I've got to be honest... I get through a lot less than 15 films a year since getting a DSLR! I can understand how the expense would be an issue if it was your primary camera though.

The P3n (P30n?) is a cracker. No AF, no ability to control aperture on DA lenses, but a great manual body. You really don't need to pay more than 25.00 though, I would expect to pay half that - there are mountains of P30 bodies on ebay and Rocky cameras has about a hundred of them! Someone on this forum gave me mine. Only being able to use DA lenses in Program mode is at least possible.

The batteries the SF series take are not expensive by the way, and last a good long time, so don't be to swayed by that. Especially as an occasional film user. (The batteries cost 2.99 from 7dayshop).

Maybe you should look past what this shop happens to have in stock, define your priorities, and then you can decide on the ideal body and hunt for a deal?

I thought this was quite interesting - not really to draw real conclusions from, but as a guide as to the effect on FOV and DOF of the two formats. (The 35mm shots are done on film, and it's immediately noticeable that the digital shots require a lot more PP work to make them look as good - so much for 'I don't PP my images cos I want them to look true to reality :twisted.

50mm F5.6 on 35mm

34mm f5.6 on APSC

200mm at f8 on 35mm

135mm at f8 on digital

That looks great Barrie. Nice bit of bling for your Q!

When this subject was set I remembered these interesting images from Robin Parmar:

Myths of the New Forest

I like the choice of matt or glossy 'sports car' finish!

They've gone for a much nicer shade of red this time, sort of dark cherry red rather than 'pillar box'.

If Pentax did decide to pursue FF, I'm sure they could do the manufacturing in a way that didn't affect their production of APSC cameras. We're not talking about building the large hadron collider or putting a man on Mars here. Did the 645D affect their DSLR production? Or the K-01 The manufacturing set up for a FF camera is presumably much closer to their usual DSLRs too...

All of those top-10 APSC cameras are from brands which offer a FF upgrade path. I'm not saying that's the only reason Canikon/Sony are more popular but I bet it doesn't hurt.

After reading the 'Some Full Frame Shots and Thoughts' thread on the US Pentax forum, I'd say yes, in the many cases. The pictures just have slightly more depth and 'pop' for want of a better word. Images taken with pedestrian 50mm f1.8 lenses are better than the closest we can achieve on APSC IMO; and we have to resort to rather expensive, large 35mm lenses with huge apertures to get the same look.

But yep there are some examples where you wouldn't be able to tell. If you can't tell from a 1000px web image, it's not worth bothering about but as I say there is frequently a difference.

It has to be K1

I don't know why we argue on this subject sometimes. Pentax will make the decision on commercial grounds. But they're not afraid of marketing niche items - the 645d comes to mind. I'm sure the percentage of sales of cameras it accounts for is minuscule, much smaller than they could expect for FF, but I think most people agree it was a worthwhile project and I believe sales exceeded their humble expectations (and at one point, their manufacturing capacity if I remember rightly).