A brilliant Olympus resource ... 'Maitani Olympus'

[Keith]

I stumbled over this web site this morning while trying to find information about the battery test light on the OM-2 ... I'm sure a lot of Oly die hards know about it but it was new to me!

A great read about how the OM-2's metering system works and how it was developed ... I knew it was clever for it's time but I didn't know just how advanced it actually was ... truly amazing!

Here's the site ... http://www.maitani-fan.co.cc/index.html

And here's the article on the OM-2's metering ... http://www.maitani-fan.co.cc/maitani_fan2/om2_test_report.html

 

[Keith]

And oh yes ... I meant to mention:

There's far too much Nikon chat going on around here for my liking at the moment!

 

[pachuco]

Cool! Thanks

 

[Strangeluv]

Great link Keith.
Take a look at how they designed the XA. Very interesting reading.

 

[jarski]

Here's the site ... http://www.maitani-fan.co.cc/index.html

And here's the article on the OM-2's metering ... http://www.maitani-fan.co.cc/index.html

second link is same as first

but its good resource indeed (and am not OM fan myself, not yet! ).

heres interesting comment from Maitani about discontinuation of OM system, and comparisons to Leica:

M: Yes. In those days, Japan was economically highly growing. Then we could lower the production cost by running the plant at full speed. About sixty to seventy thousand cameras were produced per month. Now I regret that if we had hand-made industry line like the Leitz, we might be able to continue. We give up simply because we cannot maintain the big plant.

 

[Keith]

second link is same as first

but its good resource indeed (and am not OM fan myself, not yet! ).

heres interesting comment from Maitani about discontinuation of OM system, and comparisons to Leica:

Second link fixed!

Certainly some fascinating technical information even if, as you say, you're not a fan.

 

[Juan Valdenebro]

Great links, Keith! Thanks!

Cheers,

Juan

 

[Keith]

This website actually enlightened me over an issue with my recently bought OM-2 that had me a little concerned. I was firing the shutter in AE mode with the camera showing an indicated shutter speed in the viewfinder of 1/30 but the shutter was obviously firing a lot slower ... it sounded more like 1/15! This happens apparently when there is no film in the camera because the camera's metering system is reading of the pressure plate instead of the film and adjusts the shutter speed to suit the darker surface compared to film emulsion! At shutter speeds below 1/60 the metering system is reading off the film emulsion surface after the first curtain opens for better accuracy!

For practical picture taking we found the new Olympus OM-2 a delightful joy. Only once was our enjoyment sullied and that was our own fault. In clicking the shutter around the house without film (called dry firing in gun shooting parlance), we were horrified to find, at slow speeds, that our shutter speed indicator in the finder was reading 1/15 sec. while the shutter noise we heard from the camera itself was far closer to ½ or 1 sec. How could this be? Simple. When there is no film in the camera and the speed required is a long one, the sensors are forced to read the light reflected from the black pressure plate instead of film. Small wonder that the exposure increased immensely! Of course, as soon as we loaded film in the camera all was well in terms of the top indicator agreeing with the actual exposure timing.

Incredible!


Strangely my earlier silver OM-2 doesn't seem to exhibit this behaviour and it also has a different matrix pattern of white dots on the first curtain. If John Hermanson is reading this thread I would love some info about the changes there may have been in the OM-2's during their manufacture period ... also how do you tell the difference between an OM-2 and an 0M-2N?