[Kunzite]

What's worse, the dongle won't fit:

You Tube

You Tube

[Larrymc]

What's worse, the dongle won't fit:
My Blackberry Is Not Working! - The One Ronnie, Preview - BBC One - YouTube

Perfect!!!!!!

[c.a.m]

That's it! A K-1 II-DD, for Digital Dongle. One can imagine all sorts of potential new features in a dongle-ized system.

[rangercarp]

My son’s 7D is faster, has a deeper buffer, does better video and I think it is touch-screen. Pentax better get with the program on K-1 Super. And the new APSc flagship better be a complete new design (ending the K-7 platform) or I’m jumping ship.

Earlier this week Wheatfield was posting positive things about Pentax, and now Monochrome is thinking about jumping ship. This appears to be one more indicator that the Earth's magnetic poles are about to flip.

[noelpolar]

I recently bought a second K-1.... as I realised I don't need anything more.... and it will always be better then me..... and I'm not saving the world with my photos anyhow..... and I'm sick of them moving buttons around.

[Rondec]

This is a very broad generalization. I do landscape photography. Megapixels means much more to me than AF or burst rate. Other things I considered were features like pixelshift and price. If it were a 24MP camera, it would have been a much harder sell.

Now, obviously, different styles of photography will have different technological priorities, but to claim that everyone who bought the K-1 would have bought one anyway at 24MP is NOT accurate. Or that high MP is a "craze" is extremely narrow minded.



An amusing but a very narrow minded article. "Digital zoom" is not a thing but cropping is. And if the author doesn't comprehend the prospective difference between physically getting closer, and staying further back then cropping, He needs to go back to the fundamentals of photography. And some times you don't have the luxury of moving closer.

Ironically the author complains about "low quality" when you crop. A higher MP sensor allows you to do cropping without losing detail when you enlarge it.

So yes, megapixels do matter.

EDIT:

On topic, I don't think there will be K-1 Mk2. from a product line up stand point it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. The K-3III, GR III, 645Z successor are all much more dire need than a refresh/successor to the K-1. One of the big complaints about the K-1 are the lack of modern FF lenses.

Ricoh/Pentax have a laundry list of things they need to push out that are more important than a K-1 II.

The basic question (I guess) is which is more important frame rate or megapixels. The answer of course is neither. And both. But these days, the A7r III is doing 42 megapixels at 10 frames per second. Sure, the A9 can go to 20 fps at 24 megapixels, but you have to ask the question "Who needs 20 frames per second frame rate?" It is good a question as the similarly silly question "Who really needs 42 megapixels anyway?"

Other than hard drive space and slower (but still decent) frame rates, there is no particular negative to having higher megapixels and it sure does seem as though it is a feature that the average consumer does understand.

[biz-engineer]

The basic question (I guess) is which is more important frame rate or megapixels. The answer of course is neither.

Agreed. When viewing an entire image within the angle of view of human eyes (as opposed to pixel peeping) enlargement doesn't matter anymore, the eye can perceive the extra resolution. The perceived quality of the displayed photograph depends on the quality of the display media (print or screen). But when AF is missed, it is visible on a 1Mpixels image. Autofocus is more important than resolution or frame rate.

[Ontarian50]

I recently bought a second K-1.... as I realised I don't need anything more.... and it will always be better then me..... and I'm not saving the world with my photos anyhow..... and I'm sick of them moving buttons around.

I completely understand and sympathize. But that's also a big reason why the camera industry is in the doldrums, and everyone's predicting doom and gloom. After a decade of rapid upgrades, and trade-ins to chase more megapixels and other features, we photographers are starting to wonder if we will live up to the potential of our 5 year old camera bodies, and anything newer is a waste of cash.

If every K-1 owner decides they have reached their limit, and every Nikon D-800 owner does the same, and every Canon 5Diii also ... well, it's not hard to see how the predicted 2018 unit sales don't look so good.

Especially when the phone makers have something shiny and new to show off every few days.

[thibs]

Rest aussred, some guys like I still did not upgrade from old K-5 (not II).
I will at a time and will be for full frame. It may, however be my final upgrade for a loooong time.
Not enough photography to justify constant upgrades. But a K mount full frame of some sort will end on my shelf whatever its name.

Second hand K-1 might be exactly what I need. Waiting for new K-1 to fall as much as possible to get better 2nd hand price

[monochrome]

I suspect the camera industry will look a lot like 1989 - 1999, minus the compact AF film cameras (which were replaced by compact digital - which were replaced by phones). Problem is the cash flow com compacts is gone forever to Apple and Samsung.

[photoptimist]

The ongoing quest for more resolution reflects both the underlying architecture of human vision and changes in how images are viewed.

First, a key aspect of the human visual system is that it is a foveal visual system. Instead of the human retina having a uniform resolution (like a piece of film or digital sensor), the center has extremely high resolution and the periphery has very low resolution. Our brains build up an incredibly detailed view of the world by panning the high resolution fovea all over the scene. At some level, the total resolution of the mind's eye is unbounded. Even in an incredibly detailed cityscape, the mind can see or imagine every license plate, every red blouse hanging from a 20th-story window, every cigarette butt in the gutter, the menus on the street food carts, and every white dog hair on the black fleece jacket of the man who just walked by. We see and seek detail.

Second, image viewing has changed. We used to print images which is a fixed resolution output medium. And if prints were still the only output medium, then there would be no point in higher resolution than having say 100-300 ppi on some typical print size. Probably 24 MPix would be way more than enough and most prints would be fine with 10 MPix. But now most images are viewed digitally and everyone is used to zooming and panning. And that zooming and panning is perfectly natural because that's exactly what the human eye was design to do.

Humans are biologically designed to be pixel peepers and now we have the technology to satisfy that biological urge. There's no end to the resolution that we might want!

[LeeRunge]

The basic question (I guess) is which is more important frame rate or megapixels. The answer of course is neither. And both. But these days, the A7r III is doing 42 megapixels at 10 frames per second. Sure, the A9 can go to 20 fps at 24 megapixels, but you have to ask the question "Who needs 20 frames per second frame rate?" It is good a question as the similarly silly question "Who really needs 42 megapixels anyway?"

Other than hard drive space and slower (but still decent) frame rates, there is no particular negative to having higher megapixels and it sure does seem as though it is a feature that the average consumer does understand.

High megapixels are great for cropping potential. High FPS might snag *just* the right action moment as well. They both come with costs though. High MP means way more storage needed (RAW 100mb files) and less card space, less buffer for shots etc. It also isn't ideal if you edit and post on the fly with an Ipad. These days I do almost all my editing in Lightroom mobile on an Ipad transfering RAW through wireless. I specifically went after 24mb FF just to keep that process flowing at a reasonable rate. I don't print past 16x20 so the extra cropping would be nice but mostly wasted while actually hurting performance that I use every day. High frame rate means sifting through zillions of photos which is a time killer and wears out shutters much faster.

If transfer speeds didn't mean anything and storage, by all means why not keep adding resolution so long as the lenses can keep up.

---------- Post added 02-03-2018 at 11:08 AM ----------

I completely understand and sympathize. But that's also a big reason why the camera industry is in the doldrums, and everyone's predicting doom and gloom. After a decade of rapid upgrades, and trade-ins to chase more megapixels and other features, we photographers are starting to wonder if we will live up to the potential of our 5 year old camera bodies, and anything newer is a waste of cash.

If every K-1 owner decides they have reached their limit, and every Nikon D-800 owner does the same, and every Canon 5Diii also ... well, it's not hard to see how the predicted 2018 unit sales don't look so good.

Especially when the phone makers have something shiny and new to show off every few days.

I think we'll see a big slow down. I've upgraded body's a bunch of times in the last ten years. K7 to K5, huge jump in ISO and DR. K5 to K3, big jump in resolution (not really needed though) and AF got much better in low light, camera was also faster to operate. I skipped K-1 as I don't want larger files for my editing process and wanted a longer reach than 450mm. Went D750 to get the AF and lens I want. Where I'm at now I've got great AF, great DR, great ISO, enough resolution to print any size I'd want. I think many people are in that same happy place with the newer body's just not showing a big leap in performance like they used too. Like the D850 for me, no need to upgrade as the cheaper D750 fills all my needs.

It's sort of the same scenario gaming computers had in the past. You would upgrade every year because performance was increasing so fast. Now a PC will last 5 years and everything runs great on it. I see the same time gap happening with Camera bodys unless they introduce features that are very attractive to lure us into another body.

Sensors are all getting to the point now where they do well up to ISO 6400 (even M43) and all of them get good results. I've got prints around the house from multiple systems and nobody but me knows what came from which.

[Rondec]

High megapixels are great for cropping potential. High FPS might snag *just* the right action moment as well. They both come with costs though. High MP means way more storage needed (RAW 100mb files) and less card space, less buffer for shots etc. It also isn't ideal if you edit and post on the fly with an Ipad. These days I do almost all my editing in Lightroom mobile on an Ipad transfering RAW through wireless. I specifically went after 24mb FF just to keep that process flowing at a reasonable rate. I don't print past 16x20 so the extra cropping would be nice but mostly wasted while actually hurting performance that I use every day. High frame rate means sifting through zillions of photos which is a time killer and wears out shutters much faster.

If transfer speeds didn't mean anything and storage, by all means why not keep adding resolution so long as the lenses can keep up.

---------- Post added 02-03-2018 at 11:08 AM ----------



I think we'll see a big slow down. I've upgraded body's a bunch of times in the last ten years. K7 to K5, huge jump in ISO and DR. K5 to K3, big jump in resolution (not really needed though) and AF got much better in low light, camera was also faster to operate. I skipped K-1 as I don't want larger files for my editing process and wanted a longer reach than 450mm. Went D750 to get the AF and lens I want. Where I'm at now I've got great AF, great DR, great ISO, enough resolution to print any size I'd want. I think many people are in that same happy place with the newer body's just not showing a big leap in performance like they used too. Like the D850 for me, no need to upgrade as the cheaper D750 fills all my needs.

It's sort of the same scenario gaming computers had in the past. You would upgrade every year because performance was increasing so fast. Now a PC will last 5 years and everything runs great on it. I see the same time gap happening with Camera bodys unless they introduce features that are very attractive to lure us into another body.

Sensors are all getting to the point now where they do well up to ISO 6400 (even M43) and all of them get good results. I've got prints around the house from multiple systems and nobody but me knows what came from which.

You would have to more than double resolution to see 100 megabyte files. Currently, typical raw DNG files from the K-1 are about 40 megabytes and jpegs are 15 or 16 megabytes. At a certain point there is probably little benefit, but here, we aren't talking about huge increases by going, say, from 36 to 42 megapixels with an actual boost in frame rates if it is desired.

As biz-engineer says, the biggest question is really not one of resolution or frame rates but of auto focus speed and whether or not the camera and lens can keep up with the frame rates. Currently, Pentax can't -- at least not with tracking auto focus -- but I expect they are working to improve that and it should be possible with newest DC lenses.

[Kunzite]

The thing is, resolution and auto focus speed are kinda orthogonal, in other words having one doesn't preclude the other. The "I'd have X rather than Y" doesn't work. The real problem with the AF speed is, well, the AF speed/AF system - not the sensor resolution; and you can't solve a problem by working on another.
How about the buffer? Going for the 24MP sensor would not be a solution either: while the file sizes would decrease somewhat, the faster burst speed would mean there's more data to take care of. Unless the real problem is being solved (card write speeds), the camera would still be unbalanced in this regard.

[monochrome]

I suspect for quite some time the ILC segment of the camera industry will resemble the end of the AE manual film camera era, when advancements were incremental and bodies lasted years (decades, actually). There just wasn’t much reason to upgrade, so prices and margins rose. Camera companies had a lot of cash flow from automatic fixed lens cameras (and then compact digital cameras) but since June, 2007 the iPhone and its brethren have completely replaced compact digital and captured that cash flow.

The MILC evolution is really equivalent to the AF evolution of film cameras. It’s just advancement, not replacement - it doesn’t expand the market and it doesn’t replace an entire segment. Phone cameras do both.

ILC maker’s will learn to survive on lower unit volume and higher margins. Or they won’t.