On 10/31/2012 4:39 PM, Alexandru-Cristian Sarbu wrote:
Such conclusions are premature; the product we saw so far (from
October 2011) are "Pentax-Hoya" projects. There simply wasn't enough
time (less than a year, including analyzing the business and
formulating a plan) to build a "true" Pentax Ricoh camera. What they
could do was to finish products already in pipeline, including ones
frozen by Hoya (the DA 560mm for example).
Please be patient, next year we should see more interesting stuff.
Well, you may be right. I mean - it is indeed possible that Ricoh will
do way better than Hoya in terms of investing money in the right areas
so that next round of products from Pentax will be good.
However:
1. Like Larry said - cameras and lenses are just tools. I would add that
in a sense they are also toys.
2. Although great many of Pentax users that I happen to know are very
loyal (even to the point of being slightly fanatical about that) to
their brand of choice of photo gear, it couldn't be said that Pentax
reciprocates.
Just recently we had a thread about SDM failures. Previously I had an
impression that SDM failures were not an issue for this club. But then
it turned out that Paul's 60-250 developed this problem. Then Bob chimed
in. And then it turned out that we had significantly more cases. And
presently my impression is that SDM failures are not figment of
imagination of PentaxForums crowd which is deemed hysterical by this
community.
No matter - it is a technical issue that as rumor has it Pentax
resolved. However an official word would have been very helpful here,
but none was produced.
3. I cannot help but notice that Pentax lenses get very little mention
here. Granted the thread is about cameras, but IMO, Pentax hasn't been
really innovating in terms of optical design either. They did produce
the new coating - but so what... SMC is good enough.
I have two contemporary developed lenses. DA 21/3.2 - and it looses out
to my copy of FA 20/2.8 in terms of sharpness at wide aperture. And DA*
16-50/2.8 which is soft towards the corners in a way that just makes me
hit my forehead in disbelief - this is the flagship standard fast zoom
lens from the manufacturer that just 10 years prior to that was
introducing absolutely stellar optics.
The DA* 16-50/2.8 is good enough for me, but me is just a very
pedestrian amateur. What about more serious photographers? Oh, we have
Paul in our midst and Benjamin Kanarek on the PentaxForums who are doing
great job with their Pentax gear. However, despite what Paul said I
maintain that it is not because of gear they get their fantastic
pictures, but because of them being masters of their art.
4. Comparing over last 3 years the products that were introduced to the
market by all Pentax competitors large and small alike personally I
think that Pentax R&D has been forced into complete halt.
Just compare the cameras and lenses that Olympus introduced being under
extreme financial dire straits...
5. It is not to say that sky is falling and that my gear will stop
working because of that. However, the consequences are that it is not
trivial as it used to be to have to fix Pentax gear nowadays. Few people
posted here some rather unpleasant stories that happened to them with
CRIS or whomever that was. Eventually the issues were resolved, but it
was people of USA - the mightiest consumer country of them all. Where I
am - I don't want to start thinking about it...
The sky is not falling but to say that it is business as usual would be,
how to put it, narrow-sighted...
Boris
--
PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List
PDML@pdml.net
http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow
the directions.
