On Wed, Sep 22, 2010 at 02:53:41PM -0400, Eric Weir wrote: > > On Sep 22, 2010, at 1:50 PM, David J Brooks wrote: > > > . . . PZ . . . > > You forgot, David. I'm a novice. REALLY a novice. Never encountered "PZ" > before. What is it? Is it on Stan Halpin's list?
Power Zoom. A feature (or gimmick) that came out on one series of camera bodies (the PZ-10/20/1) and some of the FA and FA* lenses. Basically there is a motor in the lens that can operate the zoom, so instead of rotating the zoom collar to directly zoom the lens it becomes a multi-position spring-loaded switch that zooms at different speeds depending on how far you twist it. It's handy on long-focal-length zoom lenses, but it's not a feature that would make me decide for or against any lens. There were also a couple of trick modes, and an automatic zoom of the lens to the most compact setting at power off. I think I used one of the trick modes (zooming to maintain a constant image size as the subject distance changed) on a couple of occasions; as best I can recall I never used the "zoom during long exposure" at all. The most persistent legacy of the PZ lenses is the power contacts on the mount to power the in-lens motor; the same contacts are now used to provide power for the SDM lenses. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
