Development of Compact Lenses for Micro Four-Thirds System

In 2010, "The micro SLR Olympus PEN" of Micro Four Thirds standard won double titles of CAMERA GRAND PRIX .The characteristics of Olympus PEN series are high-quality, compact, lightweight, no feeling of burden/stress and easy to take both still images and movies by SLR quality. Especially, the consciousness of compact and lightweight is taken into the series’ entire system including the body and interchangeable lenses. We have developed the interchangeable lenses by aiming ultimate miniaturization for optical and lens-barrel design along with making the miniaturizing compliance of Micro Four Thirds standard useful. In order to create compact and lightweight interchangeable lenses, a number of technical difficulties, such as realization of thinner design by adapting lens-barrel retraction system, lens-barrel with a high degree of accuracy, quick and silent AF, adaptation of special lenses, thorough trimming of weight, had to be overcome in the developmental process. Here we refer to these miniaturization technologies.