Five new companies join MFT!
Olympus Japan officially announced that five new companies joined the Micro Four Thirds system: Blackmagic Design Ltd, JK Imaging Ltd, Photron Ltd, SVS-VISTEK GmbH, View Plus Inc.
Of course the most known company here is Blackmagic that already released a videocamera with MFT mount (here). Another company that grabbed our attention last week is JK Imaging that will release a Kodak branded MFT camera by end of this year. Than we have Photron a Japanese High Speed camera maker. SVS-Vistek is a German develops cameras for the industry. And to finish View Plus is also a camera maker from Japan.
Renze
5 months ago |Woohoo! Kudos for the new standard! Away with can ikon and nextonothing!
Anonymous
5 months ago |m43 is here to stay – at least for a while.
this is not “just a mount”, or one camera maker’s system – it’s becoming a bit of a standard.
PanOly came up with a smart compromise: sensor size, flange distance, built around fulltime liveview, software lens correction (yes I see that as a positive) – a more simple optical path, no mirror so less mechanics and more electronics, which can be improved upon constantly.
All go hand in hand in making a more compact, high quality system that is very up to date – with room for growth and improvement.
I wont call it futureproof – but it has good cards for being around for some time. (let the trolls jump in NOW!)
Anonymous
5 months ago |“SVD-Vistek is a German develops cameras for the industry”
Can someone kindly translate that?
Agent00soul
5 months ago |A German company that develops cameras for industial use
Duarte Bruno
5 months ago |Machine vision.
This has little to do with photography, but significant nonetheless.
Teun
5 months ago |They make camera’s for use in factories. To perform quality control for example. In a bottle factory for example, there will be a camera photographing each bottle. These images will be processed by software and the faulty bottles will be automatically removed. That’s one use of camera’s like the ones this company makes.
hsalonen
5 months ago |The easy picks:
Blackmagic Design Ltd – Blackmagic Cinema Camera
JK Imaging Ltd – Kodak MFT Camera (just branded Kodak)
New arrivals:
Photron Ltd – They make high speed cameras, like this one.
http://www.photron.com/index.php?cmd=product_general&product_id=37&product_name=FASTCAM+SA8&home=1
SVS-VISTEK GmbH – Machine Vision, like:
http://www.svs-vistek.com/_products/cameras/svcam/evo/evo.php
View Plus Inc – Their page has limited English info, and I don’t live with a japanese guy anymore:
http://www.viewplus.co.jp/english.html
Dummy00001
5 months ago |Thanks for the links. Some were expected – some not.
“SVS-VISTEK GmbH – Machine Vision, like:”
Industry moving to larger sensors? *But they are expensive!!!* *Surely that $0.05 sensor can do just as well!!!!!* (A not-so-funny joke, for those who ever worked in the “industrial” sector. Hint: industrial market is driven by mindless hunt for cheapness.)
valia kalda
5 months ago |Here is the best presentation i found on the ‘gang of five, but a bit on the too funny side though:
http://www.estiasis.com/story/5-new-companies-enter-micro-four-thirds-group-were-checking-them-out
What i would really like to see are some nice consumer grade stuff to officially enter the m4/3 group, like Zeiss, lensbaby, Metz, tokina, Hartblei and such. I sound like a weirdo, i know.
BdV
5 months ago |I think SVD = SVS:
http://www.svs-vistek.com/index.php
valia kalda
5 months ago |SVD is my favourite newspaper
(Swedish)
Farrukh
5 months ago |Dear Photron, Please make an affordable high speed camera I can use with my MFT lenses. Thanks
marsupial2go
5 months ago |I look forward to NAB concerning speculation of an active m43 BMCC. Nevertheless, there are many passive options already, thanks to Zeiss, SLR Magic, Voigtlander, and Nokton, and for adapters that allow lenses galore. Realizing there is a lot of hype about 4k and fullframe, it seems there is room for many formats, and there’s no guarantee that consumers will embrace 4k.
I don’t fathom how m43 can fail at this juncture, the format seems ubiquitous. What, m43 falls flat and all those cameras and lenses get dumped into the ocean? When was the last time a mount failed and what happened to all that gear? Konica in the 70s? Konica wasn’t ubiquitous, neither was Minolta and it’s still around.
Renze
5 months ago |Maybe it will happen to the Pentax Q-system…
Miroslav
5 months ago |Excellent. Now this can really happen: http://www.43rumors.com/ft4-new-blackmagic-camera-with-full-electronic-support-coming-2013/
This also mean that “Kodak” bodies will be fully supported by the lens manufacturers.
m4/3 seems to be in full swing now. The biggest thing still missing IMO is more AF lens options from third party manufacturers such as Sigma, Tamron and Cosina.
valia kalda
5 months ago |Yes, i’d like to stick my 7-14mm on a ‘Kodak” body, must be a rewarding experience
Michael Hobart
5 months ago |This is good news. Of course, just because a company joins a standards group it does not mean that they will develop products for it or even be a supporter of it. I know that sounds strange but consider that Apple was one of the original members of the Blu-Ray consortium (likely not the official name for the group). Not only has Apple never provided operating system support, but the late Steve Jobs described Blu-Ray as an atrocious standard
Kevin
5 months ago |@admin
next time to you have an interview with an Olympus representative, are you able to ask about how ‘open’ the micro four thirds standard is, i.e. can any company join or is it only if the Olympus want them to. Do members have to pay fees or royalties of any sort? If so how much? Is it the same for every company?
It would be very interesting to know the commercial arrangement behind the standard.
Dummy00001
5 months ago |@Kevin, most of the information is already available at the http://www.four-thirds.org – the 43 consortium website.
“how ‘open’ the micro four thirds standard is, i.e. can any company join or is it only if the Olympus want them to. Do members have to pay fees or royalties of any sort? If so how much? Is it the same for every company?”
43 consortium is officially open to anybody who’s willing to pay the entrance fee and the yearly membership fees. But they seem to be unwilling to allow smaller companies/start-ups in: there was a number of stories posted here over the years (IIRC SLR Magic(?) is in the position) about that. Largish, established companies had no problems joining the 43 consortium.
Teun
5 months ago |m43 is more closed than 43. Not just any manufacturer can jump in.
Dummy00001
5 months ago |m43 and 43 specs are held under the same roof – 43 consortium. Membership is on level of the consortium and members get access to the all specs. Better wording might have been that consortium became more closed since the introduction of the m43, but in the context of 5 companies joining in, that is rather trollish thing to say.
Kevin
5 months ago |@Dummy0001
I have gone through every possible page on the four thirds site and can not find a definitive statement there. If you have a direct reference please share it with me as I have been looking for quite a while!
From what I can see:
– Micro Four Thirds is not an open standard – the specification is not publicly available.
– The standard is controlled by Olympus as the trademarks and other IP are held directly by Olympus.
I would love to see the specification truly turned into an open standard.
Anonymous
5 months ago |+1 @Kevin
mFT has never been stated as an open standard, this is simply a misconception that people give it because the 4:3 was an open standard. mFT was the effort of Olympus and Panasonic, and it appears that they recognised from the start that it was a lot wiser to licence the technology if simply for the reason to control what their competition has to do in order to compete with it?
Dummy00001
5 months ago |“– Micro Four Thirds is not an open standard – the specification is not publicly available.”
It is “open” as any other industry standard. It is controlled by the 43 consortium. It in “open” in the same sense as any other industry standardization body id. One has to pay a fee to become member and gain access to the specs. One has to stay a member in order to be able to go on selling products advertised as 43/m43 compatible. And so on and so forth. Just like with any other industry consortium.
For example. ISO standards are also “freely” and “publicly” available from the ISO itself. For only $250 a pop. That’s how it works in pretty much any industry, unfortunately.
“– The standard is controlled by Olympus as the trademarks and other IP are held directly by Olympus.”
From the comments I have seen from before, the 43 consortium is effectively controlled by both Oly and Panny. (For example, most recent change to the standard to support power zooms was introduced by the Panny.) But then again, any company willing to pay the fees to become consortium member (though O&P showed to be unwilling to admit small and start-up companies) and thus gain access to the mount specs and also be allowed to use the trademarks when advertising the products. Precisely what, for example, the Sigma did. Probably they also can influence the spec, but who the heck you think I am? 43 consortium spokesperson?
Otherwise, you might be surprised to know that “LiveMOS” trademark also belongs to the Olympus – yet Oly has never ever manufactured single sensor by itself. Out of all the companies in the 43 consortium, Oly is the largest (as photography goes) and thus surely has most influence. But that is also why companies establish such 3rd party organizations: to also allow the competitors to participate.
Previously the info was available on the four-thirds.org – apparently not anymore. Now there’s only e-mail address at http://four-thirds.org/en/contact/index.html . Try to write and ask
Raist3d
4 months ago |You are mixing what a definition of open means. That is not open, period. In fact, Olympus/Panasonic can veto who joins.
Samuel Cabral
5 months ago |This means that soon we have a BlackMagic with a servo m4/3 mount?
P4INKiller
5 months ago |That would be the next logical step.
chris
5 months ago |Nice, as soon as the active M43 Blackmagic camera is out I’m buying one. I want to be able to use my fast Olympus glass and not be stuck using them wide open. This is great news, glad to see its finally materializing.
eric.stemen
5 months ago |Looking forward to a Blackmagic active mFT mount. Hopefully this will happen with them officially joining. It would be nice to have image stabilization and be able to focus the Panasonic lenses….controlling the aperture would be nice as well.
I’ve been holding off on ordering the GH3 until NAB to see if this will happen or not. I can only afford one camera and would rather it be the Blackmagic.
Anonymous
4 months ago |Look ,they are nothing without US ,.MFT user,..so please listen to our advice and complains
Crazyman
4 months ago |You realy think m43 companies really are about your complaints? Look at how long folks been waiting for a pen with a simple evf, and oly brings out that dslr looking wannabe om-d. And now, you will never see a pen with an evf because itll be basically the same cammera. Want a pen with evf? Now you have to go and buy the omd dslr wannbe.