[krebsy75]

The K-01 is most certainly form over function. And I happen to like that camera.

[THoog]

The KS-1 might do well in Japan. It might sell well at Star Trek conventions. There is nothing wrong with its capabilities, but for the price I would buy the K-50 or even a K-30 first. The KS-1 and the K-01 are both fashion over function cameras for people who care more about the looks than anything else. Yes. The LED lights are gimmicky IMO. The body looks cheap with gaps that made some people think it was a modular design when it first came out. The corporate loyalist who only care about the brand name on the camera will buy it and defend it to the end. For the rest of us its an irrelevant camera from a company that really can't afford to be making irrelevant products.

It sounds like you are getting hung up on appearances. There are no gaps in the body - just an optical illusion in the product photos because of a mold line. In person, the body looks and feels as solid and well built as any other Pentax plastic body. As to the LEDs, turn them off, and you'd be unaware of their existence if it weren't for the constant griping about them. The 5-4-3-2-1 countdown timer is actually a functional improvement over "blinkblinkblink".

"Being small" is a function, and that was the design goal - to make the smallest K-mount possible for their primary target market, which appears to be Japanese women - a segment that is apparently very under-represented in camera sales, and wide open to the right product. Most of Pentax' sales are in Japan, so making products that are relevant to their primary market seems like a good business, no matter what the secondary markets might think. They can always dump the leftover stock in the US. We'll buy anything if we think it is a bargain.

[Winder]

It sounds like you are getting hung up on appearances. There are no gaps in the body - just an optical illusion in the product photos because of a mold line. In person, the body looks and feels as solid and well built as any other Pentax plastic body. As to the LEDs, turn them off, and you'd be unaware of their existence if it weren't for the constant griping about them. The 5-4-3-2-1 countdown timer is actually a functional improvement over "blinkblinkblink".

"Being small" is a function, and that was the design goal - to make the smallest K-mount possible for their primary target market, which appears to be Japanese women - a segment that is apparently very under-represented in camera sales, and wide open to the right product. Most of Pentax' sales are in Japan, so making products that are relevant to their primary market seems like a good business, no matter what the secondary markets might think. They can always dump the leftover stock in the US. We'll buy anything if we think it is a bargain.

I said it "Looks cheap", not that it is cheap. Whether the gaps are an optical illusion or not doesn't change that. I guess the LED lights do make life easier for all those millions of people who can't figure out the "blinkblinkblink". Of course I think those people have bigger problems, like figuring out how to turn the camera on.

I said "The KS-1 might do well in Japan." There seems to be an obsession with toys over there. For the price, there are better cameras on the market, so the people who are buying it are buying it for looks and not value.

---------- Post added 12-14-14 at 10:23 AM ----------

It provides the perfect platform for M42 lenses, letting you compose at working aperture
(and accepts lenses like the Westromat which foul DSLR mirrors).
It lets you focus and use lenses like the K or A50/1.2 handheld in low light conditions.
And both the K-01 and KS-1 have small, light bodies that are easy to carry around.

I just bought a Sony A7m2 will do all of those things and gives me a FF sensor. It works great with M42, K-mount, Leica M, Canon EF, Nikon F, Zeiss and Voightlander for practically any camera they made lenses for. So far the Sony A7m2 w/Zeiss 55mm F/1.8 has been focusing faster than my K-3 with the 31mm LTD.

The really good thing about the K-01 is that nobody bought them and they ended up being sold at fire sale prices. The K-01 was a great deal when they were being liquidated at under $300.00 each. This time next year the KS-1 will also be sold at fire sale prices.

[normhead]

Cross posted from https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/16-pentax-news-rumors/282658-australian-n...ml#post3078623 , because I get tired of repeating myself.

A friend bought a D3200 with an 18-250 so she wouldn't have to change lenses. I think she paid around 800 Canadian for it. Mind you it doesn't do bracketing and a pile of other stuff Pentax users take for granted. So I understand the market. She also has small hands and preferred the smaller size of that camera and light weight. The odd thing was even though I was comparing her 24 MP camera to my K-5 images, with the 18-250 lens on the camera, there was no discernible increase in IQ. But when she held my K-5 her comment was "to big, too heavy."

So, the fact that there's people here who don't know what the market is for this camera, I know one personally, and there are probably thousands more.

I know everyone thinks any camera designed to be what they want is perfect, and the cameras designed for other people are trash.... but that's just psychopaths talking. Psychopaths in that they can't empathize with other folks enough to realize that different people have different needs.

For my friend, the criteria were, small and light, easy to use, no lens changes. But she would have liked a bracketing implementation. This camera once the price drops will be right up her alley. And she represents a market just as much as the posters on the forum. It's just a market that isn't represented on the forum. (The forum tends to be people who overthink their gear, where as her market are probably people who under think their gear, they just want better than point and shoot.) But it is quite possibly a larger market segment than is represented here. When I look at my non-photographer friends and by far the largest market is non pros, I think this camera could do really well.

There is also some speculation that this camera might hurt Pentax... it is very likely Pentax will sell more of these cameras than they will sell K-3s. It is just as likely that there will continue to be new releases of high end Pentax cameras because in part o the money made selling these cameras. In that scenario far from hurting Pentax, they make the cameras you like possible. Yet we have folks on here trashing the camera instead of saying "Thank you... thank you very much." Kind of like biting the hand that feeds you.... the KS-1 uses Pentax technology... and the more of that they sell, the cheaper it will get. I don't care what a bunch of forum reading navel gazers think the success of this camera will be... if it sells Pentax technology it will help the brand, and help pay for new Pentax technology, and that's good for me, even if some of the rest of the Pentax world can do intellectual contortions to come up with bizarre reasons as to why it isn't good for Pentax, or for themselves.

---

Last edited by normhead; 12-14-2014 at 09:52 AM.

[lytrytyr]

I just bought a Sony A7m2 will do all of those things and gives me a FF sensor. It works great with M42, K-mount, Leica M, Canon EF, Nikon F, Zeiss and Voightlander for practically any camera they made lenses for.

Seems you had to leave out the bit about reliably auto-focusing the Tamron.

And I won't go into the IQ issues that appear when you use adapters for a foreign mount:

LensRentals.com - There Is No Free Lunch, Episode 763: Lens Adapters

[THoog]

I said it "Looks cheap", not that it is cheap. Whether the gaps are an optical illusion or not doesn't change that. I guess the LED lights do make life easier for all those millions of people who can't figure out the "blinkblinkblink". Of course I think those people have bigger problems, like figuring out how to turn the camera on.

I said "The KS-1 might do well in Japan." There seems to be an obsession with toys over there. For the price, there are better cameras on the market, so the people who are buying it are buying it for looks and not value.

And it still sounds like you are hung up on appearances. As Norm pointed out, small size itself is a feature that people will pay for.

I just bought a Sony A7m2 will do all of those things and gives me a FF sensor. It works great with M42, K-mount, Leica M, Canon EF, Nikon F, Zeiss and Voightlander for practically any camera they made lenses for. So far the Sony A7m2 w/Zeiss 55mm F/1.8 has been focusing faster than my K-3 with the 31mm LTD.

That's great! I hope you enjoy it. (You see, that's how you talk about a camera that's not right for you, but may be for someone else.)

We're done here.

[tvdtvdtvd]

Cross posted from https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/16-pentax-news-rumors/282658-australian-n...ml#post3078623 , because I get tired of repeating myself.

A friend bought a D3200 with an 18-250 so she wouldn't have to change lenses. (snip)

Sorry to derail, but why does anyone buy a DSLR if they don't want to change lenses?

[clackers]

So far the Sony A7m2 w/Zeiss 55mm F/1.8 has been focusing faster than my K-3 with the 31mm LTD.

I'd be genuinely interested for you to post side-by-side pictures here you've taken with your A7m2/55mm and K3/ FA31 combos, Winder.

[LensBeginner]

Sorry to derail, but why does anyone buy a DSLR if they don't want to change lenses?

Well, theoretically you could buy it for choice. Find me a camera equipped with a fixed focal single lens ("rangefinder-style") that has a 77mm on it...

[Rondec]

If I could give Winder +1 via tapatalk I would. He nailed it from A to Z.

Pentax didn't need the K-S1. There are at least a half dozen products or upgrades that could been realized instead. Things like leaf-shutter lenses for the 645, ring motors to replace SDM, DC-powered lit zooms. The list goes on.

Pentax "needs" a lot of things. All of the things you mention appeal to current users and higher end users. How many leaf shutter lenses would Pentax actually sell? I imagine it would be in the hundreds at most. Depending on the cost to develop such a product, it could hurt the brand quite a bit.

One of the things that Pentax needs, is products that appeal to entry level folks that are upgrading from cell phone cameras. The K-S1 seems to be targeted at those kinds of folks. And the price is coming down a lot. Amazon is selling it for 430, body only. At that sort of pricing, it could easily match up well versus a D3200 or a T5 (or whatever the entry level Canon is right now, I can't keep track), none of which are great on ergonomics, appearance and none of which stand out in a crowd.

I won't buy a K-S1, but that doesn't mean that it isn't wise for Pentax to make it.

[LensBeginner]

*snip*

The really good thing about the K-01 is that nobody bought them and they ended up being sold at fire sale prices. The K-01 was a great deal when they were being liquidated at under $300.00 each. This time next year the KS-1 will also be sold at fire sale prices.

It's already down to the price of a K-5IIs... 496.95 with free FluCard:
Pentax 2014 Holiday Deals - Deals and Savings | PentaxForums.com

[Winder]

I'd be genuinely interested for you to post side-by-side pictures here you've taken with your A7m2/55mm and K3/ FA31 combos, Winder.

I will post some. I'm trying to put something together to show my photography social group next month.

The K-3 doesn't have the AA filter so stopped down to f/5.6 with the 31mm is very sharp and I've always liked the colors with the 31mm. I'm still trying to figure out the A7m2. The noise level is not significantly better than the K-3 at 6400 so far. ISO 800-1600 seem to be cleaner. The biggest difference I have seen so far is that the colors of the A7m2 seem better. The Adobe standard color profile is very good. With the K-3 I have downloaded Huelight color profiles, constantly use my X-rite color Passport to create profiles, you name it. I have not been happy with the K-3 colors for skin tones. For some of our local contests we pick a VSCO preset that everyone has to use, and VSCO doesn't support Pentax, so the colors have always been a challenge. VSCO supports Sony RAW files and the colors are so much better. The Sony RAW files seem to be giving me more to work with when it comes to color. I'm not sure how much of an advantage the A7m2 has with noise. I haven't gotten around to making prints yet.

The 55mm seems to have a very abrupt in-focus to out of focus transition which makes things pop. Very impressed with the lens so far.

[mrNewt]

Seems you had to leave out the bit about reliably auto-focusing the Tamron.

And I won't go into the IQ issues that appear when you use adapters for a foreign mount:

LensRentals.com - There Is No Free Lunch, Episode 763: Lens Adapters

Those tests are not nearly as accurate as he lets you believe...
Yes there could be badly build adapters, but a hollow tube will not affect the IQ of a lens in any way. The worse thing that could happen is that you will get a "tilt adapter" if surfaces are not perfectly parallel; or you won't be able to focus to infinity. IQ however, will still be there.

Also, all those metal components of a camera expand and contract over time anyway... and most of the time that doesn't happen evenly either. You will always have tolerances built in and no camera is exactly 100% to specs...

[Rupert]

There probably is someone, somewhere in the world, like the actual guy who see's the boxes go out the door, who knows what Pentax sales of this camera are like. And he's not talking.

Yep, and he can't talk because the inactivity of the K-S1 was so intense he got rigor mortis and can't move his lips!

Regards!

[Rayn]

Agree with the KS-1 review completely. I actually had to check the calendar for april's fool day after seeing it for the first time. It's a pointless, gimmicky DSLR camera with some appalling design choices and it's no wonder nobody bought it. I understand it's users will flock to defend it, but that does not make the camera any better. The 645Z is an amazing MF camera, K-3 is the best APS-C camera out there, the K-50 the best value, making the KS-1 completely superfluous.
But everyone makes mistakes, right? What scares me more is that such a camera could get through design, manufacturing and testing without anyone stopping to think for a second about it's intended market. It shows just how disconnected Pentax can be from the current market trends and it's users needs.
I just hope this was just a fluke, and Pentax will continue to produce amazing cameras like the K-3/5. And the newest prototype seems to confirm that they're on the right track. Loving it so far