DIY: Adapting the Pentax FA*85/1.4 onto the Cantax K-5D Mark III

Since a Pentax K-mount FF has been rather pessimistic for long and even that the K-mount might be aborted, today I have decided to build my own K-mount Full Frame body myself again, to accommodate my superior and excellent FA*85/1.4 lens, which has been collecting dust for long without a matching FF body!

So, here we go!

Warning: If you follow me to do the following, do it at YOUR OWN RISK!

And, great care must always be taken throughout the whole course:-

1. Put a large white paper on the working desk/table with bright illumination on it;

2. Find a high quality matching-size screwdriver for opening the rear of the lens;

3. Remove the three screws *around* the mount so as to pick out the whole assembly of the aperture coupler protector, as follows:-



4. Remove the five screws *on* the mount for dismantling the mount. Before doing that, do put on adhesive tape onto the gold plated electrical pins and contacts to prevent them from dropping off when the mount is removed:-



5. Pick out the aperture ring coupling ring inside:-



6. Unscrew the aperture coupler and remove it:-



7. Put back the aperture coupling ring and the mount:-



8. Get a quality Pentax-K to Canon-EOS adaptor and put it onto the K-mount lens. Mine is a Kipon adaptor with a programmable chipset and PCB attached:-



9. Keep and store the removed parts safely and properly:-



10. Focus adjust the lens before use, the correction parameter can be either entered into the body or into the memory of the programmable chip of the adaptor, which I choose the latter. This calibration method of mine is used.

Last but not least, other K-mount lenses could also be mounted!




Related:-

Compatibility List of Some Pentax Full Frame Lenses on Canon 5D Body

Compatibility of DA Lenses on Full Frame

K-5D Mark III: DA 18-55 II Converted to a 24-80 FULL FRAME Lens!

When the Focusing Screen Lies - Part 2

Latest Interchangeable Lens Camera (ILC) Market Sharing for 6 Months (Japanese Home Market)

See what BCN reports:-

http://bcnranking.jp/news/1302/130228_24917.html
(in Japanese)



The aggregated sales trend of the top four market leaders are plotted for 6 months, namely, Canon (Orange), Nikon (Yellow), Sony (Blue) and Olympus (Green). Do note that the sales of both DSLR/reflex and mirrorless types are included and added up.

As both Canon and Nikon sell mostly reflex cameras instead of mirrorless, it is proven that DSLRs and reflexes still have a huge market of its type. The market pie is being eaten by the mirrorlesses, though. That's what the result achieved by Olympus has told.


Related:- 

Japanese Mirrorless Market Share 2012 (Up to October, BCN Data)

Higher-end DSLRs Live Longer than the Cheaper Ones!

http://www.petapixel.com/2013/03/24/study-confirms-higher-end-dslrs-lose-value-more-slowly-than-cheap-ones/

Unfortunately, Pentax has no real high-end camera of any for the mass market. But on the other hand the 645D is just too "high-ended" to keep the company alive!

Canon has Taken the Crown Away From Pentax! :-(

..for the smallest and lightest DSLR bodies ever made, wins over both the size and the weight! >:-(

Camerasize.com has updated their database to include the new Canon EOS100D/SL1, in particular, I've checked the following:-

1. 100D Vs K-x:-

http://camerasize.com/compare/#448,229

The overall size of the 100D is a bit smaller, but the weight of the 100D is 30% less!

2. 100D Vs K-01:-

http://camerasize.com/compare/#448,285

The K-01, with the complete omission of the mirror, viewfinder and penta-mirror, has no real edge over the 100D in terms of size and weight. The K-01 is a bit smaller but it is yet 27% heavier than the 100D. The body material used is aluminium+plastic of the K-01 against the aluminium alloy+fibre glass plastic of the 100D. The Canon rules for the materials and technologies for how to cut most weight out of a DSLR body! So, how come Pentax could not give out her crown to some body else?!


Previous Related:-

Canon DSLR Diminished, Leaving Pentax and Others Behind!

DA560 Lens Review Published at PF

The ever most expensive Pentax DA lens has been reviewed in full by the PF:-

http://www.pentaxforums.com/reviews/pentax-da-560mm-f56-ed-aw/introduction.html

I have gone though the IQ parts of the review. From the test pictures and samples posted, I found that the resolution of the lens is low, flare control of it is so-so, CA of it could be obvious, bokeh of it is not that pleasing, i.e., rough and without good feel of separation which is just odd enough..

Although the PF editor writes and comments in words that the lens is performing good for each of the above departments, I would rather opt to inspect the posted pictures instead as one picture is worth more than one thousand words!

Anyway, you may agree or disagree what I have concluded. So you should decide yourself for what I have blogged. Just go read through the PF review and measurebate things yourself! Yes, I do promote their website this time! ;-D


Related:-

Mounting a (Cheap) Telescope onto a Pentax (K-mount) Camera Body

New Firmware for Pentax Q

http://www.pentax.jp/english/support/digital/q_s.html

• Improved contrast AF performance.
• Improved stability for general performance.

Good job, Pentax! I will update mine shortly.

Update (3-29): The firmware is pulled down from the above Japanese support website without any reason given. Only the following is stated:-

We are sorry to inform you that the software version 1.11 is temporary not available.

It might be the case that Pentax has found something wrong with the released firmware. Meanwhile, if you still want to do the update but yet could not find the software, you can download the updating file from the following alternative official link:-

http://www.pentax.com.cn/service/download.html?id=16

But do bear in mind to do it at your own risk then! :-o

K-mount is to be Discontinued and Replaced!?

The rumours continue.. Read this Xitek post (Google translated).

Well, it is told that:-

1. The source of information is from an old classmate of the OP who is now working at Tokina in Japan;

2. There is a collaboration project in progress amongst Pentax Ricoh and Tokina (This is confirmed via the previous news posted by the PF);

3. The March 27 rumour is not true! (Yes, that poster firmly said it was not going to happen when everyone or at least most/many people believed that on the day before, me inclusive of course!)

4. The real planned time-frame for a Pentax FF announcement will be in the second half of this year of 2013;

5. The K-mount will be discontinued! A new mount will be used for the new upcoming FF Pentax body, which is NOT compatible with the old K-mount!

In fact, in a previous Japanese interview with the Pentax Ricoh Head in the fall of last year, that Head did really disclose that they were considering a new mount and the K-mount might be aborted! But now this new rumour says something that is so close! So, could it really happen?! >:-(

If it really happens and the K-mount is aborted, the Pentax sky is really falling and I am sure that they will die in a very short time and Pentax the brand will disappear!!

What Internet Contents that Could be Trusted BTW?

A Chinese idiom states that sometimes one cannot really distinguish between the truth and the fake..

An alleged boy named himself as Mike (Milan) Svitek as the poster appeared in YouTube yesterday and stated that all the recent Pentax new body and lens rumours "created" by him were all fake!



URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXPo72dpAtQ

But then here comes the questions! IF *everything* read from/on the Internet could be fake and one should be susceptible, for instance:-

1. How come one can know if this little boy is the original poster of that recent Pentax rumour?

2. How to verify this boy's identity and if he is that Mike/Milan Svitek before?

3. Even it is really that person, how do you know if what are being told in the video is true or not. Or if someone forced him to do so, if not he would bear some serious consequences? Btw, I have a feeling that he was being pointed by a gun to force him to say something to correct his serious mistake done! ;-p

4. Will you shoot yourself like that if you really have told a big lie to the world but then you still opted to show your face to the world and then yet laughed at all those stupid guys of being fooled??! :-o

Oh, my bad again for reporting the "fake rumour" anyway! >:-|

Where Came the Countdown?

It was originated from a blog post by the Mr. Blurry Cameraphone-man, whom posted the diagram below at his new Chinese "micro-blog" hosted at the Sina Weibo, a few days ago:-

http://weibo.com/1495193132/zob2Hz9r5

(Update: The above page has been removed.)

So, this is the significant stuff that posted:-



In short, the Japanese words above meant that at 10:00 a.m. on a x7th day (something is to be announced) and that the "secret is highly restricted".

Do note that Mr. Blurry Cameraphone-man is actually the top Chinese Pentax Ricoh official in the mainland China where the headquarters of the company is based at Shanghai, whom I think is indeed 100% authoritative! As such, I firmly believed that this piece of news was really special and the source of information should be very reliable and trustable.

I further read that two posters/followers to his blog responded and suggested that it would be 27th of March and I saw no objection from Mr. Blurry but then he was actually online after that as seen and thus I further assumed that he could silently admit the date.

After all those, I simply decided to set up the counter sooner but not later as I was really much excited and I thought I was confident enough to do so! :-o

Yes, nothing has happened today but we can still wait for the 17th of April to see if something will really be announced by that day.

Still, I think it's yet the big fault of Pentax Ricoh after all! Why? These days we can see worms of hungry and long-awaited Pentaxians who have been so frustrated and have been hoping for something new from Pentax and especially for a Full Frame body that we could get very soon, "finally"! We are all excited! Aren't we? In fact, all the Pentax forums in the Internet have become very hot again (which are all declining since the Photokina of the last year, indeed!) and once again keen discussions were started.

We all have very strong desire with aspiration but why Pentax Ricoh just cannot give us something that we wanted which have been asking for so long?? Why NOT just a bit "earlier" but rather than too laaaaatte??! >:-( Still an APS-C K-5II/s which is based on a 2010 deigned and marketed K-5? Shit and Damn It!!

At the end of the day, I just wonder, what are the management and marketing heads at the PRI HQs are thinking? Do they really want that Pentax the brand to die?! In fact, their management seems to be even worse than the ex-owner of Hoya, whom at least created and marketed something new every year when they steered the ship! >:-|


Read Also:-

Ten Things that I Want Ricoh to Do for Pentax

V.P. of Pentax Canada Forced Mike Svitek to Withdraw All his Posted Contents about the New Pentax DSLR!

(Glen Sealy, V.P. of Pentax Canada Imaging.)

According to what Mike Svitek told lastly, Vice President of Pentax Canada, Glen Sealy, phoned him, strongly requesting removval of all his previous posted contents about a secret Pentax DSLR body tested by him, at Google+ and Twitter.

So, now all his contents are removed but then it seems yet confirms that what Mike told are true, maybe! And do note that the Pentax VP did get / does have his phone number as told! :-)