Digitizing old 35mm SLR cameras?

Few years ago I heard there are digital camera sensors available (or coming up) which we can be "attached" to old 35mm SLR cameras. Thus we can "convert" our 35mm to a digital SLR camera.

Anybody got any idea whether this information is true ? Any companies developing it ? Thanks in advance.

Good day
~b

I should also say that I'm not really concerned about the pricing (as I'm not planning to buy). I just wanted to see whether there are any such products out there, company names etc.

It was true, but the company never could get acceptable quality to bring a product to market. The company was known as "Silicone Film", originally known as Imagek.

There were a number of impossible technical hurdles to overcome. First was the issue of film camera backs being all different. Each 35mm camera model used a different back, which meant that only a few camera models could be accomodated. Next, you have to have a way for the sensor to go active when the shutter release is tripped--which means you have to have a "data back" type system, which knows electrically when the shutter has been released.

Then, there's the issue of getting the sensor flat and aligned.

In any case, the closest the company came to getting a product to market was to announce their EFS-1 system in 2001, with only a 1.3 megapixel rating and a 2.85 multiplier for lenses! Oh, and it had a fixed ISO rating of 100 only. Bundle price--over $600.

Of course, nothing came of this effort. And these days, there's no way something like this could come into being, because digital SLRs are better options.

There isn't much point because digital SLRs are much more affordable now and come complete with things that hybrid schemes couldn't do very well, like autofocus.

It makes sense with a Hassleblad, not with a 35mm camera.

There are digital camera backs that you can buy for some medium-format cameras. Maybe this is what you heard about. For the most part, they are expensive, bulky, and the cameras have strictly manual controls. Unless you own an expensive medium-format camera with some very good lenses, you are better of buying one of the more common models of digital SLR currently being sold. Most of them have a host of automatic features, such as auto-focus, programmed exposure modes and built-in flash. You can get a very good 7 - 10 mega-pixel SLR with a lens for roughly $500 - $1000.

I remember that. A friend of mine even invested in the Silicon Film company.

There were some physical limitations to it that had to be overcome ... like cocking the shutter, readout of how many images were left on the memory (memory cards are out of the question because of other design constraints) and others.

Here is a link to some information from 2002:
http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/view_...

"Back in the day", before the major camera players invested their R&D departments heavily into the digital realm, companies made digital backs for Nikon professional SLR cameras. Kodak was one of the brands and even began rebadging some Nikon models under their own label.

These digital backs had, for that time, amazing resolution levels that today are bettered by the cheapest point & shoot camera.

With the price of digital camera bodies (Nikon D40 & Canon XTi) dropping so low, there's no call for these backs any longer. Most photographers simply move their lenses to the newer, higher resolution DSLR bodies.