Originally posted by Asahiflex I can guarantee that Pentax will sell shitloads of FF cameras, both to diehard Pentax users and Nikon and Canon users who are dissatisfied with their entry-level FF cameras.
Who is unsatisfied with their D700!
That camera will go down as one of the great classics.
FF cameras are priced high to make a profit where sales volumes are low and to make up ground where lens development is slow, costly, and expensive as well.
A Pentax FF camera will be a large beast (MZ-D big) with SR and PD AF plus space for WR, power. video, etc. All the pro controls. It will be the same size as the A900, D700, and so on. Maybe they can squeeze it down to the D300 size. Maybe.
Any such camera will go to market at between $2,500 and $3,500 which automatically prices it waaaay out of the range of "shitloads" of units. Sony could not sell that many with the A850, so what makes everyone think Pentax has more market reach. FF sales from Canikon are very low compared to APS-, as in 5% of the total.
So the sales volumes at that price point are low and the sensor alone (if available;likely not as Sony is the only available supplier and they look to have a sweetheart deal with Nikon already) is $1,000 per unit. And another $500 for distribution, marketing, support, warranty, software, etc.
And what of profit? The shareholders are so entitled. Add 20% margins to the mothership plus the dealer's 10%.
Demand is a function of the price. I do not see that demand because the price is far too high. There are simply too few consumers willing to shell out $3,000 for a camera body. It's a tiny, tiny market even in our fantasy Pentaxland.
And then there's lenses. And the fact that the whole DSLR concept with OVF is threatened by mirrorless, which shrinks market share even more as at least some DSLR users will irrevocably abandon the SLR form factor and OVF.
FF is not a growth market and there's no profit selling to a guy with 30 year-old lenses. You need him to buy a slate of $$$ zoom from 14-300 plus some primes on top of a FF body.
I cannot see Ricoh/Pentax offering FF until sensor prices drop corresponding to APS-C hitting a development wall. Not for a few thousand units per year. The economics just do not work out right now.