"Bandicoot" wrote in message ...

No. Roland is correct - logic should tell you that, rally, apart from
anything else. The only cameras that get away with leaf shutters in the
bodies (Pentax Auto110, for example) do so by having specially designed
lenses that effectively have a node where the shutter is.

Maybe this is the case with the Auto110. Actually there have been
quite a couple of cameras with standard design lenses and leaf
shutters on the body. In the 50s and early 60s there were quite a few
rangefinder cameras with shutters in the body but the lenses did not
have a special design. Some cheap rangefinders like the Konica C35
have behind-the-lens shutters, and their lenses are standard Tessar
designs where both nodal planes are INSIDE the lens. The Vito B camera
made by Voigtlaender in the 50s also has a behind-the-lens shutter,
and the lens is the same Skopar (Tessar) design as used on many other
cameras of that brand.

That is correct - though lightness is also a factor, and some see having a
shutter in each lens as a reliability issue: if one breaks at least you can
go on using the other lenses.

But that's not the main reason behind it. The first reason is that
placing the shutter in the nodal plane is the best place concerning
vignetting etc, as already mentioned. Another reason is that you would
need quite a big leaf shutter to be able to mount powerful lenses with
longer focal length. On most leaf shutter cameras with interchangeable
lenses, the range was restricted to f/4 135mm lenses or so - no longer
and no more powerful lenses. If you compare a 135mm lens for a Kowa
leaf shutter SLR to a 135mm focal plane lens design you can easily see
which compromises the designers had to make to get the light through
the (rather small) shutter opening. In the nodal plane, the cone of
light rays has the smallest diameter, and a shutter placed in the
nodal plane can be much smaller (and requires much less compromises in
lens design) than a leaf shutter on the body.

Winfried