UK Photo Show 2017 - Ricoh Pentax Stand

Just coming back from a weekend in Birmingham having been to the show. I was very disappointed with the Ricoh stand and perhaps a little embarrassed be a Pentax User. Their idea was to put a model railway on the stand but it just looked cheap and compared to most other stands you could tell no money was spent on it! When are they going to learn you need to spend money to make money.

When I was there the stand was full of people from Ricoh and there were plenty of visitors. The model railway was to shoot pictures of with all the cameras surrounding it, and it was getting lots of attention. There was also the 645Z section, with Brett Harkness in attendance.

I thought it was good, and a huge improvement from last year.

The railway was about the only good thing about it in my opinion. The reps where politely indifferent, almost bored. I wasn't expecting much but it felt sad anyhow. To be fair though, I found the whole event somewhat underwhelming in many ways, bar few stands.

did you tell them it was crap darren

Good deal on the K-1 (free grip and one other thing)

other special deals no better than what Chris usually charges. Checked out the trade-in versus a DFA150-450, show special price of £1599, even with a voucher, offered £100 for my K-5 I still have K-5, LCE had no sale.

Reps were helpful when approached, I liked the look of the KP. There was a mock up of the new 50 f1.4 in a cabinet....

Found the Fuji/Nikon/Canon stands too busy. Sigma totally disinterested... Saw the odd K-3 and K5iiS.

I will just go to the Societies show next year, closer and cheaper.. Focus was much better

i dont thing you should go every year it gets complacent

1st time for ages.... maybe 10 years since I went.... when it's £40 petrol, £12 parking and £18 entry it gets pricey....so I take my own sandwiches....

I spent an hr there, most of it listening to a Theta presentation but also getting to know the main Ricoh/Pentax marketing man and the Theta ambassador.

The stand was busy on and off - I had to wait quite a while to play with the K1. I don't think it was any worse than any other stand, the people using the cameras were focusing on the trains and taking pics. The stand wasn't as big as Canon's or Nikon's but hey what do you expect. It was nice to play with the Z, there were 3 available. There did look to be nice offers available but I'm so camera'd up that I don't need another.

This was my first photography show, I thought it was a little bit underwhelming overall. It's great if you have some cash to burn and want to get a deal from any of the various brands, but it was very limited in the number of stands that cater for my particular niche. That said I'm hoping to have made at least one good contact who'll give me an extreme macro lens to do a review of.

Was curious to see a KP in the flesh but felt that the train set was not a clever idea for them. All it did was confirm to me that the autofocusing for moving targets & tracking was not up to par. Tried a few head on bursts of the train coming towards me in continuous modes, nothing in focus at all, so confirmed my decision to switch systems.

Took a wistful glance at a K-1 on the way out but on the whole I thought the whole show was a bit underwhelming, especially the lack of any decent show deals. We had a budget of around £2k to play with and I bought a latte and a coat!

Some of the 'deals' where not very favourable. An obvious one was SanDisk, an average of 15% more over standard Amazon price w/free delivery on all their cards regardless of distributor; how is it even legal to do that, beats me. Sell for whatever you think is fit, but don't try to tell me I'm getting a better price then normal.

I did pick up a Wacom tablet - the difference in price paid for my ticket and coffee.

First year I didn't buy anything. I was hoping to buy a tethered cable I just can't get my head around £30 for a USB cable. They had no offers on given they where selling them directly and some guy therebsaid they where going up in price by 10% so that's the discount sigh.

That sigma 85mm Art lens I played with is huge though

with what i have heard so far there seems to be more negatives than posatives

(so it looks like film cameras are comming back then and not useing slide film ether lol)

I didn't go this year, having been for the last three years, but I think posters are missing a big part of the show.

You can nearly always get a good price on kit elsewhere, but I take advantage of the range of speakers, presentations and tutorials on offer - mostly free. I've always felt I've had good value out of a visit, without necessarily making a significant purchase.

I did speak to a guy on the stand but he was just a uni student who was there in his spare time....wasn't even a photography student! He did say the stand was the Sales Managers idea who was working on a very tight budget.
I thought the show on the whole was good, did a small photography workshop which was my first taste of studio work. There definitely weren't so many bargains as last year but blame that on befit

Due to a last minute revision of a change of plan, I am going tomorrow. There are stands I have in mind to visit but I think most posts here have missed the main point and benefit of the show; it is not just about getting bargains (that's what Black Friday and SRS bank holiday deals are for) but to take advantage of handling kit and talking to staff. Unless you live near one of the few really large photography stores it is one of the few occasions you get to actually see and handle stuff.