On Thu, Oct 12, 2006 at 11:22:25AM -0700, Shel Belinkoff wrote: > > Were you to read my post you'd note that a number of new features have been > added to lenses and the camera since the advent of the K-mount in 1975. > IMO, there's just so much that poor little ol' lens mount is capable of > dealing with. Perhaps the mount is reaching the limits of what it can be > called upon to do.
I don't think so, Shel - I suspect any new refinements to the K-mount will be digital, not mechanical. From a mechanical standpoint I think the full KAF2 mount, with all the mechanical aperture couplings, the digital signal pin, and the power contacts is as complex as it gets. So in other words I don't think the aperture simulator coupling was removed for purely mechanical reasons to do with the mount. Either it was a marketing-driven conspiracy solely for the purpose of making us buy new lenses, or it was a cost-cutting measure (and not just in the cost of the materials and manufacture; any design simplification saves money in testing, repair and education as well). My guess would be that we'll begin to see new lenses that communicate far more information over the digital signal pin (such as, say, the actual aperture the lens is set to; far more accurate than relying on the position of a mechanical actuator). After that, and in-lens motors for focussing, maybe we'll even see lenses with some other features implemented internally; perhaps an in-lens motor to drive the aperture diaphragm; perhaps even an in-lens shutter mechanism. Not just a leaf shutter, either; perhaps we'll see some electronic device that can switch between opaque and transparent very fast (or even translucent - a sort of electronically-controlled ND filter). Of course if Pentax do introduce electronic aperture control then we know what will happen 25 years from now when they eventually stop supporting mechanically-actuated iris diaphragms :-) -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
