digital camera strategy but I have a positive feeling about the company and their digital camera future!

via Systemkameraforum.

Impossible may be possible? Nikon f/0.7 lens patent for the Nikon 1 system.

The Japanese blog Egami (Click here) spotted a new Nikon patents containing a couple of new Nikon 1 lens specs. We have the 10mm f/2.8, the 32mm f/1.2 and the 7-13mm f/3.5-5.6 lens. But the patent discloses a surprise….drumming….Nikon unveils that lenses up to f/0.7 aperture are possible! Of course this is a patent and you know well that 90% of the stuff they describe will never become real. And honestly don’t know how much sense a lens like this would make. Anyway, I know of one lens, the Zeiss Planar 50mm f/0.7 used by Stanley Kubrick (more here on Wikipedia). And at f/0.75 aperture you can find plenty of lenses on [shoplink ‘f 0.75 lens’ ebay]eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].

So is the impossible…possible?

Mirrorless news roundup…(G1X, K-01, E-M5, X PRO1, NEX-7)


50mm prime battle at 3Dkraft.

There are so many new mirrorless camera reviews it’s time for a roundup!

E-M5 at EosHD, Cnet US, Camerazealot, DCresource, Macworld, Trustedreview, Photoreview Australia
X PRO 1 at Cameralabs, Gianni Galassi, Soundimagesplus,Fujifilmpro.livejournal.
NEX-7 at ThePhoBlographer.
NEX-FS100 at Philip Bloom.
Canon G1X at Imaging Resource.
Pentax K-01 at Focusmedia.
Panasonic 12-35mm lens at Camerastuffreview, Photographyblog, ePhotozine, SLRgear and DSLRmagazine.
50mm prime battle at 3Dkraft.

On the rumors front we have the quite time before the Canon storm :)  No leaks at Canonrumors or Canonwatch yet. There will be soon news on the Samyang and Sony front (New NEX-F5!).

The next coming mirrroless lenses: Sony pancake, Olympus macro and Panasonic X lens and more…

This has been a busy week with two new lens releases, the Olympus 75mm and the Panasonic 12-35mm X lens. But more lenses are going to be announced within the next weeks and months. Finally Sony will release a new NEX lens and it will be the 16-50mm f/3,5-5,6 OSS G pancake(!) zoom! Coming in June. Olympus 60mm f/2.8 macro is also due for this summer and the Panasonic 35-100mm f/2.8 X lens is rumored to be priced around $1,600. It will be announce din late August.

And according to our sources also Samyang and one more company are ready to launch new mirrorless lenses in June. So it’s going to be a nice lens time while we expect Canon and Panasonic only to launch a new camera too!

Olympus announces the new 75mm f/1.8 lens. Fuji the new M mount adapter!

UPDATE: You can right now preorder the lens at Amazon (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).

Today Olympus announced the new 75mm f/1.8 lens ($899). You can read all about the lens at Dpreview, Systemkameraforum (german), Full Lens PDF at Olympus Australia and Image samples at Olympus Japan. A great but also a bit expensive lens (compared to the 45mm f/1.8).

And Fuji just released the new M mount adapter you can already preorder at Adorama (Click here).

What’s coming next are 1) Panasonic G5 announcement 2) Samyang X lens announcement and 3) Canon announcement. Stay tuned!

Rumors from India: Canon with Four Thirds sized sensor and Nikon V1 modern look!

Rumors about the Canon mirrorless camera are getting stronger. Sources from IndianTimes at MirrorlessRumors and Canonwatch wrote that Canon will go Nikon’s way with their new mirrorless camera design. The camera will have a modern look and remind in many ways the Nikon V1 (picture on top of this post). The Canon will in no way remind any past design and not go the same route of the Fuji X PRO 1 (rangefinder style) or the Olympus E-M5 (DSRL alike design). But unlike Nikon Canon will use a large Four Thirds sized sensor like the one used for the GX1.

Canon announcement is scheduled for June. So stay tuned! As I told you yesterday there is a lot of new stuff coming soon!

P.S.: Nikon 1 is getting some nice deals and climing the sales ranking at Amazon (Click here).