yes, there are conditions where using ultrawides or in low contrast or
lighting situations where focusing becomes more problematic ;-) The early
ME-F and F3-AF you cited are probably examples of the simplest sensors and
electronics, as they were for the early systems (but performance may not
be as good as currently possible?). At worst, it might be feasible to take
a P&S and use the electronics modules from them. Sadly, I don't have
access to camera repair tech magazines, so I don't have the direct info I
would need to scope out which modules would be the simplest to modify/use?

You don't have to use on-axis light or the center point; the old vivitar
AF lenses (200mm f/3.5 AF) provided autofocus using internal electronics
and motors and batteries in the lens, not the camera body. They used off
axis lighting to do the AF sensing.

But yes, it would be interesting to see if there is a simple module such
as those for Nikon I cited (not so simple, as they use multi-sensor points
etc.), which could be easily adapted to a chimney finder or prism module.
Just power and LEDs, ignore the motor control outputs etc.?

Then again, if I wait a bit, perhaps Kiev folks will come out with this
kind of prism too - they just delivered on the spotmeter variant ;-)

grins bobm
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* Robert Monaghan POB 752182 Southern Methodist Univ. Dallas Tx 75275 *
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