[Henk N]

After more that 40 years of being a fanatic Pentax-user I descided to register myself on PForums :-)) I'm 64 years old,live in the Netherlands,where I was born,and used Pentax equipment since I was 22 years old. Bought my first camera;a brandnew Pentax KX with the Pentax SMC 55 mm fF 1.8 lens,in 1977.What a way to start your photographic "career"!

Since then I bought,and own several cams,of which I had a special love affair with the ME Super. My MZ-5 and MZ-5N were a bit of a disappointment,and the lenses of that area didn't please me that much,except for the FA 50mm Macro and the FA100 mm Macro,which are of the same build- and optical quality that made Pentax so loved in the 70's and 80's.During these years I built up a nice collection of lenses (K- and M-series,and,later on,some F- and FA lenses;never had the money to invest in * lenses).


Since a few months I'm the proud and happy owner of a Pentax K-1 II / D-FA 28-105mm kit,and I'm pleased with both (and I should be;collecting money for this "present" took me over 7 years!).Time to test all my FF lenses and descide which ones are worthy of using on the K-1. I'll try to put my conclusions into usefull reviews,later on.


I've visited this website very frequently over several years,now,and felt it was time to join the Pentax community (well,after 40+ Pentax years ;-)) I hope to be of some help to others,many of them "new" to Pentax,with my experience,and sometimes be helped by others when I have questions,myself.

[normhead]

Welcome to the forum....

[TER-OR]

Welcome to the clubhouse!

One of these years I'll get back to the Netherlands, it was quite charming when I visited the Naarden/Bussum area.

[Crooski]

Hallo Henk
Welcome to the Pentax forums

[C_Jones]

Welcome to Pentax Forums.

[Kerrowdown]

Welcome, good to have you all signed up now as a member.

[MarkJerling]

Welcome to the forum Henk!

Kind regards,
Mark

(New Zealand)

[Henk N]

Thanks to all of you,for your warm welcome.I'm happy to see that Pentax,after so many years of making (mostly) very good camera's,with,often,unique and inventive features,but with overly bad marketing,still excists and has a huge group of fans.I love my new K-1,but I have the impression that,at least here,in Europe,Pentax marketing is failing again.

[MarkJerling]

Thanks to all of you,for your warm welcome.I'm happy to see that Pentax,after so many years of making (mostly) very good camera's,with,often,unique and inventive features,but with overly bad marketing,still excists and has a huge group of fans.I love my new K-1,but I have the impression that,at least here,in Europe,Pentax marketing is failing again.

You have marketing - stop complaining!
We have no marketing at all!

[ivanvernon]

Welcome! It is great to have you as a member of the group. I hope you will find it as pleasant and rewarding as I have. Best to you with the new K-1II.

[Henk N]

MarkJerling,when you mean:You can buy a Pentax camera in Europe,or,in my case,in The Netherlands,you're right.What I mean is: no commercials on television,adds in newspapers,etc. And most real shops only have Nikon,Canon,Sony equipment in store,although they can order Pentax stuff for you,when you ask them.Even many (dutch) webshops only have a small selection of the availible Pentax cams,and lenses.And shop-owners told me that Pentax isn't making it easy for them,to sell their equipment.The high prices for Pentax cams and lenses in the EU,compared to the USA,didn't really help much,too.This changed for the good,since the last 2-3 years.

Just heard from a friend that Ricoh-Pentax built a big office?/distribution building here,in my town.Maybe things are changing?

[ivanvernon]

MarkJerling,when you mean:You can buy a Pentax camera in Europe,or,in my case,in The Netherlands,you're right.What I mean is: no commercials on television,adds in newspapers,etc. And most real shops only have Nikon,Canon,Sony equipment in store,although they can order Pentax stuff for you,when you ask them.Even many (dutch) webshops only have a small selection of the availible Pentax cams,and lenses.And shop-owners told me that Pentax isn't making it easy for them,to sell their equipment.The high prices for Pentax cams and lenses in the EU,compared to the USA,didn't really help much,too.This changed for the good,since the last 2-3 years.

Just heard from a friend that Ricoh-Pentax built a big office?/distribution building here,in my town.Maybe things are changing?

At first, I expected Ricoh to sharply expand marketing for Pentax. However, they must by now have become aware of the overall environmental threat to SLR and other traditional camera offerings, and may be reluctant to expand their marketing budget in a shrinking market. They may well, in fact, be exactly correctly positioned for a declining market, while Canikon is stranded with high-cost marketing overhead.

[sbh]

A late welcome also from me from the southwest of Germany.

There are many around here who know a lot about vintage glass. You'll find great photos in the "Post your K-1 pictures!" thread – most likely you've already seen them.