> That's fairly common advice. In reality, it's probably not bad. > > On the one hand, if a person is going to buy a camera without doing > much research, steering them towards the brands with the largest > market share isn't a horrible idea. If later, they go looking for > books, articles or accessories, the big brands will be supported. > Third party stuff almost always supports Canon and Nikon. Pentax and > the others may be supported, but not always. > > On the other hand, 90% of the people that buy an SLR never buy much > more than a bag to carry it in. A smaller group might buy a flash or > one more lens. For that group, it just doesn't make any difference. > Any SLR on the market will give them decent results. That group is > unlikely to ever turn the dial away from "auto." If they do, it will > likely be turned to a "scene" mode. > > The advice I've been hearing given lately is, "buy what your friends > have." That way you can borrow their stuff and they may be able to > answer questions. > > I don't think this kind of advice is hurting Pentax as much as their > lack of marketing and sales. Maybe they'll settle in with Ricoh for a > while and have a chance to build a decent distribution network. > > gs > > George Sinos
I agree with that. In fact it's pretty much the advice I give. I could have steered two people recently toward Pentax and I didn't. I told them that Nikon and Canon were pretty much a toss-up. Most of these people want cameras with quick AF (and burst rates though they don't know it) because they just want to point it at their running toddler, hold the shutter button down, and have the camera do all the work. I point them to dpreview for in-depth camera comparisons, which is inevitably more information than they're prepared to digest, much less read. When I show it to them, their eyes just glass over. They ask me why I have Pentax. Because it was my first SLR and I had accumulated lenses. If I had to do it over again I'd go with Nikon. (That way when I get a D800E I wouldn't also be spending through the nose on lenses as well). Most people don't take the camera off of auto. If they do, they don't read the manual. If the pictures come out good they think it was the camera. If they come out bad they think they weren't smart enough. In fact many people don't understand why they have to manually turn a ring on a zoom to zoom in/out when on their P&S this was a camera-controlled motorized function. They generally see a quality improvement between the SLR in Green/Auto mode and their former P&S. They got what they wanted along with the self-esteem boost of carrying an expensive fancy looking camera. I may be wrong but, at least on my radar, Ricoh has had less of a market presence than Pentax over the last 15 years. Would they have a better distribution network? Tom C. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
