Originally posted by Dan Rentea If you read all my comments, in one of them I said "Why people invest in a 36mp K1 beast and use it with film era lenses is beyond me. The only logical reasons I came up with are:
1. the nostalgia.
2. Lack of modern lenses in those focal lenghts"
I should also have included collectors which are somehow related to the first category, the nostalgic one. You can take pictures with anything these days if you put it like you did above. In fact, we have a very good and respected photographer who is an architect also and he has some teaching classes for one of the largest photo store in Europe which is located in Bucharest - Romania. One of his seminars is called "Seeing through your smartphone" and it's a very popular and on demand seminar. Here is the website of that photographer Vlad Eftenie.
It seems that the ones who were shooting film are the ones that won't let go old lenses. Some of them are defending the old lenses and they are also promoting those lenses. From a business perspective, this user base of people using and promoting vintage lenses are less than ideal. We want Ricoh to grow as a brand, but we don't buy Pentax modern lenses because they are expensive. We don't buy Sigma or Tamron lenses either because we prefer Pentax lenses (as some people suggest). The R&D money for developing new lenses are less and less with every person who doesn't buy Pentax lenses. That's one of the reasons why Sigma left the building in my opinion.
I see from time to time a Dacia car from 1970 (a romanian brand of cars) on Bucharest streets. It takes the owners from a place to another. I feel nostalgic when I see that car because we had a car like that and a lot of memories come to my mind. But, driving a car like that by someone who doesn't know the old times it's not a great experience. Same or similar when comes to vintage lenses... the ones who used them usually take their time to take pictures...
I don't know how to put it so that won't be interpreted in the wrong way. I used smiley faces in the above comments. Sure, we buy what we want and we spend as much as we want for gear. But to me is odd to invest in a pro body to use it with vintage lenses when there are lots of cheap cameras that can be used with those lenses if someone wants to remember the good old days.
Thanks for the explanation, Dan
I understand what you're saying, and I don't
think I'm interpreting it incorrectly.
I agree that
some folks shoot
some older lenses because there aren't any current KAF offerings in those focal lengths. I also agree that popularity of old lenses doesn't help Ricoh / Pentax with sales of newer glass. However, I've no doubt Ricoh knew (and knows) its target market for the K-1 & K-1II very well. It knew that many would be prepared (if not always totally satisfied) to shoot legacy glass while modern full-frame lens offerings are being developed. So whilst this willingness to shoot older glass doesn't help new lens sales, it undoubtedly helps sales of the K-1 and K-1II.
Regarding nostalgia... With respect, I don't think this plays as big a role as you make out. Although at 50 years I'm old enough to have shot film back in the day, I actually didn't get into photography until quite late on. My first interchangeable lens camera was digital - a Nikon D40X (when that model was about to be replaced by the D60), followed a year or two later by the Pentax K-7. I cut my teeth on modern kit lenses, then modern, inexpensive primes like the DA50/1.8. If I remember correctly, I didn't get my first film-era lens - a Pentax M50/1.7 - until some time later when I bought the K-5, followed by my first vintage Soviet lens four or five years ago - a Helios-44M 58/2. I fell in love with the rendering from the Helios, and thus began my fondness for older Soviet glass which I started to collect. There was no element of nostalgia to it - I just liked the rendering and the results I was getting. I'd guess that I'm far from unusual in this respect... There are young photographers and film-makers buying up vintage lenses in their droves because of the characterful rendering they've heard about. For them, it has nothing to do with nostalgia, and everything to do with achieving a different / distinctive look.
A K-1 enables the photographer to capture the intended image circle portion of
any 35mm-format lens at high resolution, with impressive dynamic range, and low noise. Why should it matter the age and cost of the lens, if the photographer appreciates the output from that lens? Why should the photographer choose anything less than the best camera he or she can afford to record the output of their chosen lenses? Specifically,
what is it about inexpensive older lenses that you feel doesn't warrant using a high resolution, wide dynamic range, full frame camera? After all, the film cameras they were originally intended for were "full frame" and offered the equivalent of high resolution and wide dynamic range with good film stock... Why shoot with a digital body that offers anything less?
I hope this doesn't come across as argumentative, Dan. We have a difference in view-point, but I consider our respective views equally valid. It's a mark of my interest in yours that I'm engaging you on it further - not an intention to argue
Perhaps we ought to take this to a new thread, as we've gone way off topic
Last edited by BigMackCam; 12-06-2019 at 02:54 PM.