Originally Posted by rparmar
However, consider someone looking for a rangefinder replacement for street shooting, or a portable landscape kit you can haul up a mountain. They wouldn't care about these limitations at all. Simply manual focus to the hyperfocal distance and you're done.
Olympus should include a built-in hyperfocal focus mechanism. For that matter Pentax should too, in their next camera. Can you imagine a body that automatically keeps as much of the image in focus as possible? There is no reason why it cannot be done with existing technology.
Just a lack of photographic imagination, IMO.
1. Mirror box and optical finder isn't that big. Look at a Pentax ME or an Olympus e410. Good enough for compact landscape kit! It only make sense if you want something strictly pocketable. An electronic viewfinder, is a answer to a problem that doesn't exist. Optical viewfinder will be here for all eternity bacuse it is the obvious and best solution there is with small size/weight penalty.
2. Built in hyperfocal distance auto doesn't work as the hyperfocal point depends of the size of the end results. Thas why only Canon have done it (and abandoning it I think).