I guess I could just buy a video camera, but in truth a good video camera is no cheaper than something like a Nikon Z8 or Canon EOS R5 MK II and then it's even more gear to hump around. When I go on holiday for example I want to shoot both superb video and stills,

The Z8 gear has arrived and I've managed one serious stills shoot with it so far and also enjoyed being second shooter on my daughter's university documentary project. We spent the day at Naim Audio who were incredibly accommodating and welcoming and I think she got some great footage, I can't wait to see her edited version.

So far I'm really pleased with the Z8 and oh boy are those S-Series lenses razor sharp. I noticed that whereas with my K1 I was usually increasing clarity a little, with the Z8 I have tended to reduce it, at least for my first portrait shoot I did.

It's clear that it's going to take me a while to get it configured how I want as there are so many focus options for example that it's a bit mind boggling but I'm really enjoying learning again and the memory bank function it offers is really good so you can setup Bank 1 for portraiture, Bank 2 for action/sports/BIF and Bank 3 for movies etc. The image quality seems to be the equal of my K1 while exposure and autofocus are simply stunning. Ergonomically and in terms of UI I am finding it fairly intuitive to get to grips with after a lifetime of shooting Pentax with only a few "what's it doing now?" moments!! lol

One thing I will say is that the Z8 feels really good in the hand in the same way that a K1 or gripped K3 does. The Z8 is a weighty beast but I would say in terms of build quality it's 90-95% as nice as Pentax top end models but not quite there.

Perhaps the biggest surprise to me is how little I have missed the OVF which is something I was really worried about! The electronic viewfinder on the Z8 is so real looking and responsive that I actually find myself forgetting it isn't a DSLR. What I do miss though is the feeling of vibration in the body from mirrors and shutters moving and the Z8 shutter sound is pathetic compared to the lovely click of the real thing in a DSLR!

Anyway the proof of the pudding is in the eating so here's some images taken from my first shoot with it...

Saxon

PS Glad some enjoy my hi-fi reviews...

Hi guys,

Sorry I've only just checked back here and many thanks for the very helpful replies. All three of the retailers I have been in touch with reported that Pentax used values seem to be falling and keeping anything bar my ME Super, MZ5n, SMC-M 50mm f1.7 and Tamron 80-210 F3.8/4 is impossible as I will need every penny to make a system move (though in truth I'd love to be able to afford to keep the K1/77/24-70 and 15-30 and still move to Nikon! So I think your point is well made Pwynnej and I envy you!

In terms of pricing I've been quite lucky I think in that two of the retailers I am selling to have allowed me to split the sale to maximise my overall return. While I could realise even more with a private sale the amount of kit I have to move means that it's a lot simpler for me to just sell the system to a camera store and get the money in fairly quickly.

I have now ordered the Nikon Z8, 24-120 f4 for £2615 from Panamoz (it's £4500 retail across the UK!!!)
Also the Nikkor Z 100-400 f4-5.6 from Panamoz for £1645 (usually around £2499 retail UK)
Also the Nikkor Z 14-30mm f4 for £640 on a 1 day flash sale from Amazon (usually £1299) I got very lucky that day as I just happened to be browsing and noticed the flash sale reduction!!

So all in the move to Nikon is £4900 and I'm now covered from 14mm-400mm with top class lenses. While there is a shortfall compared to what my Pentax system is realising, it's not huge due to the good prices I have managed to secure on the Nikon gear and I needed to move quickly to achieve that.

None of it is here yet but the 14-30mm is due tomorrow (Sat) and the rest on Tue which is exciting. Unfortunately if it wasn't for Easter it would probably be here by the weekend rather than on a work day!

I will be genuinely sad to say goodbye to Pentax (at least for digital). I'm going to retain my old film gear though just in case the urge to run a roll of Ilford through something overtakes me lol!!

To be fair if Pentax had actually got a K1 iii waiting in the wings and it promised good autofocus tracking including in video as well as 4k shooting I might have stayed, but their communication with their user base is a complete mess and people like me are tired of being left dangling with them seeming to lack direction or focus.

The Pentax K bodies are superior in feel and ergonomics to anything else out there in my view, but I have to say the AI focus tracking on those modern Canon and Nikon bodies is absolutely sensational including the way it locked immediately on to the nearest iris of people I pointed it at in the shop. For portraiture, birds in flight, airshows etc its a whole new paradigm.

My best mate has just ordered an R5II and 24-105 to augment his existing Canon system so we're meeting up at the end of the month to visit the Hawk Conservancy Trust near Andover and I'm really looking forward to putting the Nikon through its paces!! He's got a huge swathe of L series fast telephoto primes already, so it's going to be interesting I think to see how the Canon and Nikon compare.

This is a wonderful community of Pentax lovers and I have loved being a part of it. In a way I feel guilty about defecting, but in truth I feel like Pentax left me in a way and not the other way around. They just needed to communicate more and move with the times because I still love what they do well.

I really do hope that they announce an advanced DSLR this year because it's vital to keep their users like you folks on board with the system. I've spent a lot of money with them over the years having bought everything bar the 17-70mm new, but I feel fortunate that I've managed to make the move fairly financially painless to a system that will enable me to broaden my horizons significantly.

Wishing you all happy shooting! I will check in from time to time.

Saxon

I've been a proud Pentaxian since I purchased my ME Super and 50mm F1.7 with the proceeds from my paper round in 1981! Over the years I have loved the cameras, the way they are so beautifully built, the weather sealing, the intuitive menus and the feeling of just taking pictures on a truly lovely camera. The K1 has been by far the best camera I have ever owned and has delivered some astonishing images. It's ability to paint with light is simply sublime.

I have done some professional work (mainly product photography and some portraiture and PR work) but am now back to being an amateur (unless you count taking pics of hi-fi equipment and hi-fi shows to support my hi-fi reviewing sideline).

I have however reached a point where my interests are moving in a video direction, partly to support my hi-fi journalism and partly to support my daughter, who is in her first year of a filmmaking degree in Birmingham.

Obviously my daughter has access to a range of rental kit from Uni, but that means we have to go and get her from Uni by car and return her there after say Easter when she has a film project on. This is a little trickier for us because I work shifts, so it seems to me that assembling a nice video-capable system for her to use in the holidays for her own projects and coursework outside term time makes some sense. The primary use will still be my landscape and model photography, but I would increasingly like to be able to shoot decent video for my hi-fi projects, perhaps with her filming and editing and I think other brands are better suited to this.

I'm currently favouring the Nikon Z8 as it seems like a very good all-rounder and quite flexible if I add the 24-120mm F4 and 15-30mm F4.

I'm thus looking to part with my entire Pentax system which comprises:

All mint/boxed/manuals/chargers/cases/cables unless noted
Pentax K1 (21971 shutter count)
Pentax K3 (12775)
Pentax K5 (15917) my daughter managed to lose one of my official Pentax batteries, so this now has two Chinese-made substitutes.
Pentax official grips for K1, K3 and K5 - all boxed of course
Pentax D-FA 15-30mm f2.8
Pentax D-FA 24-70mm F2.8
Pentax SMC-FA 77mm F1.8 Limited
Pentax SMC-DA 12-24mm F4.0 ED
Pentax SMC-DA 17-70mm F4.0 - lens hood seems to fall off too easily, otherwise mint.
Pentax SMC DA 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 WR
Pentax SMC D-FA 100mm WR macro
Pentax SMC M 50mm F1.7
Tamron SP-AF 70-200mm F2.8 DI LD
Tamron SP AF 17-50mm F2.8 XR DI II LD
Tokina AT-X 80-400mm F4.5-5.6D
Samyang 8mm F3.5 fisheye

I'm in the process of getting quotes from a couple of leading retailers to trade the whole lot, but am interested in people's experiences of selling to a retailer v selling it myself on the forums here or on ebay. Does Pentax gear still sell reasonably quickly or does it quickly turn into a load of hassle given the amount of gear I have to shift? What have others done when changing systems?

I reckon with luck I should be able to fund most of the Nikon price with the sale of my existing system and the only thing I will really lose will be F2.8 and any telephoto capability beyond 120mm. I will at a later date need to buy a 70-200 or 100-400 for those rare occasions when I want to compress landscape perspectives or shoot portraiture from a distance.

Grateful for any insights as I ponder my next move. I plan to head to Park Cameras on Friday to get a feel for the various options from Canon/Nikon etc as feel and handling as well as intuitive controls remain very important to me!

Saxon

Cabstar,

I'm not sure if anybody offers 24 megapixel full frame in raw at 7+fps. The K1 is just a tiny bit slower than a D810 and the D5 while blazing fast is only 21mp.

I'd love the K1 to match the burst speed of my K3 but I'm not sure you can get that anywhere - yet!

As for Nikon they were likely the only SLR brand I would potentially defect to and I am sorry that they are struggling. They've botched nearly all their recent model launches but they're the only thing stopping Canon taking over the world and for that they deserve my support! Canon make some outstanding glass but I've never got on with their bodies and feel they are a bit like Apple in that they charge way over the odds for what they offer.

Pentax are however becoming a real force to be reckoned with and I feel like for thirty years I've been backing a losing horse that is now moving up the field against the odds and taking a frontrunning position. I've shot Pentax since 1981 and was frustrated with them quite often until the K3 but that camera really moved the game on from my K5 in terms of autofocus and the K1 is such an outstanding machine that it bears comparison with the state of the art. Its high ISO shooting capability and imaging quality astound me everytime I use it.

saxon

The K5 was fine but it was the K3 that really felt like all the camera I would ever need. I found it much much better at focussing accurately and it gave visibly cleaner and sharper images. The K1 feels quite different in use to the other cameras. The shutter doesn't have the same defined feel as the K3/K5 series at the halfway point, the navigation of menus and settings feels snappier and it feels much heavier in the hand.

Best of all it captures a scene and renders light and shade in a way which I think is quite different to the earlier APSC K series cameras. At first I looked at the (RAW) pictures straight out of the camera and found them looking a little 'flat' - the colour saturation is more muted (which is something I have seen in 645Z images too) but then you realise that real life isn't technicolour. The camera captures light and shade and the gradations between with a subtlety that the K3 and K5 can only dream of.

I'm still learning how to shoot with it but lets just say it's forcing me to 'raise my game' like no other camera before it...

An astonishing experience and a privilege to capture the world with it - I feel I'm on a photographic journey learning with it.

Jonathan

Thanks guys for the feedback and Peter I absolutely haven't 'avoided' testing the motion tracking but as I'm primarily a portrait photographer it's not something I felt qualified to comment on. My fast action photography really only comes into play when I occasionally visit a bird of prey center or an airshow or motorsport event and I only photograph those in an amateur capacity. I do think that from the Pentax K3 onwards Pentax ability in this area seems to have improved dramatically and one essential component of this is knowing how best to set-up the multitude of options for target acquisition and tracking in the menu. I played about with this stuff once or twice on the K3 and was very impressed at the results but there are many on here who would be far better acquainted with which options would suit a particular style of action photography than I am so I feel it best to be honest about my limitations in this area.

The low light focussing ability seems superior to the K3 (I have used that while shooting some night/dark scenes) so I can state that with some authority as there is noticeably less hunting.

I also think it's fair to say that you can't just point any camera at a flying bird and expect it to track well - they all need to be configured for action e.g. 9 point focus, hold status high, shake reduction off etc.

Hope this is helpful,

Jonathan

You folks on the fence might enjoy my appraisal of the K1 three weeks in, it includes quite a bit of Pentax historical context:

http://www.jonathangorsephotography.com/blog/2016/5/PentaxK1

Jonathan

I'm a portrait guy, not an action photography guy, but my 11 year old daughter is having an ice skating party tomorrow so I thought I would take the K3 along. I'm not really up on the best mode to use in terms of tracking on my K3 but would welcome some wisdomfrom those who do this all the time!

I know that AFC is obviously the best choice, but spot? live view? etc - any advice,

saxon

PS lenses I plan to use include Tamron 70-200mm F2.8, Samyang manual focus 8mm fisheye, Tamron 17-50mm F2.8 or Pentax 17-70mm F4

It's all about the field of view for me. I have a small home studio (12x10ft) and shooting full length on the K3 pushes me down the route of needing too wide a lens. I shot this last week but ended up with a three quarter crop while shooting.




Some of the full length ones just about worked:




But I think a K1 and 24-70mm 2.8 is going to be like adding another 6ft to my shooting distance and that is far cheaper than talking to the local builder about an extension!!

So it's a guaranteed purchase for me, even though I love my K3.

saxon

I'm puzzled by this. I went yesterday and was approached by a Ricoh rep to go to the 645Z presentation. I went and thoroughly enjoyed Matt Emmett's talk in particular plus I asked to try the 150-450 on a K3 which they obliged me by doing. I spent a while chatting with their rep, played with the 645Z extensively, had a catch up with Matt, got their sales director chap to take a picture of me with my mate. In short they couldn't have been more accommodating and welcoming. I expressed an interest in the WG-M1 and they didn't have it on display (which was daft) so they went and got one from the back for me and then referred me to LCE who had a show deal on it. Unfortunately they didn't have the helmet adapter for sale but I bought the WG-M1 and it seems great.

I liked the stand even if I thought Olympus had the nicest stand of anyone (they were also very friendly and actually their Olympus sales guy asked me what I used and when I said the Pentax K3 he said 'that's a great camera' which I thought was nice). By contrast Canon had a crap stand - swamped by people with two strange acrobat blokes climbing over what looked like a couple of packing crates for some reason and seemingly no actual sales presentation. I was with a Canon owning pro friend (who already has two EOS 5D's (one a MK3) plus an array of expensive L series Canon glass. When we did finally get to speak with someone and he asked to try the new 11-24mm fisheye zoom the guy handed it over as if he didn't give a toss. We then asked about the new 5DS and he said 'it's down the end' with a very nonchalant wave of his hand. The level of corporate arrogance displayed was staggering considering we both had lanyards around our neck saying we were professionals and my mate has already probably around £15000 of Canon gear - unbelievable.

As a result we spent far longer with Pentax Ricoh and even my mate came away very impressed with the 645Z and the new super zoom so I would say they were doing a pretty good job...

I'm sorry your experience was so different.

Jonathan