Originally posted by BruceBanner Yeah, it could, which is worrying.
I'm a little worried for Pentax in some ways. Whilst we're happy progress and production is happening I am a little concerned over their strategy direction.
Let's all be honest about Pentax for a minute. Pentax is not marketed for Professionals, yet look at some of these recent price tags. Before you all go crazy and shout at me, hear me out. If I grab 100 professional event shooters (weddings etc), I guarantee Pentax will be right at the bottom in terms of amount of users. A large proportion of those shooters will be Canikonyji. The fact that Canon and Nikon offer professional membership/service in case you are needing equipment in a hurry due to failure shows how much these brands can support their customer base. If my K-1 dies the day before an event I can't even go into a store nearby for a replacement (let alone be part of a service that will replace my camera then and there with another model to use whilst mine is being repaired etc).
Pentax don't market towards that arena, you won't see any of their marketing content geared towards wedding shooters.
They don' do sport or action, which again is dominated by Canikony. They are not strong in photo journalism either (when's the last time you saw a paparazzi with a Pentax?).
So Pentax don't compete or try to in three major professional revenues;
- Events/Weddings
- Sport/Action
- Photojournalism
Now, I'm not finished yet, so hold your hatred and breath just for a second...
Where the K-1 has been marketed often is the landscape realm, no doubt about it, when the K-1 was released in 2016 they produced a really impressive landscape FF camera. You will see landscape images mostly associated with the Pentax brand in what little marketing material they produce.
Wildlife, yeah ok, a little, but many wildlife togs have left Pentax and went Canikony for AF/Buffer issues. The K-new is exciting because it does suggest an improvement in those areas and a comeback to the wildlife genre.
At the end of the day I see the Pentax brand as being heavily geared towards landscapers, which is fair enough. Sadly however, they are little used in the landscape realm. You won't find many (to any!) users shooting a K-1 in the 'Easy Way Photograhy group or the Nightscape Photographers Australia group. It's quite saddening, even when we get a newbie asking for suggestions, K-1 is never mentioned. When I bring it up many users are surprised by the spec sheet and it's the first time they have even heard of the camera...
For some that are aware of the K-1, the points they bring up is lack of Astro suitable lenses. Now I'm not an expert in this genre, but when chatting with these chaps they seem to understand the Pentax landscape lenses on offer (15-30, Samyang options etc) but are still adamant that certain key focal lengths are omitted which prompted their own decisions to not buy into Pentax. They brought up the point that really after the K-1 they needed to concentrate all their efforts on UWA FF lenses and push for dominance in the landscape/astro genre, but they didn't. Again, not saying this is my opinion, just those I have heard from others who are really into this genre.
Always when I hear of a Canikony coming across to the Pentax platform with great enthusiasm, it's for landscape use (some are still pleased so it seems). Always those that leave Pentax and go to Canikony is typically due to AF/fps/buffer issues and are professionals in studio, weddings, photojournalism etc. Eventually they have enough... the market moves forward and more choices are available to them.
So here we have Pentax, still alive and kicking, but a small market share and an even smaller professional market share (users whom use Pentax and generate a solid living from JUST Pentax products). I'm not saying it isn't done, always there are exceptions. Please don't spam me with Pentax studio, sport, weddings or whatever sample shots, I get it..., I'm just saying how things are in the industry in general.
So if Pentax are not appealing heavily to professionals, then they must be appealing to enthusiasts.
So, here's the point. What enthusiast is gonna pay **2000quid for a portrait lens? How well did the DFA 50/1.4 sell? Who bought that lens? Two pretty expensive primes there... Are only rich loyal Pentaxians their market interest now? Maybe it is! Maybe it will work, maybe they become the Leica of Japan... I just dunno.
A lot of chitchat about this lens currently but not many people saying they will jump on it. When reading comments from other non Pentaxians they droll over the lens but then sigh what would be connected to the other end of it lol.
I'm not getting into the FF vs Mirrorless thing, it just feels about their pace in moving alongside other brands. Now if this 85/1.4 was released with a new FF (K-2) that had made significant improvements, that might actually have been really compelling and entice some ex Pentaxians to come back. Honestly... I just dunno whose gonna buy this lens, with that price tag, not because its not a justified price tag, the lens will be probably be the best 85/1.4 in the market period, but whose buying it?
Please note this is not a Pentax is doomed piece, just curious to hear your thoughts.
Bruce, the thing is, the low end market is pretty much dead in the water. A couple of more broadsides from the good ship Smartphone and the bottom of the market is going to sink deeper than the Bismarck. There is no point in going after a market that effectively no longer exists. The midrange market is being bought and paid for by Sony, though I do wonder how long they are going to be willing to throw money at the wall when it stops sticking, Nikon and Canon are now in a perpetual game of playing catch up.
The midrange is almost as dependant on volume sales as the low end market, and let's face it, Pentax doesn't have, and never will have, the volume required to be profitable in that market.
That leave the high end market. It's a small volume niche market suited to a small volume company. It's an expensive market to get into, and the quality absolutely has to be there. This is where Pentax is going. The D FA* 50/1.4 is pretty close to flawless, the D FA* 85/1.4 appears to be close to perfection.
In a way, Ricoh is going right back to the roots of the Pentax way. Pentax glass has always been very good, at one time it was well nigh impossible to buy a better lens than what Pentax was producing.
We are seeing a return to that Golden Age when Pentax was the standard that everyone chased.
They aren't going for volume, they aren't going for the Pro, they are going for the discerning amateur. They are going for the customer who wants the very best and who is willing to pay a premium for it.
They are going after the same customer that kept Leica in business for so many decades when they were completely out of step making rangefinders in an SLR world.
I believe, in a few years, that we are going to see three lens lines from Pentax, there will always be the cheap and cheerful zooms, they aren't going anywhere, and I anticipate they are going to be co-brands and rebrands, such as we are seeing with the new 70-210.
There will be the Limiteds, quirky little lenses with odd maximum apertures and very unique and pleasing imaging character. The just teased 21mm lens being the first of a new generation of Limited lenses for the digital age. Expect the 31, 43 and 77 to be revisited, with redesigns keeping what we love about those lenses intact while minimizing the weaknesses that are inherent to their pre digital designs.
And finally, there will be the D FA* lenses. These will be the optical beasts. No compromises. Lenses that are what they have to be to be as close to perfect as a lens can be. Big, heavy, expensive and exquisite. Once in a lifetime lenses that can and will be appreciated by advanced photographic aficionados.
Ricoh knows that they are in a market unto themselves. I'm quite certain that they have people on staff who can read English and can translate the idiocy that is DPReview into something meaningful.
Well, maybe not, that is a pretty tall order, but they have to know that they aren't going to get any respect from the mass market morons that post on websites such as that.
They are going to market to people that actually have lives, that aren't trolls living in their parent's basement who sneak upstairs and fire up mommies computer to throw shade at whomever they have decided the bandwagon is telling them to.
They are, as Pentax has always done, marketing to real photographers who appreciate the benefits of the very best lenses money can buy.