Pentax’ new full frame DSLR is $550 – if you bought the previous one

So Ricoh* have let their secret plan out of the bag – build a DSLR that can massively undercut the competition’s upgrade cost by being upgradeable. The deal they offer, anticipated to be announced for all regions where Pentax has retailers, is to send your Pentax K-1 (Mk. I) camera in to their workshops, and get the latest hardware added and your camera sent back. No statement has been made on whether the same upgrade policy can or will be applied to future camera releases from Pentax/Ricoh.

In what some people are calling a US $50 upgrade due to the price difference currently seen in some markets between the Pentax K-1 and Pentax K-1 II, the cameras will be fitted with a new main board that has an additional “Accelerator Unit” chip that improves noise performance by approximately 1 stop. Additionally, upgraded cameras will be capable of producing hand-held pixel shift images rather than requiring a tripod to use this feature.

Due to the added noise control by way of the Accelerator Unit, the highest available sensitivity has been increased to ISO 819,200 – I previously reviewed this high ISO using samples for the Pentax KP.

Imaging-Resource has dubbed the K-1 II the “first upgradeable DSLR”. How do you think the competition will respond to this new business model? Leave a comment!

 

All images in this article are assumed to be promotional images from Ricoh.

* Ricoh is the Japanese multi-national company that bought and merged with Pentax and now maintains “Pentax” as a brand name for higher end cameras, including all DSLRs. Ricoh was in the recent past mostly known for selling office supplies, but has also sold cameras since the 1950s.

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Nikon is launching a full frame mirrorless

Nikon confirmed they are working on a mirrorless camera. While sometimes news have been blown out of proportion in the photo industry in the past, it seems likely in this case that they really mean they’re working on a new camera system. Nikon is not a company to throw up clickbait.

So how do I know the camera they’re working on is full frame? They said the camera would be Nikon-rashii, or Nikonish. Nikon has never made a medium format camera, so we can safely exclude that. Nikon is now best remembered for the F series, which dominated journalism for a decade or two.

But this is not about reliving the past. This is about competing in the current market. How many mirrorless systems are competing for the APS-C space? Mainly three – Fujifilm, Sony, and old rival Canon. How many are competing for full frame? Really only one – Sony. Nikon knows that there are things it can do better than Sony, ways to compete with Sony. When push comes to shove, maybe Sony won’t give them the sensors they want – maybe they’ll have to turn to Toshiba or Renesas. But for a company with Nikon’s heritage and customer relations, it would be way better to start in the full frame category and gain a following among professional photographers before Sony can fully convince them, than to try to mud-sling it out with Canon in the well-scoured APS-C swamp.

$700 less: Nikon D7500 is specced-down D500

For 700 Dollars less than a D500, Nikon has introduced the D7500 without the advanced autofocus module and additional card slot. However, microfocus adjustment using Live View is available. The maximum continuous shooting rate is 8 frames per second, and buffer depth is a reported 50 raw files, with no information on RAW+ buffer depth or buffer clearing times. (A fast-clearing buffer is better than a deep one!)

The Nikon D7500 (Nikon promotional image)

At 20 megapixels, the D7500’s resolution is down from the D7200’s 24 megapixels, and instead matches the D500. Nikon claims that weather sealing has been improved. The body is also a little less beefy than the D500, and very similar in size to the D7200, although small design changes have been made:

Size comparison with related models

To get an impression of the image quality to be expected, take a look at my previous articles:

• Pentax K-70 vs. Nikon D500: raw image quality
• Pentax KP vs. Nikon D500: white balance

Pentax KP vs. Nikon D500: white balance

Continuing my series on the Pentax KP, and possibly starting a sub-series comparing the Nikon D500 against it, today my attention was drawn to ephotozine’s Pentax KP sample photos, particularly the colour section:

Pentax KP (top) vs. Nikon D500 – ISO 200 (left) to ISO 819,200.

Particularly the ISO 819,200 sample from Nikon seems to be soaked in yellow, although the ISO 409,600 sample also seems affected. Here’s the 819,200 comparison, with two attempts to fix the Nikon’s white balance in post:

Pentax KP (left) vs. Nikon D500 OOC, Nikon D500 with my own special WB procedure, and finally Nikon D500 after “color->auto->white balance” from Gimp

If “fluorescent” white balance is used in the Pentax, it gets even further ahead of the Nikon – an unfair comparison perhaps, but it’s only a single step of configuration and straight out of camera:

With even more prodding, I eventually got the Nikon image to behave. I managed to keep noise levels on par, but keep in mind that it’s a fair amount of work, and you really have to know what you’re doing in Photoshop or Gimp to get this kind of result – remember the one button fix is the image on the far right, and it improves things, but doesn’t really “fix” the problem. Cutting to the chase, here’s that final result:

Even using the Pentax’ default white balance, it does impressively well, keeping in mind we had to massage the Nikon image for several minutes to get it into decent shape:

The bottom line is that in terms of colour, the Pentax produces reasonable JPEG output even at very high ISO, while the Nikon D500 takes considerable time in post-processing to achieve a competitive result. The Nikon is not usable as a JPEG camera at this high ISO and I would instead recommend, if using the D500 at all, to shoot raw and use a raw converter, in which case it’s the raw converter’s job to give you a reasonable-looking image (this will be the next part in this series, if time allows).

Sony a99 II: No C-AF in manual video?

Here’s the relevant section of Kai Man Wong’s review of the a99 II, discussing its video capabilities, the f/3.5 caveat, and the missing option to have continuous autofocus when video exposure is set manually:

 

I take my hat off to Kai for delivering a more thorough review of this camera, and in a shorter space of time, than other frequented outlets.

Nikon cancels DL series

Nikon officially dropped the bombshell that it has pulled the plug on three upcoming premium compact camera models that were announced in the first half of 2016 and initially expected to ship in June 2016. This cancellation therefore comes after months of delays as well as rumours of an imminent shipping date.

Nikon DL24-500

Nikon cited electronics hardware problems and low projected profitability in the decision. The cancelled models would have had equivalent focal ranges of 18-50mm, 24-85mm and 24-500mm, making the middle model a direct competitor to Sony’s RX100 line, while the first model covers the focal range of two of Sigma’s DP models (which use prime lenses).

Nikon DL24-85 in silver

Among other things, the cameras would have featured 20fps continuous shooting with autofocus, and in-camera perspective adjustment for architectural photography.

Nikon DL18-50

This is the next major cancellation after Samsung’s withdrawal from the dedicated camera market. Nikon has also announced a voluntary retirement program to lay off 1000 workers.

Pentax KP better at high ISO than K-70, especially after DxO PRIME treatment

Imaging Resource have published RAW samples from the Pentax KP. Since I was able to cheat DxO 11 into processing an ISO 102,400 file, I thought I would post the results of performing PRIME noise reduction on a pair of these at ISO 102,400 – one from the KP and one from a K-70 – click on the image for a 1:1 view of the striking difference (KP on left, K-70 on right):

Compare with the out-of-camera JPEG result (KP on left, default in-camera noise reduction on both):

The out-of-camera JPEGs retain a little more detail, along with some more noise – probably a matter of personal taste, but I would go with processed raws here.

The Pentax KP features saturation compensation, to stop colours looking washed out at higher sensitivities. The in-camera processing deals with this gracefully, so that no luminance detail is lost (KP on left, K-70 on right, both with default in-camera noise reduction):

The current version of DxO OpticsPro does not include a Pentax KP profile, and some loss of luminance detail could be seen in the PRIME processed image. As explained by a commenter over on Imaging Resource, this may be due to the KP using a different white point in its raw output compared to previous Pentax cameras. That being the case, it would be true to say that this will not be an issue once the DxO software is updated to support the Pentax KP.

Pentax cameras offer a lot of configurability of the output, and it’s therefore likely that the saturation compensation can be turned off or on as needed.

Overall, one can’t help but conclude that the KP is a huge advance over the K-70, a remarkable camera in its own right. And after initial reserve over the design of the camera, many now seem to be swayed by its rich features, performance and customisability.

Feel free to head over to Imaging Resource for more samples, or take a look at a comparison of the K-70 and Nikon D500 at ISO 102,400, or the post-processed ISO 800k result from a night-time Pentax KP out-of-camera JPEG. Alternatively, read my overall thoughts on the Pentax KP.