Any Thoughts on Pentax?

[marsha7]

While we have many owners, thoughts and comments on most brands, it seems only one or two own Pentax equipment...what are your thoughts on your equipment...why did you buy Pentax, is it a growing or receding brand, any thoughts on the *istD, *istDS, and apparently they have brought out a new model, *istDL...is the DL an upgrade or downgrade on the others, any thoughts on Pentax

[hartcons]

I saw one of these (*ist something or other) at costco the other day. It seemed nice and compact. The kit lens didn't seem as rugged as what I'm used to (but that might not have any affect on picture quality and maybe is done partly to keep the lens nice and light which isn't necessarily a bad thing). Is Pentax one of those where you can use your old film lenses on the new cameras?

[Mark Thomas]

"growing or receding brand"

Not good news I'm afraid:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/07/...g/sxpentax.php

Cheers

[hartcons]

I imagine this might be one reason why some folks choose Nikon or Canon (even if some other camera might appeal to them). May seem like a safer bet under the assumption that those companies are better-positioned to ride out a prolonged pricing war. Didn't Konica and Minolta merge their camera operations a while back? Olympus is supposedly doing something with Panasonic but I don't think we've seen anything from that just yet (when Olympus was creating the e-1 I wonder if they considered just doing a nikon or canon lens mount, if that's possible without permission, and then making their new oly digital lenses for that mount?)

[Mark Thomas]

There are rumours of all sorts of alliances. Sony is also involved in getting into the DSLR market. Oly might make a killing if they did produce a canon mount camera with the dust-buster.

Cheers

[hartcons]

Back in the film camera days did it seem like your camera body was going to be obsolete within a couple years or were things calmer back then?

[Mark Thomas]

Pentax made good film cameras and lenses. When I was a CSI we used Pentax LX bodies - really pro stuff. When things went electonic the powers that be bought the Chinon K-mount cameras. The just didn't last. I left in 1993 but do know that they now use s2 pro's I use Canon myself though.

Cheers

[Walter Moss]

I see there's now a Pentax compact camera board. Would moving this thread there condemn it to obscurity?

[hartcons]

But pentax also makes film cameras and d-slrs. I'll ask the site owner to consider creating a Pentax d-slr/film board since I know he's looking for ways to increase participation.

[Mr. Pickles]

I think Pentax will be okay. Time will tell though. They did just open their new DSLR website, whcih is here http://www.digital.pentax.co.jp/en/special/digiichi/

If you WAIT for the "movie" to run through, on the last screen of it, there is a lady holding a camera pointing to the left, and it says PETNAX (mis-spelled) on there

That doesn't bode well......

[popopow]

Well, i own a pentax ist Ds.

Great camera, very user friendly but still have most of the advanced features you can need.
The CCD is the same than the nikon D70 and le Konica Minolta so the image quality is about the same.
You can use all the great old lenses made thess last 30 years for the K mount system. And there is a LOT of them.
You can also use, pentax screw mount and medium format lenses with and adapter.
The viewfinder is certainly the best of it's class, very bright. Far better than the D70 and the 350D.
So, all these old manual lenses are a joy to use on it.

On the down side, the jpeg quality is ok but not great. But everything is perfect if you shoot raw.
Some not so old pentax lenses are hard to find new (the wonderfull pentax FA 50 f/1.4 for example)
Continuous shooting not available on every mode but autot sport mode.
Auto focusing a bit weak on low light, but well just use manual focus, it's easy with such a good viewfinder.

the following picture was taken @ iso 3200 handheld with just a small candle light and manually focused :


I'll try to post more galleries soon.
To start, here is the rest of the series of the avove picture :
http://www.popopow.com/lizard/

[AlbertP]

Originally Posted by popopow

Well, i own a pentax ist Ds.

Great camera, very user friendly but still have most of the advanced features you can need.
The CCD is the same than the nikon D70 and le Konica Minolta so the image quality is about the same.
You can use all the great old lenses made thess last 30 years for the K mount system. And there is a LOT of them.
You can also use, pentax screw mount and medium format lenses with and adapter.
The viewfinder is certainly the best of it's class, very bright. Far better than the D70 and the 350D.
So, all these old manual lenses are a joy to use on it.

On the down side, the jpeg quality is ok but not great. But everything is perfect if you shoot raw.
Some not so old pentax lenses are hard to find new (the wonderfull pentax FA 50 f/1.4 for example)
Continuous shooting not available on every mode but autot sport mode.
Auto focusing a bit weak on low light, but well just use manual focus, it's easy with such a good viewfinder.

the following picture was taken @ iso 3200 handheld with just a small candle light and manually focused :


I'll try to post more galleries soon.
To start, here is the rest of the series of the avove picture :
http://www.popopow.com/lizard/

I'd like to see more from this camera, too.

[tcom]

I have a Pentax *IstD since nearly two years now and I am very satisfied with it. I have chosen Pentax mainly because I already had a few lenses from a Pentax film SLR ad because the other DSLRs at that time (Canon 10D and Nikon D100) were just too heavy.

I have on the following page some fullsized, unprocessed, out of the camera JPGs: http://www.pbase.com/tcom/pentax_istd_samples

I used the *istD quite a lot during travels. The camera uses normal AA batteries which is a great thing during travel. The camera anyway does not seem to need a lot of power. I am just back from a three weeks trip around Iceland where I have shot around 1200 pictures on the same set of Lithium AA batteries...

Here are a few galleries with pictures from the *istD if interested:
http://www.pbase.com/tcom/egypt
http://www.pbase.com/tcom/srilanka
http://www.pbase.com/tcom/ice2005

[popopow]

Nice pics.

the ist D is suposed to have much better jpeg camera processing than the ist Ds

[mikaelwardhana]

I am not familiar with pentax but my father keep telling me that in his time on the 60's and 70's ASAHI PENTAX was one of the major brands which people adore.
But how come now pentax SLR's is obviously not taking so much market shares?

I have never ever seen a professional photographer using a pentax SLR in my life even though i know pentax slr is not bad..

In my opinion, pentax should consider making another model which will able to cater professional photographer. A camera which will sit up there with 20D, Konica 7D, and S3 Pro.

[Mr. Pickles]

Maybe Pentax doesn't care about a better "pro" type DSLR? To me Pentax has had a "cult like" following over the last decade (or two). People who have an older Pentax, like the K1000, are really loyal to the brand. Maybe Pentax came out with their *istD just to keep those loyal fans? Pentax doesn't really need ot compete with Canon and Nikon, as long as they have a nice firm base of followers using the *istD's...?

Lets see Canon and/or Nikon get a Digital Medium Format camera as good as Pentax's Medium Format is where certain Pros are living.....

[mawz]

With the exception of the LX, Pentax has never really considered it's 35mm line to be a 'Pro' line. Their approach seems to be that if you need pro gear, buy a 645 or 67, but the 35mm stuff is for amateurs. They've had a couple of semi-pro bodies (Z-1p and MZ-S) but these are not full-up pro bodies and their approach to digital seems similar, with the exception of the stillborn full-frame MZ-D.

They seem to be doing fairly well here in Canada, with a fair bit of advertising and the Cameras are available everywhere. Konica Minolta has just pulled out of the Canadian Market (They're looking for a 3rd party importer right now, but KM Canada is history) but Pentax seems to be rather agressive, despite some distinct misteps (Why is the DL kit now priced the same as the DS kit was before it was discontinued, the DL kit is not a $1099CDN camera when you can get the DS kit for $999CDN at Black's).

[cameraguy21773]

The attractive thing to me about the Pentax DSLRs is that they can take ALL the older Pentax lenses and the Pentax 645 and 67 lenses. The Takumar 50mm f1.7 is arguably the best 50mm ever made and the Takumar 200 macro is a legendary lens. Pentax medium format lenses are among the very best in the idustry and may be attractively price now with the rise of digital photography and interchangeable systems.

I'm shooting Nikon digital now but am planing to get a Pentax *ist D to take advantage of my medium format lenses.

[ellette]

My mom has one.* I think it is the *ist Ds, but I don't know...the nicer of the two *ist D_'s.* It seemed very easy to use the one time I got a hold of it.* ** Seeing as how it is the only digital camera I've ever used, and I only got to snap a couple pictures and not even play around with it, I thought it was fairly user friendly.* She wouldn't let me try any settings, so it was on automatic the whole time, but seeing as how I'd forgotten my camera, any picture is better than no picture.* Here's one of the ones I took that day.* It has been cropped to be landscape instead of portrait.



Sara

[Neil V]

I had an *ist DS for a couple of months, it was an extremely capable camera, especially when utilizing RAW. Pentax has some fantastic glass and I got some beautiful captures with it. I ended up taking it back as I couldn't get comfortable with the camera, it was just too small for my hands.

Neil