Pentax thinking on K10D

There is a translation of an interview with pentax chief engineer Hisashi Tatamiya by Ken Takeshita here:- href="http://ca.geocities.com/[email protected]/TatamiyaInterview.html" rel="nofollow" class="outlink" http://ca.geocities.com/[email protected]">target="blank">http://ca.geocities.com/[email protected]/TatamiyaInterview.html

It's a bit mangled, but gives some interesting insights into their development process for the K10D.

A very interesting insight into the design team's thinking process. Thanks for posting the link.

They still talk about K10D being mid-level...I want to see if they take the next step....K1D? I want to see if this will see the light of day as it stops me from buying the K10D at the moment....plus the fact I love my*istD.

As for demand from Hong Kong - I was told to forget about discount even though the camera was being sold for around 500 pounds...but the camera did not stay on the shelf....

I think the K1D is almost a certainty now, but I think it will be much more expensive than the K10D.

It would have to have a high top shutter speed, as the article mentions, and things like that will push the price up considerably. Then add the fact that a high price will mean low sales, and therefore no economies of scale, and that will push the price up further.

So I reckon we are talking about £2,000 or £3,000. This is money that could otherwise be spent on lenses.

G

Better to spend the money on lenses as George suggests. There comes a point beyond which changing the camera body will have very little effect on the pictures we are able to shoot. The law of dimishing returns...

When I get it, I'm sure I will be happy with the K10D for a very long time.

I can't ever recall a situation where I thought "I need a shutter speed faster than 1/4000!" and doubt that I'll ever need it. 2-3K would take me and the K10D on a nice holiday where I could get some exotic pictures.

I won't write off K10D or K1D just yet, my *ist D has only just gone over the 6000 pictures mark so there is plenty of life in that camera yet (the DL has just gone over 1000, the Canon G5 is way behind despite the fect I have had that camera the longest time)...

So I will make up my mind when I see the spec of the K1D. What I noticed how many things were improved on from the K100D to K10D....

I enjoy the argument about saving the money for lenses, there may be some logic in it, just like getting the cheapest air fare for the holiday rather than paying extra for extra legroom (oh! you get to spend more money when you get there...), my friend went BA world traveller, I went WT Plus (50% extra), guess who was most relaxed (plus I get extra miles) and the extra room to cope with my knackered knee....

Peter

I wonder if Pentax have been playing a "long game" here. By choosing not to produce a flagship camera with first or second generation hardware they are gaining a lot of experience and feedback that can be rolled into the K1D if and when it arrives - which may also depend upon Pentax making some serious money on the K10/100/110D range to fund it. They will therefore have avoided a lot of the mistakes that other manufacturers have made in a stampede to market. OK it is a risky strategy if one of the other makers came out with a gobsmaking killer camera, but a hang back and shake out the bugs in the lower end of the market place approach may turn out to have been the correct one all along.

Thus ends my application for a job in marketing at Pentax!

I suspect that Pentax have been earning some money from the *istD range, and that as their success increased it made more things possible. A "flagship" model would be all very well, but it isn't in the main part of the market place and the press photographers are already geared up to Canon or Nikon so breaking into that would be a long hard slog. That would also need a lot of investment.

I think Pentax are pitching it just right with an excellent product and it should increase their market share very significantly where it counts.

I think interesting the interview was, really it opens our eyes to the thinking before the K10D, shutter speed of a higher speed would have the price made higher, also aware it makes us of the importance of balance of features againt price .........etc etc etc

Apart from the translation that was a very interesting article.

thanks