Pentax K-01 Fantasies

1. Real but old:-



Via OGL @ DPR Forum back to 2006, reminded by Mirrorless Rumors recently.

2. Imagined, maybe mostly based on the above:-



Via PF Post Here.

3. Imagined too, I think:-



@ http://www.olexi.co.uk/news-updates/the-rumored-pentax-k-01-mirrorless/

4. Look Real and should be Leaked:-



Via the Chinese Xitek Forum, Credit by OGL at My Blog.

It is rumoured that the K-01 will soon be announced on Feb. 2, together with the world's thinnest APS-C prime, the 40/2.8 XS, which probably to be the kit lens of the K-01. But also mind you that the K-01 is probably the world's thickest mirrorless ILDC btw! :-o

Yet Another "About the K-01" Rumour

From DSLR Magazine @Twitter (Spanish) via Mirrorless Rumors.

From Google Translation and Quoted:-

"For the K-mount SLR like, and probably the same flange distance. No viewer!"

"The new Pentax CSC will be somewhat smaller than Kr, and is not sure-win-at once a beauty pageant."

"The new CSC will use the mount Pentax "K" classical optics compatible with their current SLR. You do not have eye-level viewfinder."

So, just believe these or not, for a K-mount, ugly and not-so-small mirrorless camera body but without a viewfinder to come! :-o

Rumour or Not: Additional Information about the K-01 and the New 40mm XS Pancake Lens and System

See what Photo Rumors reports, I guess that they have a source to the insider information.

Quoted and my own remarks, one by one as follows:-

• The camera is designed by a famous designer

Well, are those designer chairs or whatsoever always looking nice? :-o

• The new 40mm f/2.8 pancake lens is less than 1 centimeter thick and my understanding is that it will work only with the new K-01 body

It seems that the back focus register distance of the new XS lens(es) has been shorten despite that they might still use the K-mount, just like what Canon did years ago for the creation of EF-S lenses based on the original EF mount. Btw, if the new 40/2.8 Pancake is 1 cm thick, a quick comparison to the existing DA40/2.8 Limited of which the thickness is in 1.5 cm reveals that the back focus distance could be decreased by 5mm, only, which means that the new back focus distance of the "new" lens system in K-mount variant is in about 40 mm (roughly), which is not really short anyway when compared to other existing mirrorless systems on the market, but yet shorter than the original EF mount's, say for example, which should be able to adapt most of the old SLR lenses of different 135 systems.

• The Pentax K-01 and the 40mm lens are covered with some kind of rubber-like material for better grip

Not much meaningful and important for this point, frankly.

• The K-01 will have an external mic output for video recording

The K-7/K-5 had that. The most important things instead about video recording IMO should be that if AF (or at least the ability to re-focusing) will be available during video recording, and/or, the ability for manual Av/Tv/ISO adjustments for video recording, which the "latest" Pentax K-5 body lacks both or even the Pentax Q still lacks the former.

Pentax Q 02 Standard Zoom Kit to be Marketed on Feb. 16

http://dc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/news/20120126_507247.html

(In Japanese, Google English Translation Here.)

The estimated street price of the new kit is at 70k Japanese Yens, which is roughly equal to $900 US Dollars.

N.B. There has been no standard zoom single lens kit but only either standard prime single lens or standard prime + zoom dual lenses kit since the Q was first marketed and for the time being. So this seems to be the right thing to do marketing wise, although it is just a bit late IMHO.

Pentax Optio VS20 Super Zoom Compact

20X zoom lens from 28mm wide, 16 megapixels (1/2.3"?) CCD, dual shutter release buttons, one for horizontal and one for vertical shooting:-

http://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2012/01/25/pentax-introduces-optio-vs20

I am not impressed with that black on silver design which looks odd to my eyes, at least.

Focus Adjust the K-5 and Pentax AF Lenses with Live View

In this post, I am going to brief about a new method and the general procedures to calibrate (focus adjust) the AF accuracy of the (Pentax) DSLRs which are equipped with the Live View function.

Before going on, there is something to note about the Live View function (called "LV" thereafter) of those Pentax DSLRs, the aperture in the LV is controlled automatically by the camera body, in doubled f-stops per step from wide opened, according to the brightness level as metered, but NOT according to the set Av by the user nor by the camera in Program mode. Just say for example that a F1.4 Pentax prime is mounted onto the K-5, the stepping is from wide opened and then to f/2.8 and then to f5.6 and then to f/11, as brightness rises. This is different from other ILDC cameras and systems like the Sony NEX, which always stopped down to the exact set Av no matter how.

So, here we go, the following are the detailed procedures which I have designed and recommended. Read in full and strictly following these for the best results:-

1. First of all, we need to find an ideal AF target. Find something that is flat in surface, with white background and dark but coarse *irregular* patterns, which shows the highest contrasts which are easily distinguishable, like this:-



I focused on the "Kleenex" words. On the other hands, objects with coloured patterns are not recommended so as to avoid the effect of Chromatic Aberration of a lens that might exist, e.g., red colour would front focus more for some lenses.

2. Mount the camera body with the lens you want to calibrate/focus adjust on a sturdy tripod. Put it in the environment that you want it to focus correctly, e.g. at a particular subject distance and the light source you used. For the sake of standardised calibration basis at my side, I put the object at a distance at about 2 metres from the camera and used an artificial light source at about 5200K to simulate the natural daylight.

3. Turn on the Live View of the camera, do the Live View CDAF, observe the focus scale. Repeat the CDAF three times to see if focus arrives at the same position. If it is (as it usually does), note down the exact position of it, take the picture and then switch off LV. Check if the picture is correctly focused (it usually is).

N.B.1. If the lens does not have a focus scale, stick on some marks by yourself.

N.B.2. Do observe about the aperture chosen by the LV by watching through the lens from the front which is according to the brightness level as what I have briefed in the beginning. If you want the lens to be wide opened for the calibration, the lighting level is required to be turned down a bit so as to make it!

For illustration purpose, say for example, I achieved the LV CDAF focus with a perfectly sharp picture with the lens focused at this position, according to the focus scale of the lens:-



4. Go to the Custom Menu number 26 for "AF Fine Adjustment", select "Apply One" and you should see the "Unset" setting if the lens has not been calibrated before. Do note that the camera only supports Pentax lenses with an identifiable lens ID for the Pentax F series AF lenses or later.

5. Do the Phase Matching AF (PMAF) and see if it is front or back focused in comparison to what the Live View AF has determined. Do the PMAF for several times until the AF motor doesn't turn anymore.

If it is front focused, like this, key in a negative (-ve) value for the focus adjust:-



Otherwise, if it is back focused, like this, key in a positive (+ve) value instead:-



6. Key in the compensation focus adjust values by trial and errors until the PMAF completely agrees with the LV CDAF, i.e, turn on the LV mode, did the AF and then switch back to PMAF and re-do the AF, the lens focus ring should NOT turn, anymore.

So, we did it. Here are my results (for some of my Pentax AF primes). I've noted that my zoom lenses (no matter DA or FA) do not require any focus adjust before they were accurate but fast primes would require. This may be owing to the lack of a f/2.8 AF sensor in any Pentax DSLRs, including the K-5. Thus, focus adjust by individual lens is essential and crucial:-

Lens	Focus Adjust Value as Measured	Conditions
FA 28/2.8	-2	2m, 5200K, f/2.8
DA 35/2.4	0	2m, 5200K, f/2.4
FA 43/1.9	+5	2m, 5200K, f/1.9
DA 70/2.4	-5	2m, 5200K, f/2.4
FA 85/1.4	0	2m, 5200K, f/2.8
DFA 100/2.8	0	2m, 5200K, f/2.8

Good luck and happy measurebation! I hope that you would get razor sharp images with your Pentax primes (which are mostly capable of when focused correctly) after calibration with my above method! :-D One final reminder: Forget about all those "45 degree" inclined chart methods, which is not going to help you to do the job but would just create more confusions! Believe me.. The Live View will tell you the truth, really! Try it out by yourself! :-)


Related:-

Finally, I am Done! :-D

Videos: Nikon AF-SLR Manufacturing Process (for F70)

Part 1 of 2:-

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjM0MDc0MTg4.html

Part 2 of 2:-

http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjM0MDgzNDky.html

Quite interesting, although the videos are old. As seen in the videos, the camera manufactured is the F70 which belongs to the old F line of the Nikon AF SLRs, which were all made in Japan in the past.


Read Also:-

Leica Lenses Manufacturing Process

A Virtual Lens Plant!

NEX-7 Brief Hands-on Impressions

Tried it at the Sony showroom and then immediately decided to buy a K-5! ;-D

1. Not too big and heavy and is comfortable to hold.

2. Build quality is nice, body felt solid, except the flash.

2. Built-in flash is rather flimsy, especially when it is popped up or during being opened. Closed flash still has some slight play which I don't like (against what every K-5's closed tightly)!

3. Shutter lag is more noticeable than my NEX-3, i.e., double shutter actuation is indeed noticeable and can be heard.

4. Image saving requires rather long time per picture. (Unsure if it saved RAW+ but the waiting time is really rather longish!)

5. The Tri-Navi operation system and interface is difficult to use! At least I couldn't adapt to it on the first run! I hate that the selection range is long for the parameters but there is no facility and any means to reset the value and do the homing.

6. Don't have any high expectation on the EVF! No matter what it is stated on paper, it is YET an EVF! Refresh rate, dynamic range, colour rendition and accuracy are all old problems!

I didn't test on the IQ, as I only had one spare SD card with me but which I brought for use in testing my new K-5 which I wanted to buy and I did not want to take the risk of messing up the image file numbers. But anyway, after the above quick test and play, the NEX-7 was already kicked out of my wish list and in fact it is about (US)$130 dearer than a K-5.

Finally, I am Done! :-D

With the K-5, which is my 10th DSLR/ILDC ever purchased:-



No major problem as tested and used for two days, except a big dot of dust inside the focusing screen that is visible from the finder, which I believe is a gift from the factory. AF seems to be fairly accurate under both tungsten and white light, at different lighting levels but consistency is less good at lower light. Anyway, I don't find any noticeable difference in the actual performance between firmware 1.01 (which was programmed out of the factory) and the latest 1.12. Nevertheless, I might still complain later and quite likely! Sure will let you readers know if I find something! So, stay tuned~ ;-)


Related:-

Pentax is the Biggest Enemy of Herself!

Latest Family Photo of My Pentax Gear! ;-D

Poll: Will You Buy the K-5 Right Now?

Fuji X-Series Lens Roadmap 2012-2013

http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/gear/CES-PMA-2012-Fujifi-4404.shtml

via Jimmy Yen's Blog (Chinese)

So, the lenses to be offered in X-mount are:-

2012
• 14mm (21mm equivalent) super wide
• 18-72mm f/4 (27-108mm equivalent) image stabilized zoom

2013
• 23mm f/2 (34mm equivalent) wide
• 28mm f/2.8 pancake design (42mm equivalent) normal
• 12-24mm f/4 (18-36mm equivalent) image stabilized zoom
• 70-200mm f/4 (105-300mm equivalent) image stabilized zoom

Seems to be quite nice for the lineup and I do like much the focal lengths of the two primes in 23mm and 28mm which are my favourite AoV in 35mm and 43mm of 135 film equivalent, which both Pentax lacks in the current DA lens line.