> It appears to me that the rumours of the new Pentax cameras "ist" and 67III > come from a recent interview of the President of Pentax in Japan. During > the interview, he said that compact and simple are the major direction of > current Pentax camera development and Pentax is developing a compact version > of the 67 camera. He quoted the highly popular "ist" series of small car > from Toyota as the example and role model for Pentax
Henry, Thanks very much for this information, which is fascinating. It partly amplifies, partly corrects, and partly confirms what Pal was reporting. It will be really interesting to see what a redesigned 6x7 would look like. The current camera has such old roots. I personally hope that it has the metering in the body, not in the prism. Many years ago I used an Exakta 66 for about 6 months--it was an unmetered 6x6 SLR with a waist-level finder. I had so many reliability problems with it that I gave it up (it had much more ancient roots than the P67, going back to the Praktisix and Pentacon Six), but I was addicted to the combination of the SLR layout and waist-level viewing. Adding metering to that arrangement would be great. When I shot with that Exakta 66 I went for six months without a light meter. I got very good at it, but it takes concentration--I always had to be looking at the light, and I photographed every day. I've tried going without a meter since then, but when I only photograph once or twice a week it is much more difficult. --Mike
