FX-A and Contax 137AF: What could have been
May 12, 2021 23:01:11 GMT
on May 12, 2021 23:01:11 GMT
Last Edit: May 12, 2021 23:04:12 GMT by dalegreer
I found this online about Yashica's efforts to develop the FIRST autofocus SLR. Yes, THREE YEARS before Minolta.
Pasted from www.hi-ho.ne.jp/sbko-hq/KyoceraAF/1.html
Machine translation from Japanese:
Photokina in 1982.
A prototype of the CONTAX 137MD-based AF single-lens reflex camera, which is sometimes called "CONTAX 137AF", has been released and has been a big hit.
However, the "CONTAX AF", which has a lineup of AF Planar 50mm f: 1.7, AF Distagon 35mm f: 2.8, and AF Sonnar 135mm f: 2.8, was never commercialized after that and never appeared as a commercial product.
The main reason is that some lenses become too huge to make AF lenses designed for MF. It seems that most of them could be converted to AF with the specifications at that time, but since it was around the time when the man-hours for changing the design of the focusing mechanism and the market size of AF single-lens reflex cameras could not be read, there was a risk to Yashica, which was difficult to manage at that time. It seems that it was too big. Minolta's patent dispute, which was dragged even after Kyocera (the merger of Kyocera and Yashica was in October 1983, the year after the announcement of "CONTAX AF"), may have been a drag.
At that time, Yashica didn't have much money to compete with (actually, CONTAX AF, which left the company at the time of the merger with Kyocera, and some engineers who developed YASHICA FX-A transferred to Canon and moved to EOS. It is said that it was developed. At least, it has been confirmed that a person who developed a finder with a super-impose type focusing indicator, which is also a feature of CONTAX AF and FX- A, came to Canon later).
However, the reason why the lens becomes huge, and when you look at the current N system, it's just stupid that makes you want to say "Why isn't it?" The N system zoom lens (especially wide-angle lens) is huge.
This is a problem not only with Zeiss T *, but also with Nikon, Canon, lens makers such as Sigma and Tamron, and everywhere with large-diameter wide-angle zooms.
Why did this matter? Considering the current situation, it sounds like a fool, but how was it at that time? However, as if contrary to that, the AF lens made by Kyocera was very compact at that time, and the 35-70mm Macro etc. was the same size as the 50mm lens of MF.
After that, about 10 years later, the "CONTAX AX", which has an amazing back focusing mechanism that turns the MF lens into AF, has already disappeared from the lineup. AX isn't bad either, but it's sad that there's only one option. Then, if you try to use an MF Zeiss T * lens with AF, you will end up with the Kyocera / YASHICA AF system.
After a lot of research, I found that the Kyocera AF system had 14 lenses in total (and 15 lenses after that). Most of the Kyocera AF lenses are made by Kyocera Optec (formerly Tomioka Optics) like the Zeiss T * made in Japan, and I came up with the easy idea that all 14 lenses would be collected (actually, it was difficult and I haven't achieved it yet. Hmm: In January 2003, I managed to get all the lenses, but the hood (^^ .... I discovered the 16th lens after that, and I'm still here ... The head family, CONTAX, is gone. I haven't done it ... 2005/10/05).
So, this site was originally intended to start as "Kyocera AF Lens World" with the parody of the PR book "ZEISS T * Lens World" published by Yashica in mind, but when I started collecting it, the name of the body I learned that there are variations and variations, and that there is also a YASHICA / CONTAX mount MF system that was born based on the AF system, so I decided to introduce all of them anyway.
//end quote
Pasted from www.hi-ho.ne.jp/sbko-hq/KyoceraAF/1.html
Machine translation from Japanese:
Photokina in 1982.
A prototype of the CONTAX 137MD-based AF single-lens reflex camera, which is sometimes called "CONTAX 137AF", has been released and has been a big hit.
However, the "CONTAX AF", which has a lineup of AF Planar 50mm f: 1.7, AF Distagon 35mm f: 2.8, and AF Sonnar 135mm f: 2.8, was never commercialized after that and never appeared as a commercial product.
The main reason is that some lenses become too huge to make AF lenses designed for MF. It seems that most of them could be converted to AF with the specifications at that time, but since it was around the time when the man-hours for changing the design of the focusing mechanism and the market size of AF single-lens reflex cameras could not be read, there was a risk to Yashica, which was difficult to manage at that time. It seems that it was too big. Minolta's patent dispute, which was dragged even after Kyocera (the merger of Kyocera and Yashica was in October 1983, the year after the announcement of "CONTAX AF"), may have been a drag.
At that time, Yashica didn't have much money to compete with (actually, CONTAX AF, which left the company at the time of the merger with Kyocera, and some engineers who developed YASHICA FX-A transferred to Canon and moved to EOS. It is said that it was developed. At least, it has been confirmed that a person who developed a finder with a super-impose type focusing indicator, which is also a feature of CONTAX AF and FX- A, came to Canon later).
However, the reason why the lens becomes huge, and when you look at the current N system, it's just stupid that makes you want to say "Why isn't it?" The N system zoom lens (especially wide-angle lens) is huge.
This is a problem not only with Zeiss T *, but also with Nikon, Canon, lens makers such as Sigma and Tamron, and everywhere with large-diameter wide-angle zooms.
Why did this matter? Considering the current situation, it sounds like a fool, but how was it at that time? However, as if contrary to that, the AF lens made by Kyocera was very compact at that time, and the 35-70mm Macro etc. was the same size as the 50mm lens of MF.
After that, about 10 years later, the "CONTAX AX", which has an amazing back focusing mechanism that turns the MF lens into AF, has already disappeared from the lineup. AX isn't bad either, but it's sad that there's only one option. Then, if you try to use an MF Zeiss T * lens with AF, you will end up with the Kyocera / YASHICA AF system.
After a lot of research, I found that the Kyocera AF system had 14 lenses in total (and 15 lenses after that). Most of the Kyocera AF lenses are made by Kyocera Optec (formerly Tomioka Optics) like the Zeiss T * made in Japan, and I came up with the easy idea that all 14 lenses would be collected (actually, it was difficult and I haven't achieved it yet. Hmm: In January 2003, I managed to get all the lenses, but the hood (^^ .... I discovered the 16th lens after that, and I'm still here ... The head family, CONTAX, is gone. I haven't done it ... 2005/10/05).
So, this site was originally intended to start as "Kyocera AF Lens World" with the parody of the PR book "ZEISS T * Lens World" published by Yashica in mind, but when I started collecting it, the name of the body I learned that there are variations and variations, and that there is also a YASHICA / CONTAX mount MF system that was born based on the AF system, so I decided to introduce all of them anyway.
//end quote