Well said, Larry. I passed up the K-7 in favor of the K-x because of
its low light capabilities and am absolutely ecstatic with the K-5.
Maybe I'm just too easy to please. Then again, I have a nearly 50 year
history with Pentax and can remember Kodachrome at ASA 12 and *High
Speed* Ektachrome at ASA 160. That makes getting a useable image at ISO
25000 pretty damn awesome.
All the mental masturbation about where Pentax is going doesn't mean a
lot when they're still giving us the tools to get the job done. The
time to fret about it and start considering which new brand to buy is
when they tools they give you don't do the job you need them to do. As
for the demise of Pentax, Twain's quote probably applies..."The reports
of my death have been greatly exaggerated."
-p
On 10/31/2012 1:51 PM, Larry Colen wrote:
On Oct 31, 2012, at 7:20 AM, Collin Brendemuehl wrote:
It's difficult for me to conclude anything except that Pentax
just does not have the capacity to produce anything more advanced.
All the buyer gets is a few tweaks.
Baby steps are not adequate in today's technology world.
Colin, have you ever developed a new technology product from the initial "customer
requirements" to shipping?
How much time have you spent designing, writing and testing embedded firmware?
As far as I can tell, Hoya cut back development to the absolute bare minimum to
keep the company afloat and maximize short term profits, so it would seem that
Ricoh has to pretty much start with a clean slate.
Lets look at the K-5. When it comes to low light work, it is absofuckinglutely
amazing. In some ways it is close to on par with a D700. The D800 increases
the resolution over the D700, but for low light it's not a lot better. The
Canon 5d3 is pretty amazing in low light, but either of those cameras cost two,
nearly three times what a K-5 does. What was the K-5s one weakness in low
light? Focus. And they seem to have addressed that issue.
I'd love more, smaller, focus points, but that's a much bigger, time consuming,
and expensive redesign.
Yes, autofocus could be a bit quicker, there are improvements that could be
made in auto exposure. So, if you are the sort of photographer than just wants
to aim the camera and let it make all the decisions and do everything that
requires any actual skill, then maybe Pentax isn't the brand for you. Maybe
you'd be happier with a Canon point and shoot.
They needs a new partner -- someone larger than Ricoh -- who is
interested in making the company into something great.
Perhaps Apple or Google will buy the company and run with it right.
Oh sodomize me with a moldy corn dog, the last thing I want is a camera
designed by Apple. Apple's forte is in designing pretty, fairly reliable
consumer electronics that absolves the user of needing to put any thought
whatsoever into using it. Apple products are extremely easy to use, if what
you want to do is what Saint Steven of Cupertino thought somebody should want
to do. This is great if you want your hand held throughout the process, but
try to do something different, and you'll find it difficult when they won't let
go of your hand.
And, realistically, we, or at least most of us, aren't shooting film any more.
We don't need to be able to instantly move any lens from the body loaded with
pan-F to the body loaded with Kodachrome 64. And, realistically most people
who own several lenses, after a few years also have a couple of camera bodies.
You can own multiple systems and tune each, body and lenses, to what they do
best at. For hand held low light dance photography, it's damn tough to beat a
K-5 with a fast 30ish mm prime. Sure you could get a D800 with a 50/1.4, but
you won't have image stabilization, and it'll cost you a damn sight more.
If you're shooting video, or you need an insane birding or sports lens, then it
seems Canon is the way to go.
Why do people seem to forget that cameras are tools, not a religion? They
aren't even spouse, you are allowed more than one at a time. Use the tool that
does that particular job right, rather than trying to find something that does
everything perfectly well.
--
Larry Colen [email protected] sent from i4est
--
Being old doesn't seem so old now that I'm old.
--
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.
