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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
09-09-2016, 03:18 AM
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Now while I have my heart set on mirrors, I think the weakness of the sony systems is their lens selection. True, it's catching up to the big names (and at an ever growing rate I might add) but it's hard to beat canonikons selection of lenses. I recently spotted this sexy little thing. It packs the same sensor as the 80d which is impressive considering that the thing is smaller than the a6000.
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Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion
08-25-2016, 08:55 PM
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And I'm afraid I don't trust the market judgement of someone who said that that "sony could be next..." in regards to the future of Samsung's camera division. You seem to be out of touch with reality. Sony has twice the market share of Pentax last I checked. Their cameras are starting to to
You do realize that while that while the future of samsung's camera division may be up in the air, the NX1 put every pentax camera to shame. It packed the convince of a mirrors body with the rugged durability of a dslr body, a combo that is basically no where to be found. The NX1 put pentax to shame in almost every department. It had much autofocus than any pentax, certainly subject tracking. Show me a pentax that can track at 15 fps. From what I have seen, most can't even keep up with their meager ~5 fps. It put pentax's video to shame. It offers better lowlight than all but the K1. I know it does better than the K3 and likely comes very close to the K1 And needless to say, it offers much better connectivity.
The NX1 offers a full sensor readout in 4k, which even the high end 1DC does't. As far as I know. I know the 5D MK IV doesn't and it costs around 3x as much s the NX1.
Samsung's first tour de force effortlessly captured the hearts of pros and was used heavily by pro video shooters in 2015.
Now, with Samsung likely out of the game, the chances of me putting all my eggs in Samsung basket are looking slim but you sir fail to realize what Samsung accomplished. If Canon or Nikon did what Samsung did and did it well, Sony would be in trouble.
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Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion
08-25-2016, 07:42 PM
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Oddy, Pentax keeps popping up in movies. It seems like half the time, when a camera pops up in am movie it turns out to be a Pentax.
In my opinion, the reason why Pentax is kind of rare and kind of the big foot of the photography world is that they are all function and no form. They try to compete with numbers. Seems like every camera they try to squeeze more and more into it without having any idea of how it all fits together. I mean, their image quality is pretty nice, but even if they had more of an opening in retail outlets, I doubt it would gain them much in the way of new market share.
Think about sony or panasonic. In 2010, the only thing in camera stores across the globe was either canon or nikon. Now, we have sony, panasonic, etc. The market has become very crowded. Point is that sony earned their spot on camera shelves. They brought a radical new approach that has since taken the photography world by storm. Even if Pentax was on shelves what do you think someone would think when they see that down right bizarre screen rotating mechanism on the back of the K1? It just screams quirky, and archaic. Honestly, that thing looks like it was designed by some high school kid for a science project or something. Sure, it's robust and whatever, but it also turns people off.
Like they say, people shop with their eyes. Well, I guess that's eat, but I think a lot of the same applies to something like a camera. Back in the 80s cameras were just tools, but now with such a diverse market they have come to be ways for people to express themselves, just like phones.
Pentax is like cosmic background radiation. It gives you a glimpse into the past. Ever since the advent of the a6000, the market trend has been towards smaller, lighter cameras that do it all. Pentax comes onto the market with a camera that bis bigger and heavier and can't even match the burst rate of full frame cameras from a few years back. They wonder why they aren't taking off with names like "Flu" card.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
08-22-2016, 02:10 PM
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This is a joke right? The green button is right next to the movie icon on the K3, which would lead people to think that it is somehow related to movie shooting. I figured out of basically how to use my nikon without even really opening the manual. Sure the more advanced things, required a little bit of looking into but I was able to pretty much pick up camera and start shooting from the getgo without having to spend time buried in the manual.
Now, granted we are talking about sony and I found it to not be quite as intuitive as my nikon, but calling pentax user friendly is a stretch. I am a designer by trade.
Compare the d3200 to any entry level dslr from pentax. The D3200 is, designed from the group up, to be for beginners, someone who is is still learning their way around the ins and outs of photography. The pentax is simply a lower speced out option.
Looking at the K3, everything seems to claustrophobic and clustered together. They squeezed everything into the right side of the camera, refusing to use the top part of the camera. Pretty much every brand out there has controls on the top of the camera and this is for a good reason. It lets you do more with the camera one handed.
Look at the pentax flu card and compare it to the built in wi fi on virtually any sony. Tell me flu card that has you opening a browser like something from the 90s is easier to use. Instead of plain english, the menus use numbers for options. This is just the K-30 but my first camera the Istds (whatever it was called did this.)
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
08-22-2016, 01:50 PM
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Nope, when I press the shutter button, it takes a picture, but without the flash.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
08-22-2016, 01:33 PM
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Very cleverly worded responses here. I swear, people would probably recommend pentax's first ever dslr over a top of the like canon or nikon and say that "it depends on what you are using it for." Sony announced a an update to fix the lossless raw ages ago. The a6000 is newer, and sony's a mount is showing up everywhere. You can look up Jason Lanier's video where he talks about why he is shooting a mount instead of his top of the line nikon DSLRs.
Sony is reinventing the wheel whereas Pentax is still chasing the status quo.
Pentax K-01 vs Sony A6000 - Our Analysis |
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
08-22-2016, 01:13 PM
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I was trying to trigger my on camera on my d600 during a recent shoot and I noticed that when I was in live view, the flash wouldn't fire. I had to focus in live view then exit out of live view to take the shot, which is a tad bit annoying. I have noticed the same thing with even the built in flash, it simply won't fire when I am in live view.
Any ideas?
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Forum: Pentax K-1 & K-1 II
07-04-2016, 12:48 PM
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Wow, the amount of elitism here is mind blowing. I don't watch digital rev when I want to make buying decisions about where I'm gonna put $1500. i watch it when I want to be entertained. DRtv is by far one of the most amusing photography channels and proves that we don't all have to be stuck up, overly serious about what we love to do. I wonder if some people here don't tell kids to get off their lawn.
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Forum: Pentax K-1 & K-1 II
07-01-2016, 11:25 AM
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Maybe the reason why most reviewers stay away from Pentax is that their are overly sensetive and immediately go after anyone who says anything bad about their cameras. This thread is evidence enough of that. Every camera release of Pentax has been followed by lengthy arguements where people try to explain away the reviewers comments (mostly all with the same "they dont understand pentax.") Tony Northrup actually followed up his video with another one called "attack of the Pentaxians." I think there may be something to be found here, maybe how overly defensive Pentax users are. Criticism is a good thing. It's how I got from not having a portfolio that would get me hired to landing an internship.
Yes, Pentax's K-01 was designed by a well known designer and that didn't turn out to be a raging success but I think that might have something to do with Pentax's less than stellar choice of designer. You don't pick an interior designer to do a car. Besides someone at Pentax should have looked over the proposed design for the K-01 before it went to market. It's a little bit like the now famous "ho lee fuk" news incident. Mark newsom is an industrial designer. He designs plans and jewelry according to google. Why Pentax picked him out of all the designers is beyond me. If the K1 was simply a little easier on the eyes, I think it would be getting more attention.
Saying that only lifelong users who sleep with a Pentax under their pillow can review Pentax is just silly and elitist like the above dude said. It's just making excuses.
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Forum: Pentax K-1 & K-1 II
06-30-2016, 09:17 PM
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The prevailing arguement I see here is "he doesn't shoot pentax so he cant review it" which is just..sily? This is just like claiming that no one can see your imaginary friend because they don't believe in him.
Pentax is trying to compete purely in terms of spec sheets and that's where they are losing out. They are completely neglecting the human aspect of it. The camera's design leaves a little bit to be desired, I am a designer by trade and the K1 ain't exactly what you would call pretty. The controls seems to be laid out pretty well, but the boxy look went out with the pinhole cameras of the early 90s. Pentax cant seem to design decently looking cameras.
They have so many examples of this done right with canonikon. Why they insist on being different is beyond me.
We often see people refer to their cameras as tools, and to a certain extent this may be true, but as photographers we idenitify with our cameas. No one wants to spend over a thousand on something that.
None of the things he mentioned had anything to do with being a vetran user of Pentax. Pentax af has been behind even a cheaper entry level mirrorless for quite some time now.
Claiming that film lenses count as full frame digital lenses is borderline false advertising. Film is no where near 36 megapixels. There are no electrical contacts with film era lenses, depending on how old they are so you probably wont get any communication between half those lenses and the camera. It's vaguely like some kid trying to scribble over his report card or something.
In fact, as far as I can tell, the photography business as we know it didn't even exist in the days of film, so things like sharpness weren't really a high priority. Digital photography has driven a constant stream of progress, where things are always moving forward. Film was way before my time, but I dont think anyone was buying 5K lenses in the days of film.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
05-17-2016, 05:02 PM
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Sorry to disappoint you guys but I think this pretty much puts a stake in the rumors of samsung's demise. They might have been down but things point to a big comeback for them. Sorry clackers. :)
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
05-08-2016, 08:45 PM
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Well it's not 100% dead anyway. Lenses and firmware are still available and no official word from samsung which leaves the slight possibility that there may be a future for the NX lineup. \
As I see it the biggest downside of a mirrorless system is the lens lineup. Samsung got a bad rep for the limited lens lineup but sony's doesn't seem to be much bigger, possibly because they are focused on putting out a new e mount ff camera every other week. Sony does have the benefit of having a bunch of lens adapting options as part of their ecosystem, but my concern is that on such a small body things are gonna be very front heavy. After using an slr for 3 years It's gonna be strange to leave behind the wealth of physical controls. I love being able to easily switch from continuous to single at a moments notice on my nikon.
So, yeah, the NX1 is rapidly becoming a dodo bird, but im gonna try and score one soon. :)
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
05-08-2016, 06:15 PM
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This place always amuses me. :) Never fails.
The NX line was built on the NX1, which is not a compact as was suggested. I don't know why anyone would think that the ilc or compact market was collapsing. Every girl in a club has a compact camera. There is a huge market for them in the casual shooter who just wants to you know take pictures of their drunk friends or something. Photographers aren't the only camera market and this is especially true for samsung with you know a certain phone that is only second to the iphone. The NX1 is one of the most amazing cameras to date, combing the best of mirrorless with a dslr. There is a hack floating around that lets you shoot in 230mb/s. Now, whether there is actually a point to this what with h265 saving you the space I dont know, but this is something previously only you could do on a cinema camera. It's an immensely powerful camera a tour de force for Samsung's first effort basically.
The more plausible reason for the disappearance of the nx lineup was the fact that the chairman of Samsung has actually recently passed away and his children are reportedly selling off/reorganzing various departments for tax purposes.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-15-2016, 07:53 PM
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Do you need to own a certain model of car to know that being able to go from 0 to 60 in 3 seconds is really fast? :) The camera can only focus where there are af points, and while your shot is quite nice, my d600 has only around 50% frame coverage like the average pentax, recomposing often leads to missed shots. Recomposing is rapidly becoming a dated way of working and is there because traditionally we haven't had edge to edge coverage. Micro expressions change in a model with each passing second and this can sometimes make the difference between a good shot and an amazing one. It just slows you down. The number of points would be distracting in a conventional dslr, but in every video that I have see they are invisible until they have a job to do. :) Having denser, tightly packed focus points seems like it would help you focus on finer details, especially since with the nx1 you can just touch the screen. It's like buying more lotto tickets. Much better chances that you will get the lucky number :)
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-15-2016, 07:23 PM
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It looks like pentax completely forgot about ergonomics in the ks2 (Ks1 looks like they tried to make it as unergonomic as they could), menus look like a throwback to the K20, has a massive 11 focus points (why not just a d3100) , and only shoots video in 2009 cell phone resolution. What makes the NX1 so nice is it doesn't put tech before user experience. Impressive weather sealing, I will say that though. Chris from tsctv (look em on youtube) dunks the thing in the water and it was fine. It's stands up the elements well, but the same ruggedness seems like it's being taken to heart with the user experience. I can't speak to this directly as i don't own it, but this really came through on the k20, where it relied heavily on numbers. For example, the custom settings was a confusing mess of arconyms and numbers that was useless without out the manual. The Ks2 quite a bit better in this regard at a quick glance at the manual and if I had to get a pentax this just might be it, but it's an upper entry level camera, sort at the same level as the d5000 series from nikon.
The only pentax that's at the price point Im looking at is the K3ii and it has the same slow live view af that my nikon has (I intend to make live view a bigger part of my workflow), only shoots 1080p, not as good in low light, it's heavier, and I seriously doubt it can track at whopping 15 fps. ;)
AF coverage and density is an issue too as a portrait shooter.
---------- Post added 04-15-16 at 07:31 PM ----------
It's not marketing. That's just a cop out. Better marketing would help granted, but we live in a social media age. If pentax cameras were changing the lives of pros, we would be hearing about it on social media and before you know it people who want to take pictures of their kids would be raving about them too. But it doesn't seem like pentax has managed to appeal to either. No one buys camera magazines anymore to choose their next camera. When I wanted to see what to replace my nikon gear with, I went online and started looking at what the various companies were offering, sample images, reviews, etc. Pentax can be found on dpreview and every major youtube photography channel reviews them.
I think pentax deserves more attention than it gets. Some of their cameras do offer quite a bit at the price point, but they alienate themselves with the quirky looks and dated, not entirely fleshed out features that often fall short of expectations (video the 645 for example.) Pentax reminds me a bit of myself when i was in the early stages of the job hunt. I was blaming everything on everything else where it was really ME that had to improve with a better resume, portfolio, etc. If pentax wants to be have a spot in more camera stores, they need to give them a reason to do so. They aren't going to put up a pentax section unless there is a demand for them.
Pentax needs to stop neglecting video and connectivity. If they are going to stick with the dslr way of doing things (which is slightly out of touch with the state of things) then they need to focus on market trends. If they can make it easy and painless to connect the next K mount camera to your phone, email pictures, etc. then they will already be in a much better place.
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Forum: Canon, Nikon, Sony, and Other Camera Brands
04-15-2016, 03:23 PM
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So, I'm having a hell of a time trying to choose between the NX1 and the a6300. Focus seems awesome on both. NX1 has that awesome touch screen that samsung is known for in their phones, while the a6300 is well, the a6300, one of the most popular mirrorless systems out there. The only thing is that the a6300 has a max shutter speed of only 1/4000th of a sec, so the question I'm facing is do you really need anything higher than that? I know the 8000th is a staple of "pro" bodies, but is there anything that can't be frozen with 1/4000th? Do you ever find yourself needing more when shooting wide open? The a6300 also syncs up to 160th sec sec but I gather there are ways around?
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 10:33 PM
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Hm, just like the most focus points on a pentax is a massive 33? :) The NX1 has over 200 points. Just like the highest resolution video a pentax can shoot is a massive 1080, only a 1/4 of what the NX1 does? Like the fastest a pentax can shoot is a massive 8 fps almost half of the NX1s 15 fps? And honestly from 10 feet away, you really think you need a 200mm lens? An 85 would do just fine. The lens lineup isn't ideal for sports but even with an 85mm + 24 mp of cropping I was able to get some decent shots. With a 200mm and being close to the action you should be fine.
That prism has it's pros and cons (inspite of the EVF the NX1 only gets 200 shots less than the K-1.) It saves battery life, well some anyway, but you are limited by what you eye can see. An evf can allow you to manual focus in a very low light. Not to mention that prism is gonna give you your fair share of chimping.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 05:47 PM
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Switching cameras systems isn't easy, so naturally i looked at other pentax cameras first since it would mean I could keep using my lenses. I looked at the k30 in particular, but the autofocus just wasn't there. Good autofocus isn't just about speed, it's about how smart it is (sony is brilliant here.) Very quirky, looked like it hunted a lot in videos I saw on youtube and not very capable in all but the simplest, least demanding of situations. Video is important for me as well, and the K3 doesn't even have continuous af in video. Pentax video is still in the age of horse drawn carriages. The k30 just looks dated and that turned me off. Pentax didn't have any full frame options at the time either or frankly anything really suited for my needs.
The NX1 beats pentax for a lot of the basic departments. Since it's release, it's gotten 4 firmware updates, which make it even more a beast. The camera store tv actually compares it to a pentax interesting enough in their review and they say it beasts it for high iso although this isn't really a concern of mine. The NX1 has an OLED screen, pentax has yet make any great advances in this area. LCD screens are notoriously hard to see in daylight. I can barely see the live view on my nikon. The NX1 also tracks way better than any pentax ever released, and I will stand by that, especially with the latest firmware upgrades. The NX1 has focus peaking too, which is huge for me as a portrait shooter. Inspite of being the new kid of the block it actually beat out the K3 according to preview. You can go see for yourself, not I have any doubt the k3 is a nice camera.
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/samsung-nx1/14 |
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 05:01 PM
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Well lets see my first pentax ever was the ist ds. Then I owned a k10, and finally a k20. They were nice for what they were I guess. Nice colors, and pretty compact. I shot pentax for almost 3 years. I might still be shooting with them if they had shown more willingness to modernize and focus on human aspect of things.
No, at the risk of sounding egotistical, I think it's largely the photo industry's standard. Connectivity has changed the industry, making it easier than even to connect your camera to your other devices. Touch screens have made it 10x faster to pull focus, changes setting, etc. Sony and samsung even allow you to charge your cameras over usb power. So, no more switching out batteries. Just plug it in and you are ready to go. There are even some DIY ways to attach a power bank to the hot shoe for endless hours of shooting. Man power banks cost about the same (if not less) of the official batteries and will give you several times the charge. Most of the time the battery grip will suffice but it's nice that we not have that option. There is more. The sony systems have cross brand compatibility. So, you can stick a canon flash on an a6000 and it would fire fine, without any special adapters or anything. Think about this. This is huge. It almost got me to go with sony.
Everything is done by designers, dude. Canonikon has designers, etc I dont know if you notice, but the design of the K-01 wasn't exactly a huge success. In fact, it was universally panned. The iPhone doesn't need to be ergonomic at least not in the same way an slr does. You hold a phone differently than you do a camera. I did mention this, i guess you just missed it. Form follows function, at least it should in the most basic sense. Cameras are held with one hand so they need to be designed to comfortably do so. It's design that made apple's brand more than just tech item, and one of the most recognized and sought after brands in the world. The iPhone doesn't need to have a grip like an slur does but it completes its function with form beautifully. It's simplicity at it's finest. Apple products have won just about every design award out there. Steve jobs said the user experience should come first and then the tech should come after that, not the other way around as pentax seems to be doing.
The 645 may have a great grip I won't argue with that as I've never used it.
Cameras may have been "just tools" back in the time of ansel adams where they were so big that you needed a mule to take yours around, but no one wants to pay thousands for something that looks ugly. Cameras aren't nails and chisels where we keep them in our shed. My camera is a part of me. I take it almost everywhere I go. And the "pro" looks get compliments all the time and have even landed me gigs.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 04:10 PM
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I mean, dont get me wrong the K1 and newer pentax offerings look worlds better than the pentax cameras that I have shot with. I am glad pentax hasn't fallen for the "bigger is better" idea. Even if I had the money I would never want a D5. 90% of the reason I chose the NX1 is that I am getting the smaller size with modern aps c low light power. But it seems like if they put a little bit more effort into things, they could get to a modern standard of usability. It's not about having more controls it's about smarter usage of few controls to keep things clean and simple. The d600s AF control is a great example. One control gives you both access to af mode and every other af option you could want. With the K1, it's two buttons, which could possibly have you taking your eye off the subject mid shoot.
The pixel shift thing isn't a first either for pentax afaik. Olympus did it with their extra lengthy named OMD EM5 mark ii and it uses and electronic shutter so it's very fast.
That's like just saying "you're wrong." Reminds me of my photo teacher in college. He would just walk by you and tell you you did it wrong without bothering tell you why. ;)
IMO, the K-01 is one of the bet looking cameras ever. I hate to sound negative, but this is an example of how to photo design a camera. I think they might have sold 3 of them.
I think that sounds fair monochrome. I would be curious as to whether sales of the K1 are actually bigger than previous cameras. I dont think it's too much of a stretch to say that pentax would rather the person who is looking for a new camera buy a K-1 instead of a D750. The tilt screen is evidence enough that they are trying to compete.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 03:17 PM
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That back switch for af point selection left a lot to be desired. It was just poor design. It was just so bad that I never even bothered to use it. The tactile feedback on the buttons was completely nonexistent. It felt like a cd player from the 90s.
The k1 looks quite a bit better but it just doesn't seem like it's been given it's due attention. Pentax seems to have bought into the traditionalist school of thought that would have you believe that there is something bad about making things simple and easy (The k20 had much more of a learning curve than my nikon did despite being not suited for pro work.) Many upper level cameras have touch screens which makes a world of difference for things like image review. I always used found using the left and right buttons for cycling through your images to be a bit clunky and slow (yes, i realize that nikon does things the same) and hence why I love the NX1s use of a canon style scroll wheel for shooting through images.
DPreview noted that the tilt screen mechanism has all the elegance of "two desk chairs mating" and I think this is their issue. The back of the k1 looks crowded. It's like the time honored phrase of "don't work harder, work smarter. The led illuminiation is a great touch and probably one of my favorite features of the k1, but if it's activated by a button, and said button isn't itself back illuminated, most people will just use their smart phone to illuninate the camera. They should have gone for something like pressure sensitivity or something. You know, the camera detects when there is a low ambient light and when you open the side door, it automatically lights up. We live in an age of smart devices and if Pentax wants to stay competitive it needs to realize that people expect their cameras to be smart as well.
The third command dial is a neat idea, but it involves making a compromise that I wouldn't have made : making the the top deck lcd smaller. I use my top deck lcd all the time to change settings on the fly in the middle of a shoot. Samsung does this in a smarter way, with the i function on their lenses that allows you to use the scroll wheels instead of having to clutter things up with more controls.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 02:05 PM
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Completely missed the point. You can keep making light of it, but as long as you keep doing so, Pentax will only have a few users like the fro said. He has more subscribers than pentax has users probably. I looked back at some of my early photos in college and they were pretty piss poor. Now I get calls from companies to shoot their events and do headshot of employees, etc. It was only through criticism that I improved. The iPhone isn't a dslr. It doesn't have a grip because newsflash, it isn't mean to be held for hours on end like a dslr is. But you can bet the iPhone 6 is aesthetically miles and miles ahead of any Pentax camera to date. I think Pentax's best looking camera was the k30 and I don't understand why they didn't follow in it's footsteps with the K-1. Boxy cameras went out of style decades ago. There is a market for retro looking cameras, and fuji has some of the sexiest retro style cameras that money can buy but I'm fairly certain that Pentax isn't even going for that here. One of the most welcome improvements going from the K20 to the D600 is the usability. The camera felt like it was designed with the user in mind.
I mean, is this the only thing holding Pentax back? No, but it's easy to fix. If they just played to the tune of canon/nikon they would already probably be positioned to get more mainstream attention.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-14-2016, 12:37 PM
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This place loves it's word games doesn't it? Design as in visuals, the user experience etc. Apple is second to none here and pentax could learn a thing from them. No I'm not saying their cameras should look like iPhones, but user experience is everything. Our cameras are letting us upload pictures directly to social media. It's not just enough that the camera lets you get the shot, although this is a huge part of it granted. The pentax cameras that I've used in the past while admitantly small and lacking the bulk of full frame, just didn't feel good in the hands. The grip on the K20 just didn't feel like it was designed to be ergonomic. Pentax's design hasn't been the best traditionally. Pentax is losing out because of the form follows function. It's not marketing. We live in a social media age. Sony cameras have blown up primarily to social media. Good things sell themselves. You could have the best tasting dish ever but if it looks like an alien from a low budget movie, no one is going to want to order it.
Im not Jonathan Ives (iPhone designer afaik) but I feel like I could have designed far better looking cameras for pentax. I know, bold statement, but Pentax has traditionally not been at the top of the design game. It's like they dont have any sense of direction or goal. I can't tell whether they are going for a retro look or they just weren't sure how to design it. Fujifilm does the retro thing beautifully and if this is the case, they could learn a thing from fuji. I did take a look at a few videos of the K1 at CP and the screen itlself does look like pretty nice.
https://youtu.be/XrN7xiHGg80?t=6m57s
Pentax has been trying to compete purely with specs and bells and whistle. The k3 as good as it seems just doesn't seem that unique. It doesn't seem like they went in thinking "how can we set this apart from every other full frame dslr on the market." That's one of the dangers of showing up the full frame party 5 years late (not to rip on them or anything.) I know, there is the pixel shift, which is honestly very cool, but it's limited to a certain kind of shooter. How is the K1 going to improve things for portrait shooters? What about connectivity? The "flucard" (which sounds like it might make you sick) wasn't exactly an example of cutting edge connectivity. They compromised the size of the top deck lcd in return for a third dial which I hope does something big. The smaller top deck lcd means that info such as white balance cannot be shown which makes it much less useful for pros. What about studio work? How is the K1 going to help the studio shooter?
Im not trying to rip on pentax, I just think these are some things which may help them. There is some truth to what Jared said, and while it may have ruffled some feathers i think it could help pentax. Greater market penetration means more 3rd party support for things like lenses and the like. It seems like they have some really cool things but then they get distracted and forget about the other things. I think the reason why pentax is still kind of rare to this day is that their cameras tend to not be the most well rounded packages (even though they may do some cool things) for example, video has been a huge weakness and instead of just of just focusing on stills, they opted to include a video mode which dates back to roughly 2010. The control illumination and all are cool but that doesn't change the fact that things like autofocus are still very important. The k1 only has 33 af points and a very small coverage at that. I don't think it's even 50% coverage. This is why mirrorless cameras came along. They give us what we have always wanted in our cameras, that nearly edge to edge af coverage. In some ways, pentax is ahead of it's time,but in other ways it's still playing catch up and I think this is why more people dont use them in spite of the fact that they are pretty good.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-10-2016, 07:47 PM
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Fair enough, but I just think it's interesting all the mud that being thrown at the Fro. All the witty playground like, remarks along the lines of "oh yeah well only 3 people subscribe to you" make me smile. He has 500k subscribers. He is among the biggest photography channels on youtube. He isn't necessarily my most watched youtube channel and I admit I dont really rely on his advice a lot but it seems like people getting their jimmies a little rustled over what amounts to a very small remark, that is for all purposes has some truth to it.
I dont claim to be an expert on anything, but anyone who has a background in design will you know most likely not really be all that into that thing on the back. Pentax's real obstacle to mainstream recognition has never been it's marketing (I see pentax as in almost every camera magazine) but it's always been the "human" aspect. The look and feel has always not been perfect. Cameras are tools, but unlike in the film era where cameras were strapped to a donkey or slung across your back, design matters. Sleekly designed things win market share. Millions of people flock to the apple stores to buy the next iPhone even though there are other things out there with even better specs because of Apple's legendary design.
Now, granted, the K1 is every inch a pentax camera, but if they want to become more than a niche product (and putting out a medium format camera doesn't exactly leave a lot of room for doubt) then they need to focus more on just the bells and whistles.
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Forum: Pentax Full Frame
04-10-2016, 07:15 PM
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I completely agree. I used to think high iso is a must have, that's why I went full frame. But I find i lately go over 1600 especially when using flash. The only people who I think really benefit from it are people who mostly do video as the bulk of their work. Might be good for urban explorers as well I guess. As someone who has aspirations of getting into urban exploring, that flexibility seems like it would be nice. Coming off a 2008 era aps c (and lets remember aps c used to not be so great at high ISOs) all I could think about was better iso. And to some extent, it has helped. but there isn't much of a difference between the latest crop and full frame (excluding the soon to be released canonikon full frame cameras) at iso 3200 and below. I never really had a flash in college and i tried to just solve all my problems with increasing the iso. But with my metz 52, I can shoot on a dimly lit street at on iso 400, so you know it's not really that important to me. Now the hard part is I guess focusing and this is where I think cameras should be focusing on instead. EVFs are nice in this regard as you aren't limited by the human eye.
It seemed like just yesterday that we were all being wowed by iso 25,600 and now we're seeing 3 million. Honestly who needs that? If you have the slightest understand of light, you won't realistically need to go past 6400 at the most and I dont even remember the last time I went nearly that high.
More megapixels is nice to a point, though I suppose it really depends on your needs. The medium format digital backs we shot with at school did 80 megapixels and as long as you have the card space and processing power this isn't all that bad. The detail in those files was amazing!
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