Poll - who would £1000 for a full frame K10D?

I do not want to buy a bigger camera like 645. If you do buy it. I prefer to remain to 35mm SLR.
One of the most important advantages of Pentax is compatibility. The most important. You can find anything and put it on a Pentax body. Manual focus or Auto focus, Pentax, Carl-Ceiss, Chinon, Tamron, Tokina, Vivitar, etc etc.
Pentax is a serious company and it is not going to put the moter on the lenses.
There are lenses that cost millions. Could you imagine such a lens with a broken motor?
I think Pentax is going to produce a body with FF and I think that a lot of people are going to get it.
People that have invested on Pentax equipment for years and have manual or AF bodies with lenses will get it. Also techno-freeks would like to take a camera with FF which means a great gadget for them.
I strongly believe and hope that Pentax will give such a FF body because after the success of the new models for the serious amateurs would probably like to come closer to professionals.
I gave you 3 reasons.
And as I have already said in another topic,
PENTAX K100D --> 6MP
PENTAX K10D --> 10 MP SEMI-PROFESSIONAL MODEL
PENTAX K1D --> FULL FRAME PROFESSIONAL MODEL

IF I SEE SUCH A MODEL I CAN GIVE ALMOST 1500€ TO BUY IT.
If you are pleased for the current models keep them and not go further. All of us are free to chose.

If you are going to come and post here, please take the trouble to keep up with what is going on in the modern world. This is 2006, not 1906. Pentax have already announced lenses with motors in them that will be available in the first half of next year.

http://www.digital.pentax.co.jp/en/lens/roadmap.pdf

There really is no point in your posting when you clearly know absolutely nothing.

Now get it into your head:

98% of serous photographers use digital
80% of snappers use digital
35mm film is almost dead.
99% of digital photography is done using cameras with a sensor smaller than 35mm.
Canon is the only supporter of 35mm sized sensors, but these account for only 2.1% of its digital camera production.
Neither Pentax, nor Nikon, nor anybody else is going to produce a new DSLR with a 35mm-sized sensor. Olympus, Sony, inter alia, have gone with even smaller sensors than Pentax and Nikon.

Because so few people are now using film, and because Pentax is not going to produce a DSLR with a larger sensor, there is no point in NOT using DA lenses.

Now get real, face facts, and adjust your life accordingly. You have become VERY irritating.

G

PS: Anybody who thinks film isn't almost dead should look at the financial position of Agfa (dead), Ilford (almost dead), Kodak (almost dead), and Fuji (now making its money from digital).

This is my last reaction to one of your posts, Pentax IS going to put the motors in the lenses. Take a look at the lens roadmap... Why do you think that the K10D has additional contacts which are NOT for the powerzoom, they are just at the same location as the powerzoom contacts with older camera's.

/Remco

Well, reports of the death of film are perhaps premature.. but that's another thread.

Lenses with motors-not something I think about.

However, there's a good deal of marketing savvy, if not technical need, that would point any manufacturer in the full-frame direction. After all the pixel counting gets tedious, there has to be somewhere for camera makers to aim. The affordable full-frame digicam will likely sell like crazy.

I think we WILL see several makers having 'full- frame' models in their product inventories,...perhaps there will also be different sizes/shapes of sensors also.

I think that the Sony company holds the key to this hypothesis.

Trying to see into the future is a "fool's errand", however, we can be absolutely sure of two factors about future camera product ranges;

a) Makers MUST keep on bringing out new models even if these are simply cosmetic revamps of previous models.

b) Makers MUST look at new or diversified product ranges as saturation levels are reached in existing ones (and profit margins diminish due to competition), in order to attempt outflanking moves on their opponents.

When Sony aquired the Konica-Minolta technology earlier this year they made it known that they were set on gaining 20% of the SLR market quite quickly and that Canon were their main opponent, at least in the long term.

K-M had already allowed various people to suggest that a full frame camera was in development. if this did indeed exist, albeit in developmental form then this presumably passed to Sony since K-M gave up on camera products to be active elswhere.

Since Sony is the 'other' big sensor maker to Canon and has stated that it intends to chase Canon as the market leader, then we will presumably see full frame sensors appearing in pro level bodies from Sony.

Although Nikon has stated that it will NOT be going full-frame, it's statements are probably neccessitated by the lack of FF sensors. However since Nikon buys it's sensors from Sony it seems highly likely that it would have to aquire the Sony FF sensor if only to stay in the game.

With these three major makers gone Full- frame the rest would be forced to follow.

Pentax is in a very interesting and unique position of having a stated interest in larger still sensor cameras,..ie., the 'digital 645' Perhaps this is why it's been so long appearing,.....perhaps Pentax is really waiting to target the FF models from other makers with a better cost effective alternative.....

Incidentally, I understand that the APS sized sensor has already reached a 'max-out' due to the laws of physics and would reqire revolutionary changes of direction to go further in terms of pixel count and resolution. This is certainly borne out by the new 6 meg models (and decreased high ISO performance of 10meg models) and by several makers now looking at improved signal processing,..as in K10D.

I'd have to disagree with that statement, as technology is sure to progress at the same astounding rate as it has done in recent years. Consider the Pentax A20 compact - it's got 10Mp crammed into a 1/1.8" sensor (which according to DPReview is 7.176mm x 5.319mm). Now I'm not saying that currently that's ideal, and there are sure to be quality issues with such small pixels, but I'm also sure that the camera produces acceptable images, and probably better ones than would have been produced by a compact 3 years ago.

At this pixel density (approx 260,000/mm2) an APS CCD would have just short of 100Mp. It's not asking too much to believe that APS sensors are going to reach 20Mp within the next couple of years, and who knows what beyond that.

Whether the average user needs that resolution is another matter.

Dan

Not only the average user, but even professional advertising photography doesn't need what's already available.

The agencies want you to shoot 39 megapixels so they can print a double-gate spread on an offset press through a 200 line screen? C'mon, get real!!

I don't agree entirely.

Some of us continue to favour using film, and I guess that there are a lot of people out there who have not yet bought a digital camera. It's just that the market for film cameras has evaporated. I will continue to use film alongside digital.

I, like you George, am irritated that another thread has been hijacked by one person who thinks his views are better than those of established members. I own a Z-1, Z-1p and an MZ-S (plus the D and DL) which I love and to be absolutely brutally honest I don't give a sh*t about the sensor size on my digital camera.

Will the irritant please note that it is image/picture quality that matters, and composition and exposure that matter. Not the size of the sensor.

Mind you if, one day in future, after years of happiness with my APS-C K10D or K1D, with DA* lenses, pentax bring out an M-series digital with a 36 x 24 sensor that is leap years ahead in terms of everything over the KD then I might consider the jump. Will I cry over spilt milk that my DA* lenses will be incompatible? No, I will have a battery of older lenses to enjoy again....

So 1000 pounds for a full frame K10D??? Only if it's better than the K10D itself, from what I read that will take some doing...

I'd be happier with a 12MP camera like the D2x which would make picture library submissions a likelier possibility

Alamy.com, quite a major image library, are happy to accept images from 6Mp cameras:

"Note for images from digital cameras - We strongly recommend that images are captured on a digital camera capable of producing files of 17MB and upwards (6 megapixels). Please then interpolate the images to a minimum of 48MB using professional upsizing software. We recommend Genuine Fractals™, although other professional upsizing software is equally acceptable, including Abobe Photoshop versions 7 and CS/CS2 (if the bicubic option is used)."

Don't let perceived limitations in resolution stop you!

Dan

Seems they have set their standards a bit lower......I would prefer to interpolate from a 36 mB file than an 18 mB file....

For the last few months, I've spent my days in a college classroom.
The curriculumn calls for film.
using my ist ds2, and my super program together, I've shot digital polaroids, and b+w film.
here's what I learned:
I've been sloppy in recent years, since switching to digital, releying on software to fix details film shooters must pay attention to.
My time with film, has caused me to improve my digital work.
I'm spending less time at the computer.
Film shooters Must Fear Digital shooters.
The ability for consumers to obtain high quality images with digital will lessen demand for the skills of seasoned pros.
For me film is something only to be done on demand.

The last batch of santa fotos we did this season, I shot the ist ds2 and a sony hdv hdr hc1 camcorder side by side, and the resulting 4x6" photos were remarkably similar in quality.

so I'd suggest that the film/digital, or large/small image sensor, debates are moot.

Those of us that want to still be in business three years from now had better start debating "Still Photographer vs Multimedia Specialists"

Excellent point Don. Technology is changing rapidly and re-writing the rules as it goes. I mean how long before we see 6MP in a phone? Probably happened already!

A couple of months back I attended an IT seminar where a "futurologist" from BT (British Telecom) predicted that we will see more changes in the next 10 years than we have seen in the last 100.

That funny wooshing sound is the future passing us by! I'm off to my lead-lined bunker (where I also keep my single malts!)

I do a "Digital Workshop" twice a month, and even in that I recommend that the best way to improve technique, especially exposure and composition, is to shoot slide film. It's unforgiving and WYSIWYG.

A good discipline.

Hi,

George..."98% of serous photographers use digital"

Please let us know the source of this fact.

cheers Steve.

Hi Daniel,

with the DL (and I assume all the 6mp models) shooting RAW and exporting as a TIFF file will give you a 50 odd MB file without upsizing anyway. Of course this is because it exports TIFFs as 16bit and jpg as 8 bit, hence the difference. Reading the link, that's pointless anyway as their upload software converts 16bit images down to 8bit. Then it goes on to say that it's file size that matters, not dpi (pixel count), and that they want as great as dynamic a range as possible???????

Me no understand. If they want the best quality, then an exported TIFF @ 16 bit (around 50MB) is going to be of better quality than an 8bit jpg upsized with third party software. Nope.. definitely confused my little old brain.. easy to do.

Cheers

Liam