Good news, my preordered unit is shipped from B&H. That means they might have enough units for the first two waves. I did preorder pretty early, about few hours after the announcement.
Pentax's upcoming half-frame point and shoot style camera that they have been working on was recently released.
It looks decent, but it has one major issue, which is the price. During their product videos before, they have mentioned how they went with half-frame so it can be more affordable for younger people, which does work as it means twice as many shots per film. However the price is $549 Pounds, that's even more in american dollars, and especially canadian dollars, so on and so forth.
That's one glaring issue I think, for the target market.
Most young people would be better of fidning a vintage half-frame camera.
It was always going to cost something like 400-500 dollarpounds. A lower price was never realistic, nor expected. A vintage half frame camera will probably need work doing on it to function properly and won't have the automatic features the young audience need. Remember, these folk have never so much as held a camera of any kind that wasn't a smartphone.
And that's still the cost of a low end, entry level Android phone. The vast majority of the target audience already carry a device costing 3x the price of the Pentax 17 in their pockets all day long. What might help is payment schemes/loans in the way that phone contracts work...where you buy the camera over a year or two.
Still...I think we can assume that the report that Ricoh/Pentax management secretly hoped the 17 would flop can be consigned to the rubbish bin. It's been developed, manufactured and marketed well. Hardly the sign of a pig in a poke product the company really wants to bury.
Have you had photographs submitted for evidence?
I find the whole intentional scarcity to drive up demand thing implausible.
It looks decent, but it has one major issue, which is the price. During their product videos before, they have mentioned how they went with half-frame so it can be more affordable for younger people, which does work as it means twice as many shots per film. However the price is $549 Pounds, that's even more in american dollars, and especially canadian dollars, so on and so forth.
That's one glaring issue I think, for the target market.
I suspect that there's several thousand cameras in people's hands now, or on the way.
A vintage half frame camera will probably need work doing on it to function properly and won't have the automatic features the young audience need.
My Pen F gothic needed the camera Dr before it was useful. And even fully working it's no way a beginner camera. No meter, no modern focus aid, gotta learn when the shutter slaps, double advance, no hot shoe. I love all these quirks but it does have a learning curve. The 17 seems pretty straight forward. Put lens on distance indicated and shoot.
All those 50s-90s half frame cameras people rave about may well be excellent cameras, but they'll be utterly baffling to the group of people who Pentax have identified as their intended audience for now.
That seems like a glaring contradict to me -- but apparently not to a lot of other people. That was the same problem with the Yashica Samurai cameras. They were half-frame, loaded with features (unlike the Pentax 17), but were very expensive. Fortunately, more affordable today.
Most of these "utterly baffling" cameras operate exactly the same way as the Pentax 17 -- load the film, and press the button. Same as the currently available Kodak H35 and H35N -- at a 90% discount -- here's a earlier thread with lots of great shots and information about other half-frame cameras:
Photrio's first Kodak Ektar H35 review!
Behold the mighty Kodak Ektar H35 half frame camera! 72 shots from a 36 exposure roll for all you misers, spend thrifts and artists... Taking one for the team I just bought this sage green version, well, because how many other sage green cameras are for sale? I'm not going to compare it to my...www.photrio.com
Interesting how you only bring up the Pen F -- only one branch of the huge Pen family tree. Nearly all of the Pen half-frame cameras were straight-forward, P&S cameras -- just load the film and dial in the film speed. Just like the Ricoh Auto-Halfs and countless others -- no need to focus or adjust anything, although some models allowed for that.
Most of the half frame cameras of the past weren't fully auto, one had to adjust aperture or shutter speed.
I used to be a bit of a camera shob and wonder why the average functional human couldn't load and operate a fully manual camera, because I've been able to do so since the age of five. But in the grand scheme of things, many adults in decades past couldn't successfully operate a manual camera and even found loading 35mm film tricky. People under 25 don't even have the cultural background of people around them using film cameras to take hints from.
EE-3 is straight forward but you need to protect the photocell these days. It dies the camera is stuck at one shutter speed. I guess I have mostly complicated half-frames. The Univex is intimidating to look at. Simple enough if you're a photographer.
Where do you get this idea? It takes a few minutes to understand how to load and use a manual camera. Who were they selling all of these cameras to if no one could use them? Who is buying all of the old secondhand manual cameras now?
Learning to consistently choose appropriate exposure and acquire focus are more developed skills, but that is part of the pride and satisfaction of using the traditional manual cameras. People don't usually admire or enjoy an accomplishment or activity because it is easy.
Come on, the Univex was produced almost 100 years ago! An yes, just like any camera, if the meter is dead, you've got a problem, but selenium meters continue to work fine after half a century if they are protected from light when not in use -- i.e. a camera case.
Learning to consistently choose appropriate exposure and acquire focus are more developed skills, but that is part of the pride and satisfaction of using the traditional manual cameras.
That's why 126, 110, disk and eventually APS was developed.
Kodak worked for years with different formats and camera manufacturers were always touting 'easy load!' or 'Self loading!' I think near the end there was a camera that you'd drop the film in and it would take it up by itself. I remember watching the World Series in the late 90's and having this commercial run.
Camera shop owners had frequent costumers who would stop in every few weeks to their cameras could get loaded by a 'professional'. 35mm was fiddley for a large segment of the population. That's why 126, 110, disk and eventually APS was developed.
Makes me fear the Pentax 17 might fail because users will have to actually load film in the camera, and then focus the lens. And then there is the impossible hurdle of advancing the film! Only someone with a PhD in mechanical engineering can possibly manage that sort of challenge.
Pentax don't seem to think loading a camera manually is going to be too difficult for people.
I have never encountered these people that cannot load a manual film camera.
It is hard to imagine there could be any easier film loading than a 35mm SLR. On the electromechanical SLR with powered film advance, all you do is pull a bit of film out, and the camera does the rest. But even on the fully mechanical and manual SLR, the procedure is very simple to learn.
And they all failed.
None of the alternative formats were ever as popular as 120 and 135 (35mm).
Pentax don't seem to think loading a camera manually is going to be too difficult for people.
I have never encountered these people that cannot load a manual film camera.
It is hard to imagine there could be any easier film loading than a 35mm SLR. On the electromechanical SLR with powered film advance, all you do is pull a bit of film out, and the camera does the rest. But even on the fully mechanical and manual SLR, the procedure is very simple to learn.
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