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Oh, yet another APS camera. And in all these beautiful colors. LEDs also. I'm stunned by their inventiveness. Just what all Pentax users have been waiting for. But now I don't care anymore. After 35 years with Pentax, the five last of these waiting for a full frame offering, I switched to Nikon in 2012 --- and lived happily ever after. R.I.P.
Sure RiceHigh, my Pentax gear is still intact, probably because I share with other frequenters of your blog a sufferering from Pentaxcipation – a disease characterized by a futile but inextinguishable hope that Pentax (then Hoya, now Ricoh) would one day come up with a full frame body (not a cropped 645 format at exorbitant price, weight, and size) that is compatible with my three shelf meters of K, A, F, and FA lenses. In stock is also my arsenal of bodies spanning from KX through MZ-S and digital bodies up to K20D (after which acquisition I started to recover from said disease). However, with the brand mishandling the last few years I see prices on used Pentax gear dropping fast. Face the facts: The Pentax brand with its legacy of K-mount lenses dating back to 1975 is dead for anyone with aspirations beyond plastic DX bodies with a matrix of Hello Kitto colorings and flashing LEDs. Who cares if their offerings can attract phone camera users with aspirations beyond miniscule 20+ Mpixel sensors that can be adapted to device with 5-6 mm thickness. Fact remains that signal-to-noise ratio is determined by sensor surface area and visible optics is diffraction limited, which means that shrinking pixel size below a few micrometer is simply senseless. You also need full frame to get really creamy out-of-focus effects.
This inability of keeping in touch with its loyal user base is really sad, because the inner workings of their Pentax digital cameras rival even the prime brands. The problem seems to be that Pentax has always been in second or third position in the queue for new sensors, an area where Sony is in the forefront because of its heritage as an electronics company. Yet, the Sony A7R was not there when I bought my Nikon D800E to go full frame three summers ago (a purchase that would certainly have been a Pentax, had there been a reasonable full frame offering by Asahi Kōgaku Kōgyō and its sequels then). Early 2012 there was nothing coming even close the the D800E in sensor quality and portability, and the images that can be captured by that sensor are not beaten any camera body except for the new D810 even today. This also applies to the Pentax 645 (http://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Ratings). Sure, Sony makes great cameras and my favorite companion when I cannot bring heavier gear is today is the Sony RX1 with electronic finder. However, Sony simply cannot compete when it comes to availability of heritage lenses and accessories. How many Minolta enthusiasts sites are there? Play with the thought that Sony had bought Pentax instead of Konica-Minolta back in January 2006. We would have been in heaven then.
Is this is it boys and girls!? No more big announcements from Ricoh? You can say anything you want about Sony or Olympus but they are not boring and they are not sitting on their hands like Ricoh. I'm bored already!
Pentax seems to be degraded from a tool manufacturer to a toys manufacturer... serious and enthusiastic photographers: say goodbye to pentax and ricoh... the latest product announcements make me very sad. 645 is a serious tool but... you can't grow within their system. why do they think that enthsiast photographers are waiting for 256 color combinations of their body? on the other hand there are real innovations with the switchable AA Filter but nobody outside the pentax world realises it.... and with nearly no options for accesoiries, lenses and the capability to step up to full frame it stays a dull investment for everybody serious who wants to grow... ricoh marketing does not seem to understand european and us market... although i switched to canon after K5 i kept my pentax stuff and still wait for a capable FF Body... it's even impossible to sell a K5 on the used market for a reasonable price...
Logging you in...
anunnaki · 551 weeks ago
Heiko · 551 weeks ago
...if only the narration was a little "clearer" in its message!
BUT overall: not a bad effort
So when is the "fixed" K-3 successor coming?
Simon · 551 weeks ago
Rataskanken · 551 weeks ago
Rataskanken · 550 weeks ago
This inability of keeping in touch with its loyal user base is really sad, because the inner workings of their Pentax digital cameras rival even the prime brands. The problem seems to be that Pentax has always been in second or third position in the queue for new sensors, an area where Sony is in the forefront because of its heritage as an electronics company. Yet, the Sony A7R was not there when I bought my Nikon D800E to go full frame three summers ago (a purchase that would certainly have been a Pentax, had there been a reasonable full frame offering by Asahi Kōgaku Kōgyō and its sequels then). Early 2012 there was nothing coming even close the the D800E in sensor quality and portability, and the images that can be captured by that sensor are not beaten any camera body except for the new D810 even today. This also applies to the Pentax 645 (http://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Ratings). Sure, Sony makes great cameras and my favorite companion when I cannot bring heavier gear is today is the Sony RX1 with electronic finder. However, Sony simply cannot compete when it comes to availability of heritage lenses and accessories. How many Minolta enthusiasts sites are there? Play with the thought that Sony had bought Pentax instead of Konica-Minolta back in January 2006. We would have been in heaven then.
Andrew Munster · 550 weeks ago
Dante · 549 weeks ago
Frank · 549 weeks ago
the latest product announcements make me very sad. 645 is a serious tool but... you can't grow within their system. why do they think that enthsiast photographers are waiting for 256 color combinations of their body? on the other hand there are real innovations with the switchable AA Filter but nobody outside the pentax world realises it.... and with nearly no options for accesoiries, lenses and the capability to step up to full frame it stays a dull investment for everybody serious who wants to grow... ricoh marketing does not seem to understand european and us market... although i switched to canon after K5 i kept my pentax stuff and still wait for a capable FF Body... it's even impossible to sell a K5 on the used market for a reasonable price...