[ogl]

At Calgary Photo Expo said that Pentax has no plan to make neither FF, nor MF.

[awo425]

Sad, I guess i can say now: Future laid out for me, no new products from Pentax

[ogl]

New APS-C camera will be. K30D and K300D.

[RMabo]

...which is basically what they are saying. Everything is uncommitical. They are not spilling the beans but saying that 645D and FF are all options provided they are financially viable.

But medium format digital is a closer option than 24x36, which has been stated in two recent interviews. So of the two options, the medium format digital is more likely than the 24x36.

[deejjjaaaa]

New APS-C camera will be. K30D and K300D.

K300D will be a "bit" changed K20D (same sensor minus some goodies to keep it a level below K20D/K30D - like pentamirror instead of pentaprism, etc... like K200D was a "bit" changed K10D)... call it K20DC (C for castrated).

K30D will have more mpixels, but the same SAFOX/metering/WB/fps...

[*isteve]

1) Bjørn Rørslett has no credibility in my book. He was one of the first digital zealots who claimed that 2mp was better than 35mm film and approaching medium format. This was and is clearly nonsense. It is noteworthy that Pentax says the 14,6mp is as good as 35mm film which is probably closer to the truth.

Closer in some ways, but it depends on your basis for comparison. At similar ISO from 100 and up, film grain is much more obvious and has more impact on enlargement than resolution. Generally you can enlarge a 6MP digital print as far as a 100 ISO negative print and what you lose in fine detail you gain in edge sharpness and lack of grain. 14.6MP is probably about as good as the best slide film with top end glass, but 6MP was at least as good as an average Kodak Gold 100 film on a consumer SLR with consumer lens.

2) Thom Hogans predictions is usually wrong. Even 35mm film cameras show difference between good or bad lenses. It is not overkill how these cameras resolves bacuse it is not resolution digital excels, but in edge definition, and hence apparent sharpness and lack of noise. Film outresolves them. An it is not true that the differences are only visible at large prints. It is only true if your judgement of quality is not seing noise and that the image still appear sharp. If you look at texture, which is where resolution really hit in, then the difference is obvious in even the smallest print.

But if that texture is grainy then its not real texture, its just grain. Fortunately however Thom Hogan is usually wrong in his business predictions, or we would not be posting on a Pentax forum.

3) John Sheehy is right as usual. You need 100mp for APS in order to "outresolve" the lenses. That should put Thom Hogans 12mp outresolving lenses and all the resolution you want in the correct perspective!

Actually this is a bit misleading. You said yourself that even on a 6MP sensor you can tell the difference between a good and a bad lens so 100MP is a little OTT. More to the point, relatively few lenses show any practical resolution improvement between 10 and 15MP. The problem is measuring practical resolution rather than theoretical resolution. Most systems use MTF 50 for visible detail at normal viewing distance and MTF 10 for max visible resolution. Even at MTF10 there are few lenses that would match a 100MP APS sensor and even if they did you wouldnt see the difference in most prints.

[k100d]

K30D will have more mpixels, but the same SAFOX/metering/WB/fps...

i hope not! more mp isn't really important
but upgrading SAFOX, metering, WB, fps should be priorities

[Kunzite]

K100D, don't worry. Deejjjaaaa doesn't know anything, is just wild speculation.
Btw, our little K-m slightly improves the SAFOX speed and the fps; I think the "K30D" should be better

[ogl]

New AF system will be in new cameras. At Calgary Photo Expo said it.

[Supernaut]

New AF system will be in new cameras. At Calgary Photo Expo said it.

Interesting! Can you verify with a link or where you there?

[Supernaut]

By the way.. Do you think that that K300 and K30 will be moved up half a notch to make the K30 more pro and differentiate K-m/K2000 more from K300?
My guess (just speculating here) is that three models is enough for the engineer team to develop and support for the moment. Imo, it's enogh for the customers too

[tcdk]

Btw, our little K-m slightly improves the SAFOX speed and the fps; I think the "K30D" should be better

Nit: K-m doesn't really improve on fps speed when you look at the amount of data compared to the K20D. K10D->K20D improved on the amount of data pushed. K20D->K-m is moving less data...

I know this is nit-picking, but when wanting to extrapolate to what the K30D will do, the K-m doesn't say anything (new/good) about how much data PRIME can push...

[thibs]

I know this is nit-picking, but when wanting to extrapolate to what the K30D will do, the K-m doesn't say anything (new/good) about how much data PRIME can push...

Indeed, the only thing K-M means is:

• Slightly faster mirror box (3.5fps)
• faster AF (tweaked algorithms)

Still interesting to note but they need to process files faster as well as tweaking the mirror box, otherwise K30D will be stuck at 3fps.

[Kunzite]

tcdk, yes, that's nit-picking
I'm not talking about technical issues, data processing - but about something much more basic than that. If your entry level can do 3.5 fps, your flagship (a camera 2 levels higher, in this case) should be faster - otherwise, you will upset your customers.
If they will do that, they probably won't use the same PRIME, but a faster version or maybe 2 of them? But that's not the point.

[mikereid]

2. There are no plans for 35mm full-size sensor but instead development of superior 645 digital is ongoing, the result targeted to serious amateurs. (Therefore cheaper than rival systems?)

looks like my Sigma 12-24 was a waste of money, should have got the 10-20 APS only