[kypfer]

If I was Ricoh marketing , I would add a 3 months timeout in camera firmware such that if you haven't connected all of the limited lenses within 3 months, your camera won't power-up

Haha

I had a similar thought … that the update would only work during the season it was designed for!

[y0chang]

I feel that if Pentax did this for say all the FA and DA limiteds in each season it would reach a greater audience. I realize that this is more of a test of this "curated experience", but even if you count all the users world wide, there won't be enough people actually using this profile. This feels like Pentax is trying to put a niche in a niche.

[house]

Business behaviour with various artificial limitations have a long and fraught history. Pentax and those not seeing the issue probably aren't familiar with the many controversies and their consequences.

Brand management is extremely sensitive and difficult. Missteps may have long term, hard to repair consequences. Pointing out the issues is important to prevent Pentax from going further down this line.

I think this was intended as light-hearted fun along the lines of the "Pentax official" site. A sort of game for users. Unfortunately the history of these kinds of moves by business means those aware of said history will react very badly indeed. These "fun" activities could be useful and fun but Pentax needs to steer well clear of the dangerous waters many business and marketing people will lead them into.

[reh321]

Business behaviour with various artificial limitations have a long and fraught history. Pentax and those not seeing the issue probably aren't familiar with the many controversies and their consequences.

Brand management is extremely sensitive and difficult. Missteps may have long term, hard to repair consequences. Pointing out the issues is important to prevent Pentax from going further down this line.

I think this was intended as light-hearted fun along the lines of the "Pentax official" site.

and we in the West have zero understanding of how it is being received in Japan.
Unfortunately, we hear all they say there, even if they just whisper.
Pentax understands what the Japanese market much better than we do.

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Last edited by reh321; 06-24-2022 at 08:17 AM.

[JPT]

Pentax just sent out a "Summer Sale" coupon code to Japan users that links to several deals. Notably the K-3 III, the K-1 II and the DFA21 are among them. The email also has links to the firmware and article about it. So I think this is part of a coordinated sales push for their two main cameras and certain lenses.

Incidentally, another interesting thing in the email is that they are promoting a camera rental service, which seems to be new.

[jersey]

Consider it as a mini-game introduced by Pentax. Nothing to be offended about, just be happy that Pentax is willing to invest into such pranks, smile and go on with it.


I personally appreciate it, it does not seem like a profile I would like to use everyday and with emphasis on sky look it may be good profile for 15mm used on sunny summer day.

[lytrytyr]

The latest firmware introduces a specific custom image to be used only with specific lenses.

The first one is summer themed and can be used with the K-3 III plus HD 15mm ltd or the the K-1 or K-1 II with the new 21mm ltd.

Introducing profiles that mess with the Limiteds' rendering kind of defeats the intended object of them.

[madison_wi_gal]

Confirming that my SMC DA 15 Ltd does nothing here. I have the SMC 21 Ltd so expect nothing there either. My 20-40 is the real deal so I guess I wait and see.

---------- Post added 06-24-22 at 22:06 ----------

Sorry. Same old, same old argument doesn't fly with me and never did. Last time I looked even on Windows or Apple there weren't too many packages which read DNG but not PEF. On Linux that number goes down to zero. What is your definition of "broadly supported"?

Just tested on Mac OS, changed RAW format in K-3 III from DNG to PEF. Took a snap, inserted SD into Mac.

DxO says fine
DCU says fine
Photos (MacOS native app) has white blank box. Has no idea what to do with this (unlike DNG)

SInce I only use Photos to do a quick look-see I don't care, I can do same in DCU or DxO. But in this experiment, Apple native app can read DNG but not PEF.

Cheers!

[Ian Stuart Forsyth]

but if you can achieve the settings you require in DCU, which are far more extensive and comprehensive than being "limited to selecting just profiles"

Profiles are the first setup as to how the image will look, if profiles are not that important then one should be able to select any profile say vivid profile and simply make adjustments in DCU or the camera's settings and make the image appear the same as if portrait profile in the camera or DCU had processed the image. This is why creating the first step the profile cannot be just mimicked. there is a reason as to why a person would first select the profile of camera and then make adjustments to the other settings in the camera. One of the major is how colors are going to be produced, how light or dark that color would be processed in relation to the other colors in the image.

This also includes matching profiles that if one of my cameras is used I then can produce the very same look as if was taken with a different camera with a different sensor manufacturer, when shooting jpeg so I can hand off work directly off the people that are using my work without issues with how colors appear from those different cameras

[leekil]

It's possible that's all it is. It's also possible for there to be more important fixes for the K3III that will improve the overall camera operation.

The firmware doesn't really change size based on how many fixes are in it; you get a whole new replacement firmware each time, it's isn't just adding only the new things on top of the old firmware in the camera. The K-3 III firmware is probably always larger than the older cameras' firmware.

---------- Post added 06-24-22 at 08:26 PM ----------

Sorry. Same old, same old argument doesn't fly with me and never did. Last time I looked even on Windows or Apple there weren't too many packages which read DNG but not PEF. On Linux that number goes down to zero. What is your definition of "broadly supported"?

The biggest risk would be that many years in the future, DNG would be more likely supported than a proprietary camera format. But if you're using Linux, the open source PEF reader might still be maintained.

[detour]

Pentax just sent out a "Summer Sale" coupon code to Japan users that links to several deals. Notably the K-3 III, the K-1 II and the DFA21 are among them.

Hi, JPT. Could you please give the source news? Thank you in advance.

[leekil]

Introducing profiles that mess with the Limiteds' rendering kind of defeats the intended object of them.

It doesn't mess with the limiteds' rendering, just adjusts the colors. But you also can chose not to use those profiles with your limiteds.

[Paul the Sunman]

K1 + DFA 21mm Limited @ f/5.6. Jpegs straight-out of camera. The blue sky is slightly more saturated in BRIGHT compared to KATEN, but the grass is a little more saturated in KATEN.

The current DCU5 doesn't recognise KATEN of course.

BRIGHT and KATEN
<---->

SATOBI

[Digitalis]

The blue sky is slightly more saturated in BRIGHT compared to KATEN, but the grass is a little more saturated in KATEN.

On my calibrated display it would also appear the midtones of the image are a bit more compressed than the bright setting, there is a overall cooler hue balance and and emphasis on green/ yellow end of the spectrum.

But this is just from one image, I'd prefer to look at the effect from a gretag macbeth colour chart to see where the changes really are.

[Paul the Sunman]

On my calibrated display it would also appear the midtones of the image are a bit more compressed than the bright setting, there is a overall cooler hue balance and and emphasis on green/ yellow end of the spectrum.

I'm looking at them on a newly calibrated Benq SW270C, and I don't disagree.