Originally posted by Adam I think adding this tech to the K-1 makes a lot of sense. Pentax seems to be betting pretty heavily on appealing to those who value image quality above all else. But not improving the AF might piss a lot of people off...there certainly doesn't appear to be any innovation going on.
At the end of the day, improving the image quality of the camera only goes so far when we're stuck with lenses from yesteryear. I get that Canon and Nikon recycle designs too and use a lot of their film era lenses with minor updates (Canon especially), but they do have a healthy stock of lenses designed for high resolution sensors. Pentax has few at the moment.
Originally posted by Adam Of course I would have liked the K-1 II to have 100 AF points like everyone else, or improved video. But perhaps it's time to accept that Pentax will always be behind in these areas.
It seems that's the case. The issue is the AF tech. It's a good 5-8 years behind at this point. There's really no excuse for that now.
When I shoot at f/2 with the DA*55, the only high resolution normal lens for the K-1, my keep rate is like 20%, if that. I have to shoot 10 images to get one or two that are fully sharp; most are close but off by just a bit. I've really gotten tired of it. A new lens would be nice but it's been two years and Pentax still hasn't produced the 50mm we've been promised....
Originally posted by redpit For those that are already unhappy with Pentax I can see there may be more reasons now to go away (although high expectations for a totally different II model is what might ruined it for them). I have to say something and I'm really serious about that! Before you jump ship find good reasons for doing so (e.g. much better AF-C performance, more FPS, deeper buffer, more lens options). There are many. I would advice them though to shoot side by side with some good photographers with D850 and 5DIV with top lenses and compare the results
The image quality of the K-1 is quite good. That's not an issue, really. The product line, however, is. More than that, the message this sends is not one of confidence. It's been two years since the K-1 came out and we've gotten what for it?
NOT ONE NEW FF LENS in that time. This update, to me, says "This is our product and our product line and it's not going to improve." Feels like the K-1 was a bone they threw to long-time Pentax users but they either don't have the interest or the resources to develop it into a product line that can remotely compete with the offerings from Canon and Nikon.
And I'm not even talking about having two hundred crazy lenses in weird focal lengths. A modern 35mm. A modern 50mm. A modern 85mm. We have none of those. The 24-70 is a rebadge. We've been waiting for two years for some of these products and gotten nothing.
A friend of mine had the 645Z and really loved the camera. The lack of third party support (i.e., his flash equipment which said it would work with HSS and just didn't despite his efforts) and a sense of "This is all I'm going to get" is what made him abandon it for Fuji. I may finally understand.