from 35mm to digital with om2n

[lescrooge]

Hi all,
I have an OM2n and I'm wondering if there is a CCD back for it to turn it into a digital camera.
This would bring me back (almost)to my point'n'shoot days with my Minox 35GT.
I don't want auto anything.
All I want is digital facility.
I've been doing photography for 45 years from Pen S, EES, Trip, FT, OM2n, M4 and the 35GT.
I understand photography better than all the allsingingalldancing yangadang crap that is avaiable on the market today.
I would really appreciate if someone can help me.
TVM
Louis

[El_Sid]

As far as I know there is no digital back for any existing 35mm camera other than the Leica Digital Modul-R which fits Leica's R8 and R9 models only.

There were rumours of a digital insert (called 'Digital Film' IIRC) being developed some years back but I believe that it died a death when the price of digital SLR bodies started falling rapidly...

FWIW Oly do an adaptor that allows the use of OM lenses on E-series bodies.

[mark_jacobs]

Close it was 'Silicon Film' announced around 1999... and 2000... and 2001...

[El_Sid]

That's the bunny.........

Shame it never took off. Would have been fun to slip one into my old manual Nikons.......

[mark_jacobs]

Found it! An AP graphic that predates the change of name...



...must sort out the graphics folder

[Manofolympus]

Did the design get any further than that?

[mark_jacobs]

I think that, with captions, the illustration got further than Silicon Film and (e)film. I believe the company went bust in '01 never having brought a product to market. Three years in 'development', no LCD, cheaper digital cameras with larger sensors etc. it wasn't going to happen.

[alanS]

"I don't want auto anything."

Just a thought...Auto is not mandatory.

Buy a DSLR, set it to Manual mode, select manual focus, turn the image stabilisation off, turn the back display off, ignore the exposure meter, select the ISO, shutter speed and aperture you want, shoot RAW...and you have a manual camera.

I don't mean to be disrespectful but I just don't understand the resistance to digital because you don't want auto anything. All of the auto functions can be turned off or simply ignored. I use my camera in Manual or Aperture Priority mode and although I use auto focus and look at the exposure meter it's not the end of the world.

[beejaybee]

I don't mean to be disrespectful but I just don't understand the resistance to digital because you don't want auto anything. All of the auto functions can be turned off or simply ignored.

Yes, but it takes effort to do so, and the camera is designed to use auto modes, the manual modes are harder to use than a proper manual camera (get the thing into the right mode to adjust the aperture using the same control as the shutter speed instead of having seperate dials), and some functions are compromised by having auto available e.g. focusing rings with a ridiculuously short travel so that the AF motor can work faster.

So far as I'm concerned this is an anti-auto rant, not anti-digital. I'd love a "digital OM-1".

[alanS]

It's not hard, IMHO, my camera has separate controls for shutter and aperture control and I don't enter the menu.

There are comments about manual control from time to time and I often wonder what the problem is. You might have a plastic wheel and an LCD readout instead of an etched and knurled steel knob but I don't care.

It was just a thought, each to his own, but I'd urge the op to look at the modern DSLR's available.

[ACS]

lescrooge, I'm not a fan of auto stuff either.

I bought an E400 and stuck the kit lens in the back of the cupboard. Then I put an adaptor on it, so's it can take my OM manual lenses (28mm 3.5, 50mm 1.8, 135mm 2.8, and a Tamron 90mm SP Macro).

I shoot on aperture priority (like I do on my OM2n) and the E400 travels with my OM2n - they share the lenses. Got my head around exposure compensation and that's about it reall. You can ignore a lot of the autobabble for most of the time.