Hello forum,
As a collector of Pentax cameras for many years I have always been searching for a black AP to add to my collection. The past months several black versions of the AP and K has been for sale via eBay. Today another one came to my attention. The seller is marking them as repainted.
The camera for sale on eBay today showed off a Takumar 35mm f4 with a black colored aperture ring. That lens never came in black. That made me wonder. And then I recall another sale a while ago with a black painted Takumar 58mm f2.4 which I also never have seen or heard of. I therefore sent the seller a message asking what "repaint" means. And the answer came back quick, it is a chrome body painted black by a "camera craftsman".
Question to the forum: is it ok to paint a chrome body black, and charge 4x-8x more for that body compared to a chrome version and how can we distinguish the original factory painted blacks from the repainted?
The photo is from the eBay add.
Cheers, Baard-Einar.