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Impress Japan had an interview with many of the Japanese camera manufacturers and I thought I’d talk about that with some opinion included. My news and opinion in video format on Youtube : The full interview in Japanese: https://www.impressjapan.jp/pr/monitor/1112_dcm/271201_free.pdf Companies in the interview: Pentax, Ricoh, Canon Fujifilm, Nikon, Sigma, and Sony. Points of interest: Olympus: Eventual E-5 SLR replacement. Canon: Interested in small cameras, but not necessarily ones with interchangeable lenses. Has a focus on sensor sensitivity rather than mega-pixels (just look at the 1D X with its 18MP). Sigma: DP series additions coming. Mirror-less format lenses coming. Sony: Smaller e-mount lenses to better fit their mirror-less cameras. Talk of electronic shutters. Nikon: Replacements for the D3 and D700 coming. Compacts should have a focus on ergonomics and control to have more benefit over cell phone cameras. Fujifilm: Focus on high-end compacts like the x100 and x10. Impr...

Even at first look before the acquisition, Ricoh and Pentax seemed pretty similar. They both released cameras that were smaller than the class norm. that also included quality materials like magnesium alloy and an overall solid feel. More specifically, cameras like the GR Digital and the Pentax K-7/K-5 series. In their fight to gain and keep market share they sometimes have gone outside the box in ways that just didn’t make much sense. Look for used Ricoh GXR equipment on eBay or KEH . As an affiliate of these shops, I earn from qualifying purchases. The Ricoh GXR system is one such camera to go far out of the box. It’s not an interchangeable lens system and it’s not a fixed lens camera like their GR Digital. The body that houses the grip, controls, LCD, and battery is one unit. The other half of the camera gets mounted inside. This has the lens, sensor, and processing electronics. On first…and second… glance the system doesn’t make much sense. It is expensive because to use ...

It’s official. The assets of Pentax, both in Japan and the 9 subsidiaries, are transferred to Ricoh on October 1st. No real useful information for users of Pentax, but a few interesting bits of information to mention. Pentax consists of around 1900 employees. So all of our neat photography tools come from the efforts of 1900 people. Manufacture and sales of optical equipment such as digital cameras, binoculars and lenses for security cameras Lenses for security cameras… I bet the c-mount lenses Pentax makes have seen an increase in sales since mirrorless-ILC cameras started showing up. If I had a Q, I’d try some out for sure. The ones on B&H have the occasional review from a m4/3 user. By forming the new company, Ricoh will strive to further bolster consumer products and services, in addition to its existing digital camera business. So we should be seeing new tools and improvements to the existing lines such as K, Q, and 645.

As I’m a believer in going to the source to make sure things go well, I just sent a general inquiry email to Ricoh Japan . For people who are actually good at Japanese, pardon my low quality letter. I think it good enough to get my point across though. If you see odd squares and such below in my letter to Ricoh, that means your computer can’t display Japanese because the proper fonts and/or system data isn’t installed. はじめまして、　スコットです。 メッセージはアメリカから。　　RICOHは日本の会社です、そして日本語を書きました。　少しが分かります。　すみません。　　私は頑張ります。 This message is from America. Ricoh is a Japanese company, so I wanted to write in Japanese. I only understand a little. Excuse me. I’ll keep trying. RICOHのPENTAX買収のニュースを見ました。　　良いニュースですね！　　RICOHは古いKーMOUNTレンズを作りました。　　GRーDIGITALも良いカメラ見たいと思います。 I saw Ricoh’s pentax acquisition news. It’s good news isn’t it! Ricoh made old K-mount lenses. The GR-Digital is also a nice camera I think. 私はPENTAXユーザーです。　「*IST　DS」カメラから。　（K１０D、Kー７、Kー５も）。　　そして、ペンタッ...

Pentax will be part of Ricoh by October… Huh? While not unexpected, it is a little abrupt. Ritax? Pencoh? Nope… Here is Ricoh’s full press release in PDF format. “On completion of the Acquisition, Ricoh will begin to use the PENTAX brand name for some of its digital camera products, and HOYA will continue to use the PENTAX brand name for their endoscopes and other products. Furthermore, with the Acquisition, both companies will cooperate with each other to increase the value of the PENTAX brand.” So it looks like they will use the Pentax name at least. I’ll assume that means the 35mm, 645D, and Q-mount will stay Pentax. The Ricoh release is pretty positive from my point of view (unlike the useless Hoya one). It sounds like they respect Pentax’s history and want to really improve and grow the interchangeable systems. Maybe that will mean full-frame Pentax in the future and some interesting glass? It’s also interesting how much they men...