Originally posted by filmamigo Nice looking camera. I like that Pentax seem to have carried over the "three wheel" control scheme from the K-1.
That is, to me, a smart compromise between old school shutter speed dial + aperture ring, versus the electronic control wheel.
Personally, I hate the electronic control wheel. Have since the Pentax PZ1p and Nikon F90. It's a cheat, that saves camera makers money, while not improving ergonomics.
And I'm not an old guy (yet
)
I do agree with you about electronic control wheels and yet I can see why advances in camera design forced these changes.
Back when cameras had shutter speed ranges from 1 to 1/1000 sec (+Bulb), the control dial only needed 12 labels in the circle which is a little tight but is still fairly readable. But today's cameras range from 1/8000 to 30 sec (or more) which would require 19 labels on the dial which would make it unreadable. And if you let the person set shutter speed in 1/2 stop increments, that's nearly 40 tiny little positions of the wheel makes it hard to use and control.
Worse, old-style labelled dials are ergonomically nasty with automated metering because the camera is setting the shutter speed. That forces designers to either: 1) make the user to spin the wheel all the way to the end to get the "Auto" setting (and spin it back to get from "Auto" to get to a normal shutter speed); or 2) have a mode dial that ignores the shutter speed dial setting which is confusing for the user because they'll still see the setting of the wheel. I suppose they could build little motors into the wheel to spin it but that would draw a lot of power and make a lot of noise if the light levels are changing quickly.
That said, future e-dials could be enhanced if each one had a tiny display on top showing the current setting. The display could be OLED, LCD, or e-Ink.