[philbaum]

Problem is the lenses will be as huge or even bigger than current DSLR lenses, as long as you have to cover focal length past 50mm this will be the case. And that not lot of reach on an FF. Sony didn't put f/4 instead of f/2.8 on it zoom by random. They still target a somewhat small/light product. They would need to make their A7 as big/heavy/sturdy as a highend DSLR to make it comfortable to handle in such condition. At what point the idea of mirror or not is more a matter of preference than anything else.
.

Be careful what you wish for - you may get it. At one point I was arguing about the need for f2.8 zooms as well. Then i found out how heavy, large and expensive they are. Don't know exactly what current lenses cost, but a FF 70-200 f2.8 from a major manufacturer is 2 lbs or more and will cost close to $2500. Haven't looked it up lately. Course one can do better on the price from a 3rd party lens maker, but it will still weigh a lot. You will look back on your Pentax 50-135 f2.8 lens with envy - at least i did. But i still have the Pentax lens and use it. So i have become more of a prime lens user on my Sony FF camera - lighter and easier to carry. And i bought a used 70-200 F4 lens for my FF and even that i often leave it at home.

I'm going to make a prediction here, that many of the buyers of the Pentax FF will use a combination of crop lenses and FF lenses to use with their new cameras. Its not just the cost, its the weight of your camera bag as well.

[normhead]

MILC peaked in Sept. 2012 if you can read a chart. DSLRs are still out selling them 3:1. That's what I see. It's pretty much plateaued now, but interesting how the downward trend in DSLR sales, hasn't translated into increase MILC sales.

[IchabodCrane]

MILC peaked in Sept. 2012 if you can read a chart. DSLRs are still out selling them 3:1. That's what I see. It's pretty much plateaued now, but interesting how the downward trend in DSLR sales, hasn't translated into increase MILC sales.

The chart pretty clearly shows the ratio of DSLRs to MILCs has gone from 6:1 to 3:1 in the past three years or so. I don't care to project what that ratio will be in two years but I doubt it's going to trend back toward DSLRs in a meaningful way.

[normhead]

A fine job of interpreting the data. In a time of falling camera sales holding your own is definitely the way you want to be, but long story short, MILC is not increasing. Let's not get too carried away with the spin.

Or to put it another way, if everyone is going down the tube, your relative position during the flush is irrelevant.

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Last edited by normhead; 11-20-2015 at 03:50 PM.

[zoolander]

Problem is the lenses will be as huge or even bigger than current DSLR lenses, as long as you have to cover focal length past 50mm this will be the case. And that not lot of reach on an FF. Sony didn't put f/4 instead of f/2.8 on it zoom by random. They still target a somewhat small/light product. They would need to make their A7 as big/heavy/sturdy as a highend DSLR to make it comfortable to handle in such condition. At what point the idea of mirror or not is more a matter of preference than anything else.

The lack of 2.8 zoom lenses is what a lot of pro's complain about in FE.

Agree. I looked at it quite a bit. My issue is that don't like that their sensor is not so well supported overall. In particular in DxO that tend to have better denoising that lightroom. Now I asked myself "what would I gain by going Fuji ?". I have seen that I would have to reinvest at least 1000$ more, to basically get a better/smaller large apperture WA and get a bigger/heavier/smaller apperture tele. As I value more large apperture in tele, this isn't worth the trouble. Maybe if I was starting from scratch. But then the price don't make it a good alternative to begin with. When I started I wasn't ready to spend that much on photography gear. I just wanted to try.

Yeah Fuji lenses are not cheap, and they don't have proper rain proofing.

The only way to have a great echosystem of lenses for Pentax is to keep K-mount and make a very light K02 with an EVF. Could be a great match with ltds. But if they change the registration distance to gain more or less 100g they would have to rebuild everything again and compete with established competitors.

I think a K-02 would need its own new mount plus a K-mount adapter. You can't bring DSLR sharpness to a mirrorless fight. DSLR kit lenses which are peaking at 35-45lpmm, where E mount and XF mount is much much higher. Ltd's could compete here, but Pentax weather proofing is also a real edge.

[RonHendriks1966]

Ok what I see in this chart is DSLRs trending downward, by 1million pieces/year towards obscurity within 3-5years. Whereas Milc is staying consistent.

Europe has a strong economic crises during the past years. The market for selling images is very marginal compared to several years ago, and dslr where used to make those images.

I do see it going down, but maybe having a floor at 2 million pieces/year some time from now.


For Pentax this isn't good news. They are marginal in dslr (I be generous and say sub 1,5 % and declining in 2015 due to waiting customers for ff) and in Europe having not much sales with Q.

[reh321]

I think a K-02 would need its own new mount plus a K-mount adapter. You can't bring DSLR sharpness to a mirrorless fight. DSLR kit lenses which are peaking at 35-45lpmm, where E mount and XF mount is much much higher. Ltd's could compete here, but Pentax weather proofing is also a real edge.

Two related questions:

(1) what size sensor are the E-mount and XF-mount optimized for?
(as I discovered when adapting lenses for my Q, a smaller sensor is when you really need high-lpmm lenses)

(2) how to the prices of E-mount and XF-mount lenses compare to those for comparable K-mount lenses?

[biz-engineer]

Europe has a strong economic crises during the past years. The market for selling images is very marginal compared to several years ago, and dslr where used to make those images. I do see it going down, but maybe having a floor at 2 million pieces/year some time from now. For Pentax this isn't good news. They are marginal in dslr (I be generous and say sub 1,5 % and declining in 2015 due to waiting customers for ff) and in Europe having not much sales with Q.

There is market condition and how to deal with it. New products with significant improvement over the existing products generate sales, even in a depressed market. You have to bear in mind that market statistics are aggregates of actual product sales, not the other way around. In any market, there are losers and winners, the difference between the winners and the losers depends on how well the strategy of each player works in a difficult market. For example, in the semiconductor industry, there are some large players who have poor financial performance because the competition is fierce in the segments they address, while there are also smaller players that are able to have outstanding financial results in niches and with highly differentiated products. As far as Pentax is concerned, they compete well in the medium format segment, however in the lower formats they are not very competitive. The main reason for Pentax to stay alive is MF, outside of MF Pentax tends to be slowly dying, as they get smashed by competition essentially because they are nearly absent in the distribution channels. With a Pentax FF they have to shot well above average in order to achieve sales via online distributors essentially. I believe that if there was no Pentax MF activity, Pentax would already have run out of business. To me it looks like Ricoh are heading towards a Leica style of marketing ("Full Frame by Pentax" etc), but even Leica are on the shelves, where Pentax is not.

[RonHendriks1966]

There is market condition and how to deal with it. New products with significant improvement over the existing products generate sales, even in a depressed market. You have to bear in mind that market statistics are aggregates of actual product sales, not the other way around. In any market, there are losers and winners, the difference between the winners and the losers depends on how well the strategy of each player works in a difficult market. For example, in the semiconductor industry, there are some large players who have poor financial performance because the competition is fierce in the segments they address, while there are also smaller players that are able to have outstanding financial results in niches and with highly differentiated products. As far as Pentax is concerned, they compete well in the medium format segment, however in the lower formats they are not very competitive. The main reason for Pentax to stay alive is MF, outside of MF Pentax tends to be slowly dying, as they get smashed by competition essentially because they are nearly absent in the distribution channels. With a Pentax FF they have to shot well above average in order to achieve sales via online distributors essentially. I believe that if there was no Pentax MF activity, Pentax would already have run out of business. To me it looks like Ricoh are heading towards a Leica style of marketing ("Full Frame by Pentax" etc), but even Leica are on the shelves, where Pentax is not.

The question wheater Pentax can run on being a Brand for medium format? Having k-mount on the side. Up til now it is the 645-system that profits from the development made in k-mount series. It looks like 645Z is selling good and that even new lenses sell better since the second hand market for them has depleted over time by the bigger number of users. So this is a good sign. When Pentax would be a Brand making for k-mount only hi-end products, where K-3ii would be entrylevel, then thè numbers of sold camera's would be low. They stil have to pay for all R&D for making competitive products in future.

[Kunzite]

Pentax slowly dying outside MF? Doubtful.
Sure, there was a transition period - being sold out had an impact for sure. That was a serious but temporary drawback. Also, the market isn't doing great. But, with cameras like the K-3 out there and an entire FF product line being made, I just can't see how could they possibly be dying.

By the way, the K-3 is a regular occurrence on this sales top:
http://kakaku.com/camera/digital-slr-camera/ranking_0049/
Few years ago, you couldn't often see a Pentax camera on the first page.

[biz-engineer]

Pentax slowly dying outside MF? Doubtful.

You have to clean-up what's in front of your eyes. What drug are you taking? Have you not noticed that everyone is using a Canon or Nikon or Sony around you? I really hate the amount of bul***it that's running around here. That's why I unsubscribed to a lot of thread and getting more involved into photographic art and technique instead of getting blind while hanging on a brand name.

Up til now it is the 645-system that profits from the development made in k-mount series. It looks like 645Z is selling good and that even new lenses sell better since the second hand market for them has depleted over time by the bigger number of users.

Well, in Austria, most shops (not talking about online shops) have stop Pentax K mount completely, but some shops have added the 645z to their offering...

[Kunzite]

Could you please make your point more aggressively, and of course with no attempt at supporting your own claims? Otherwise I might never learn. Thank you.

[RonHendriks1966]

By the way, the K-3 is a regular occurrence on this sales top:
http://kakaku.com/camera/digital-slr-camera/ranking_0049/
Few years ago, you couldn't often see a Pentax camera on the first page.

That is good. Being #19 means maybe a marketshare of 1 - 2 %. So that is still small. Ofcourse outside Japan it is very different. I don't think overhere you find any K-mount model reaching near 1%.



In 2010 we had a buyers group in one store for the K-5. I think it took two months to fulfill all pre-orders. I guess my second body was the last to come in mid December. For K-3ii there where zero pre-orders.

[Zygonyx]

Yeah, Pentax already WAS doomed at that time.

[philbaum]

Europe has a strong economic crises during the past years. The market for selling images is very marginal compared to several years ago, and dslr where used to make those images.

I do see it going down, but maybe having a floor at 2 million pieces/year some time from now.
.

I don't think either DSLRs or MILC are going away. There are needs for both types of imaging devices as they presently are constructed. It seems credible to me that DSLRs would level off at 2 million pieces and MILC sales would eventually reach that ceiling for a ratio of 1:1 sales between them. Its all guesswork though and the facts will be made clearer as we move along.

Canikon has borne a huge reduction, 50% since 2012, in sales piece numbers in just 3 years. They've got to be feeling not so good. According to this chart, the mirrorless makers went from 0 in Dec 2011 to perhaps 0.9 million pieces today, so they have to be feeling pretty good. They are in a niche where there wasn't one before.

Meanwhile, the technological improvements continue for non-conventional imaging devices like Ricoh's Theta and that Light 16 camera, not to mention improving smart phone cameras.