See his latest posted samples at Flickr:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ned_bunnell/sets/72177720307495920/
via his DPR post here.
Whilst the photos are nice, they do lack a bit contrast and sharpness. I would expect (much) better IQ for a dedicated B&W machine, honestly speaking.
Btw, it seems that Ned does not update his blog anymore.
https://pentaxofficial.com/18527/
https://pentaxofficial.com/18482/
https://pentaxofficial.com/18512/
All in Japanese, but the pictures speak for themselves. Various Pentax original lenses were used for the tests.
https://www.yaotomi.co.jp/blog/walk/2023/04/pentaxk3iii,monochrome-kyoto,sakura.html
(in Japanese)
My impression is that while the B&W photos do have more contrasts and better tonal representation than normal digital cameras' ones, they are yet not as solid as those images produced with better B&W films, even after they are digitalised via professional-grade film scanners.
Besides, there is a side-by-side comparison against the original K-3 III, look this:
Lastly, DC Watch reports that the Ricoh has stopped to receive pre-orders of the K-3 III Mono as the tailor-made sensors have already been out-of-stock owing to the overwhelming demand. Besides, Ricoh also said that their production capacity on the Mono units was indeed rather limited.
I received this message from the Dpreview Admin yesterday and thought that was a hoax at the first glance but it is actually true:
https://www.dpreview.com/news/5901145460/dpreview-com-to-close
So, the DPR is really doomed, even earlier than Pentax. :-o
See: https://twitter.com/ricohimaging_jp/status/1633634970702061568?s=20
for the newly released firmwares of K-1/II, K-3 III and KF.
According to a latest Japanese IT news report, it is revealed that the Pentax K-r actually had a hidden function of "Photo Challenger" mode which could be activated via an advanced (at its time ;-)) IR data communication mode with another compatible camera,.
(Credit: Japanese Cameota blog)
After linking up with the other camera, two photos can be selected for comparison and the computer will give marks to the photos in three aspects. The loser will have his photo displayed in a cracked glass window at the end.
A demo YouTube video could be found below:
Now it is put on sales at the Japanese Ricoh online store (Google English translation of the page Here).
It is learnt that Serial Number of the camera shall be provided for the purchase of the license key for unlocking the function. The key is not portable across different bodies and one key is solely for one unique camera body. Besides, it should be noted that product keys for the K-1 and K-1 II are different. The price of the product key (without tax) is in Japanese Yens 10k.
Upon purchase of the key, Ricoh will send the buyer a QR code which the camera will read the code to unlock the function. It says it takes from several days to one week for Ricoh to generate and send back the code to the buyer. It seems that everything is being processed manually. The worst thing is that if the consumer has entered the wrong serial number of his/her camera, Ricoh will not be responsible for it and the correct code will not be resent?! :-|
As for the operation of the function, read the Chinese article here. The working principle is also briefed in the article.
In short, the camera takes two consecutive photos according to the maximum Exposure Value (EV) difference. The camera will then process the photos and clone them into one with the selected gradual ND pattern. And, the pattern of dark/bright sections could be set by the user. It is recommended that the user should put the camera on tripod when using this function.
The EV range could be from 0.3EV to 5EV. Some example results are as below:
