[chromo]

Ha ha ha ha Magkelly.
Yeah well it is a bit ugly, but I guess I could put up with that if I really wanted one. Which I don't.
I'm thinking more in terms of the handling.
Like, no view finder...How the hell are you gonna take a photo anywhere with bright lights around you or on a bright sunny day ?
Nothing to grip on to and buttons and dials in the wrong place. Plus I need a mirror to comb my hair.

Things can only get worse...I hear that next year Estée Lauder is designing Mark Webber's F1 race car, and Gucci is designing the next space shuttle.

P.S. Sorry to those who love the K-01. It's just not my cup of tea.

[Rondec]

The K-01 is the most polarizing camera which I can remember Pentax releasing. I like the way it looks, but there are an awful lot of people out there that think that it looks awful. But there is now arguing over that.

The big mistake Pentax made, was in believing that because the camera looked different and had Marc Newson's name on it, they could charge 800 dollars for a 450-ish dollar camera. If they had released it at that price, there would have been comments back and forth about its looks, but it would have sold.

[PBandJ]

With 40XS! After the 40 sold my K-01 cost me a whopping $152!

Me too,more of less. Nice upgrade to a Canon Elph series and iphone!
Waiting for k30 prices to plummet!

[Rob22315]

It's interesting how polarizing the looks are. I think it is really sharp looking and quite stylish. I give kudos to Pentax for taking a chance and engaging in some forward looking design that I think is modern art museum-worthy.

My main beef is the lack of an EVF, as it is so hard to use on a sunny day.

I love the looks too - I went for the white version.

I use a Delkin sun shade for 3" screens - works great unless the sun is in your face then reflections are a problem. Enhance sells a similar model.

Amazon.com: Delkin Devices DU3.0-M BLK Universal Pop-Up Shade for 3.0-Inch LCDs (Black): Camera & Photo

Amazon.com: ENHANCE LCD Hood / Sun Shade & Screen Protector for Nikon D5100 / D3200 / D3100 / D5200 / D600 & More Digital SLR Models *Includes Card Reader & Cleaning Cloth*: Electronics

[anthony mazzeri]

That made me laugh. You know, sorry, but even at $300 I still don't like that camera. Nothing against the innards but that design is still about as ugly as it gets and for me it's total turn off. They could give me one for free I'd probably cover the body up with leather or something just so I didn't really have to look at it. It still reminds me of a plastic kid's toy cam and I don't mean that in a good way. It looks like something Tonka toys would sell for 5 year olds to go along with their dump trucks and that.

Even if you've never actually held one, are you honestly saying the camera on the left looks ugly and toy-like to you compared to the one on the right?



I'm just not seeing what you're seeing at all. Where is the ugliness in its clean lines compared to the amorphous black blob and mess of buttons and icons of an EOS? And what specifically is toy-like about it compared to the EOS?

[anthony mazzeri]

The K-01 is the most polarizing camera which I can remember Pentax releasing. I like the way it looks, but there are an awful lot of people out there that think that it looks awful. But there is now arguing over that.

The big mistake Pentax made, was in believing that because the camera looked different and had Marc Newson's name on it, they could charge 800 dollars for a 450-ish dollar camera. If they had released it at that price, there would have been comments back and forth about its looks, but it would have sold.

It's not the camera which is polarizing, it's pictures of it.

The camera itself wins most people over who actually handle/buy/use one. The strong negativity I notice is most often from judging purely the pictures of it and not the camera itself.

And maybe Pentax's biggest mistake was simply forgetting it's not 1979 any more. I often think the K-01 would probably have fared much better in the pre-internet days where the only place to see one would probably be the first time you actually handled one in a store - and likely conclude how nice it actually looks and feels, and even more likely conclude that the cheap all-plastic EOS next to it on the counter is in fact the toy camera in comparison. Maybe that's what the Pentax marketing gurus thought by assuming that once people actually compared them in the hand it would justify the high initial price. Except most people made their strong negative judgements before any of that could even happen purely based on pics on the internet.

[THoog]

Somebody has to say it: De gustibus non est disputandum - there's just no point in arguing matters of taste. It's just as true now as it was 2000 years ago, and yet people still do it.

With Pentax' limited lineup, the new products that do come out are scrutinized that much more closely. In tough economic times, people are going to be less comfortable being challenged by something 'different'. There seems to be a particularly virulent strain going around of "everyone wants what I want and those that don't should just go away so that all that is left is everyone who wants what I want". I've observed this mindset for a long time on DPreview, but it seems to be particularly nasty lately, and it seems to have taken root here in News and Rumors. ('cause every thread is a FF thread)

Ironically, I did handle a K-01 (or a dummy body) in a brick-and-mortar store, and I wasn't impressed. My only thought was that the green button was placed badly. But later, when the price dropped to $500, I bought one for the quiet(er) shutter, and to spite the critics. It wasn't until I forced myself to explore the camera's differentness (and quit trying to force it to be a dSLR) that it really bloomed for me. And now I own all four colors. I'm going to be shooting a K-01 for a long time...

---

Last edited by THoog; 04-09-2013 at 07:15 AM.

[GXRUser]

Even if you've never actually held one, are you honestly saying the camera on the left looks ugly and toy-like to you compared to the one on the right?



I'm just not seeing what you're seeing at all. Where is the ugliness in its clean lines compared to the amorphous black blob and mess of buttons and icons of an EOS? And what specifically is toy-like about it compared to the EOS?

I think the toy like comments come from the White and the Yellow versions. The Black is very nice. The Silver is the best looking of all of the K-01 variants. It is very unfortunate that in the US, the Silver version was never offered.

[NickLarsson]

Well, it seems that a non-negligible amount of people see a camera as a fashion accessory instead of a tool which can be used to actually take pictures. So I guess that instead of hiring an industrial designer Pentax should have asked Jean-Paul Gaultier or Karl Lagerfeld to design the brick.

[audiobomber]

I'd surely like to see the innards in a better body though.

It's already available. The K-30 has the interesting photography features of the K-01 (same sensor, 921,000 dot LCD, fast CDAF, focus peaking), but adds an OVF, PDAF, WR, dual wheels and faster raw handling.

I have a white K-01. I find its clean rectangular shape to be quite handsome, though holding it makes me truly appreciate the K-x's heavily sculpted grip. I initially passed on the K-01 because it had no viewfinder. I ended up buying one instead of the advanced compacts I was researching, for its superior performance and absurdly low price. Oddly enough, I now consider the lack of a VF to be an advantage. Holding a camera to your eye makes human subjects uncomfortable, and it's a hard habit to break given a choice. The K-01 leaves me no choice. For street photography and candid photos of friends and family, it is the absolute best camera for me.

[robtcorl]

Maybe I'm one of the few that didn't see it as a beauty or a beast, just different.
When my white model arrived, any notion of it being toy-like vanished.
This is one hunk of a picture taking machine.
I've never picked up a lower end Canon dslr in a store and not thought, man this thing feels cheap.

Everyone who has seen my 01 thinks it looks really neat, not that I care one way or the other.

[Rondec]

It's not the camera which is polarizing, it's pictures of it.

The camera itself wins most people over who actually handle/buy/use one. The strong negativity I notice is most often from judging purely the pictures of it and not the camera itself.

And maybe Pentax's biggest mistake was simply forgetting it's not 1979 any more. I often think the K-01 would probably have fared much better in the pre-internet days where the only place to see one would probably be the first time you actually handled one in a store - and likely conclude how nice it actually looks and feels, and even more likely conclude that the cheap all-plastic EOS next to it on the counter is in fact the toy camera in comparison. Maybe that's what the Pentax marketing gurus thought by assuming that once people actually compared them in the hand it would justify the high initial price. Except most people made their strong negative judgements before any of that could even happen purely based on pics on the internet.

Photographers are a pretty conservative crowd who like their cameras to look like "a camera is supposed to look" and like it in any color, as long as it is black. As such, it is not surprising that the K-01 was viewed pretty harshly by the forum faithful here. I have heard from plenty of non-photographers that my K-01 is a "nice looking camera," but then again, they don't have experience shooting photos, so what could they know?

(sarcasm featured in last sentence).

Pentax's problem really was that this was a camera that wasn't really targeted at the people who would be attracted to a K30 or K5 II. It is almost like a really nice point and shoot, but those people never really got to hold or use or evaluate one in the United States, because it just wasn't in stores. I think it could have been a big hit if priced right and available to average Joe photographers.

[THoog]

Unfortunately, the US market has demonstrated time and again that we prefer to buy cheap stuff that looks like something we saw on TV.

The K-01 team set out to make a one-of-a-kind camera, and they certainly achieved their goal, but the K-01 didn't take off with the average Jo in Japan, either - and Pentax is clearly more focused on the Japanese market (for now, at least). In a boom economy, it might have done better. So many what-ifs...

What if they had gone with AA-batteries and a pink version? Would it have caused outrage to the point of cardiac arrest? A camera that actually kills?

[Docrwm]

Unfortunately, the US market has demonstrated time and again that we prefer to buy cheap stuff that looks like something we saw on TV.

The K-01 team set out to make a one-of-a-kind camera, and they certainly achieved their goal, but the K-01 didn't take off with the average Jo in Japan, either - and Pentax is clearly more focused on the Japanese market (for now, at least). In a boom economy, it might have done better. So many what-ifs...

What if they had gone with AA-batteries and a pink version? Would it have caused outrage to the point of cardiac arrest? A camera that actually kills?

AAs would have helped. Pink would have helped (particularly in Japan). The K-01 is neither fish nor fowl and was ridiculously priced when it arrived. Most consumers don't care about the specs beyond MP and have zero idea who Marc WHO is. Yes, the K-01 is a competent camera for what it does, but its not a MILC in the sense that its meaningfully small and its not a dSLR. It was a DOG in sales. I got shouted down when I said this when it came out and even censured. It is simply a fact that it was a dog and remains one from a sales point of view. Aesthetics aside, after being on DEEP discount for months there are still units available for sale and the price has dropped even more. On products that even have marginal unit sales you do not see that happen unless the company does so with all their products because they are in financial difficulty. Pentax is not and has not done so other than with the K-01.

[robtcorl]

A camera that actually kills?

A killer camera!