What would you do if you were in charge of Pentax DLSRs?
Discussion
So, you've got a fundamentally decent set of products and some cracking lenses but relatively small market share and perhaps not a huge amount of marketing budget compared with Nikon and Canon. Essentially little to lose but everything to gain.
What woudld you do?
I would make the range as modular as possible, much like the PC market. Its sensible engineering to do this internally and many manufacturers models share Sensors, AF units etc. Taking this to the max could reduce manufacturing costs. A smaller player could take this further by offering user changeable parts:
Viewfinders, pentamirror, prism, aux electronic, a posh X100 like hybrid one.
Sensors,
Processors
Chassis
Flash etc
This policy would be suicide for Nikon or Canon who have everything to lose and nothing to gain (a new sensor for my D200 and its nearly as good as a D7100. For a small player though it gives them a better chance of retaining existing customers and would tempt many others.
From a user perspective it would allow you to spec your pefect camera(s) and even customise it for certain jobs.
I'd even be tempted to offer different lens mounts, the body market is far larger than the Pentax lens market.
It suprises me that there isnt more innovation from the smaller players. To my mind Olympus got it right when they ditched 'me too' 4/3 cameras and majored on the small size possibility of m4/3.
Sony innovated with the DSLT but I'm not seeing people swap over to it.
What woudld you do?
What woudld you do?
I would make the range as modular as possible, much like the PC market. Its sensible engineering to do this internally and many manufacturers models share Sensors, AF units etc. Taking this to the max could reduce manufacturing costs. A smaller player could take this further by offering user changeable parts:
Viewfinders, pentamirror, prism, aux electronic, a posh X100 like hybrid one.
Sensors,
Processors
Chassis
Flash etc
This policy would be suicide for Nikon or Canon who have everything to lose and nothing to gain (a new sensor for my D200 and its nearly as good as a D7100. For a small player though it gives them a better chance of retaining existing customers and would tempt many others.
From a user perspective it would allow you to spec your pefect camera(s) and even customise it for certain jobs.
I'd even be tempted to offer different lens mounts, the body market is far larger than the Pentax lens market.
It suprises me that there isnt more innovation from the smaller players. To my mind Olympus got it right when they ditched 'me too' 4/3 cameras and majored on the small size possibility of m4/3.
Sony innovated with the DSLT but I'm not seeing people swap over to it.
What woudld you do?
Given the standard of some of their lenses I really think they should look at 35mm full frame. They may not sell many but it would help change people's perception of them and up their profile a bit. I think both Canon and Nikon sell well on the back of their system cameras. They are perceived as the best and so people buy their products. Pentax might be able to learn from this.
It's hard to see what Pentax can do, short of come up with a game-changer as big as the change from film to digital. Pentax had such a dominant position, then somehow lost it and I don't see an obvious way back, certainly not an easy or quick one.
Vivitar was the main independent lens maker in the 80s; then went cheap, turned out some crap digital compacts and expired. No doubt the idea of some clever marketing bod.
Vivitar was the main independent lens maker in the 80s; then went cheap, turned out some crap digital compacts and expired. No doubt the idea of some clever marketing bod.
Simpo Two said:
It's hard to see what Pentax can do, short of come up with a game-changer as big as the change from film to digital. Pentax had such a dominant position, then somehow lost it and I don't see an obvious way back, certainly not an easy or quick one.
I see "Pentax", I think two things.
Beautiful little SP1a. Was a lovely handling, great viewfinder, brilliant Takumar lens. Probably wouldn't think it great today - but I have a romantic memory of Pentax.
Always coveted a 6x7. Never actually got to MF in film days, but that's the one I would have had.
But a nostalgic retrospective is a far cry from the dominant brands today. Once upon a time we were surrounded by Vivitar, as Simpo says, and Kodak and Ilford were the names. Others were Contax, Yashice, Fuji, Cosina.....
It's amazing that we still know the name "Pentax" this century. Sad but true!
Probably not much they can do, isn't it something like 95% of DSLR sales are Canon and Nikon? I own a K50 and am very happy with it and chose it after the great reviews it got and the fact it had features you wouldn't normally get at its price point(weather sealed has proven a big plus) and they have plenty of lenses except at the super zoom end which is when I have noticed on the forums a few owners switch to Canon or Nikon
Look at the Mazda 3 MPS or BMW 130i, great hot hatches but never going to compete in terms of sales against a Focus ST or Astra VXR
Look at the Mazda 3 MPS or BMW 130i, great hot hatches but never going to compete in terms of sales against a Focus ST or Astra VXR
K12beano said:
Once upon a time we were surrounded by Vivitar, as Simpo says, and Kodak and Ilford were the names. Others were Contax, Yashice, Fuji, Cosina.....
Plus another big name, Minolta, and Ricoh, and Chinon (Dixon's own brand), and Praktica (for people trading up from a Zenith!). Did Hanimex do an SLR?Most of the smaller ones were I think killed off by having their own bayonet, which restricted lens choices. The smart ones used the Pentax K-mount which was the most common.
Simpo Two said:
K12beano said:
Once upon a time we were surrounded by Vivitar, as Simpo says, and Kodak and Ilford were the names. Others were Contax, Yashice, Fuji, Cosina.....
Plus another big name, Minolta, and Ricoh, and Chinon (Dixon's own brand), and Praktica (for people trading up from a Zenith!). Did Hanimex do an SLR?Most of the smaller ones were I think killed off by having their own bayonet, which restricted lens choices. The smart ones used the Pentax K-mount which was the most common.
IMO pentax need to innovate like nikon and canon arnt doing.
Look at sony they are trying to do a lot of funky stuff.
So make a 35mm digital back
Or make one that has an open system for software so we can develop complex shutter apps ( intervalvometers, ramping functions linked to metering etc).
Theres heaps of stuff on magic lantern could be added etc.
Look at sony they are trying to do a lot of funky stuff.
So make a 35mm digital back
Or make one that has an open system for software so we can develop complex shutter apps ( intervalvometers, ramping functions linked to metering etc).
Theres heaps of stuff on magic lantern could be added etc.
johnymac said:
I guess the camera market and particularly the SLR market is far smaller now than in the 70's & 80's and they didn't make it into the digital era
I'm not sure - the advent of digital technology made photography more accessible/popular. There may be more DSLRs around now than there were SLRs - anyone know?The other factor is that in film days a camera body would used for 10+ years. With the fetish for 'upgrades' the effective lifetime of a DSLR is much shorter.
Simpo Two said:
I'm not sure - the advent of digital technology made photography more accessible/popular. There may be more DSLRs around now than there were SLRs - anyone know?
Not even close - Asahi Pentax, Nikon, Canon, Cosina, Ricoh, Petriflex, Contax, Olympus, Zenith, Practica, Minolta, Chinon, Konica, Kowa, Topcon, Exakta, Yashica, Alpa, Mamiya, Miranda, Vivitar, Kodak, Edixa, Leicaflex.... and those are only the ones I remember from back in the day. My first SLR was a Petriflex that I received as a Christmas present from my parents in 1966 (?). johnymac said:
Given the standard of some of their lenses I really think they should look at 35mm full frame.
They've just announced a full frame DSLR to be available later in the year, though I haven't looked in detail at the spec.I've always been a fan of Pentax stuff, the first SLR I owned was an MV1, then an ME Super, and when I went to DSLR it seemed natural to go Pentax, not least because I can still use any K-mount lens, and M42 screw with an adapter. But from that perspective it is disappointing that they've become an also-ran, it seems that they don't have the market penetration, which of course means that every thread on here (and presumably everywhere else) that asks "what DSLR should I buy" is much more likely to be answered by people who have Canon or Nikon, which just perpetuates the situation.
Big brands seem to have this mentality though, and don't notice until it's too late. I used to write software for Palm PDAs, at a time when PalmOS was 90%-odd of the market, and the other 10% was taken up by Psion, Microsoft and a handful of others. Then all of a sudden they were just a name owned by HP, and the OS all but disappeared. Same for Symbian - the smartphone market was 95%-odd Symbian, remainder shared out between Microsoft, Palm (for a short while) and maybe one or two more. Again, just a name owned by someone else now. Perhaps big brands should pay me not to use their products.
Schtum said:
Not even close - Asahi Pentax, Nikon, Canon, Cosina, Ricoh, Petriflex, Contax, Olympus, Zenith, Practica, Minolta, Chinon, Konica, Kowa, Topcon, Exakta, Yashica, Alpa, Mamiya, Miranda, Vivitar, Kodak, Edixa, Leicaflex.... and those are only the ones I remember from back in the day. My first SLR was a Petriflex that I received as a Christmas present from my parents in 1966 (?).
I meant numbers not makes! 'There may be more DSLRs around now than there were SLRs...'Gassing Station | Photography & Video | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff