So, today is CP+ show

If anyone goes to camera&photo imaging show today, can

someone post about PENTAX RICOH booth?

and tell us kindly what did they display ? thanks.

Lets not all hold our breath for we will surely all die ....

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Tom Caldwell

Tom, I know you have almost convert to Pentax,

I am in the middle, whether, I should convert to K-5ii or not/,

I heard k-5 series are good cam. If they release new unit for gxr,

then, I am going for this

http://www.pentaximaging.com/about/press/296

pentax announces

a new flash

a new lens for the Q

At least I'll "survive" regardless of what is is being said at the booth, or gossips or what Ricoh might have brought to show. No need to worry. In a few min I'll get out while it's still bright outside and take the Contax TVS Digital, Minolta Dimage EX 1500 with me and probably also the GRD.

LOL!

I checked out the event site - looks like a very interesting show. I'd enjoy going.

Trade and industry shows usually are pretty good. A dozen years ago or so I used to attend the COMDEX show in Chicago and back in those days, the money was flowing. You could leave the show with a dozen or 15 free shirts, all manner of little and not so little giveaways. One vendor even had scratch-off lottery tickets at their counter. Just walk up and scratch off a few tickets and if you won, hurray for you the money was all yours.

At one show they gave away three vehicles, including a Cadillac Escalade. Mercedes Benz was there to let you take a test drive in one of their cars. They haven't even had a COMDEX show now for 7 or 8 years. All gone, hard to believe.

Anyhow...

If Ricoh has something they'd better announce it at CP+, a show held in their own biggest market.

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You don't TAKE a photo, you MAKE a photo.

It appears there are a couple of hints at least:

"There was no exhibition of new products Ricoh brand this time, there is a bill to the top of the glass case containing a list of GR series of the past was written only "2013", presage the emergence this year of the latest model connected to the genealogy of the GR cause.

There is a sequence in the case of the GR DIGITAL IV appearance in 2011 under the "2013" from the beginning (year 1996) GR1 at the bottom."

http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=ja&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fdc.watch.impress.co.jp%2Fdocs%2Fnews%2F20130201_585986.html

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Dan

The GR Blog http://www.grblog.jp/ reporting of the show has this comment

説明員の皆さん、緊張の面持ちでスタンバイしております。

(via chrome's translation )

"I arrived, GR, GXR corner and.

So basically the placement of the 2013 card implies that Ricoh will release a GRD V this year.

Frustrating that it's nothing more than a "watch this space" announcement. Would love to have a hint of what's in store. I guess I'll just have to spend my time learning how to use the cameras I have...oh well

On another note, it seems pentax has positioned itself as the Laurel to ricohs Hardy. The brass cased mx1 and the anime skinned q10?! Kawaii is clearly driving these designs. The cameras don't seem to suffer at all for this so why not put some fun back in to designs?

I checked out multiple translation sources and I believe that the gist of the statement is that the Ricoh employees are tense when faced with questions.

My interpretation.  I don't believe there will be any specific announcement.

What makes you believe this knowing Ricoh's recent history.

As long a Ricoh follow their  two year interval for the GRD that means there will be a new GRD announced some time at this year.

Yes, and I hope they do follow the 2 year history, the GRD is my favorite Ricoh camera.I would like to see it with a few changes though, a different FL would be nice.

I'm not saying I "believe" it.

I'm saying that the placement of the 2013 card in front of an empty space in the context of other year cards in front of previous cameras •implies• that another model is coming in 2013.

It's deduction that suggests, but does not certainly state, that a new grd model may arrive.

Do I believe that a new model is coming? Or Simi believe that this is what is implied.

I believe that is what is implied.

No, not at all, I don't consider myself a Pentax convert, nor even a Sony convert now that I have a NEX-6.  Even more than I am an ex-Canonite simply becasue I have found that I can effectively supercharge some of my excellent canon EOS EF lenses by attaching them to a Metabones Speed Booster adapter.

I like the way my Ricoh gear works and that buys my Ricoh loyalty but if my mind and money wanders over many pastures it is more because I enjoy the process rather than undying loyalty to the team.

I don't seek to "punish" Ricoh for their neglect to continuously supply their team members  (army perhaps?) with extremely sophisticated new hardware items to play with on a prolific basis.  If the hardware does it's job - in this case executing images rather than people - then I guess the team can get by roughing it for a while longer even if the other teams are parading their glittering new gear.  Team spirit backed up by thorough training can overcome those rascals with new shining gear who have hardly yet learned where the shutter button might be.

So if my attention, like others, gets diverted elsewhere it is only because something else is newer, perhaps more attractive.  Some new hill to climb and conquer, it is up to Ricoh to provide the new inspiration.  Threats of dropping the brand are childish tantrums.  Looking at what else might be avaialble seems more common sense.

My first big expense in digital cameras was in buying good Canon dslr bodies and lenses.  I never left the Canon camp.  I did not sell off my Canon lenses in disgust simply because Canon did not listen to my imperious demands to make a professional level EVIL-type body.  I hoped, I played with Ricoh, I liked what I tried, I kept liking.  But I kept using my Canon gear for what it was very good at.  It still images better than a GXR, but one would hardly find a Canon camera that might hold a candle to the GRD (no matter what the specifications say - je ne sais quoi?).

However it takes a Pentax Q to explore an area where no other manufacturer has trodden and an inspired third party manufacturer to produce a device that can extract almost unheard of levels of performance out of my Canon lenses.  Not Canon, who like Nikon seem to have turned the digital camera industry into an art form of the three wise monkeys who can neither hear see nor speak any EVIL.  Kodak is a classic company riding the wave of excessive profits from an almost captive market only to find that their hubris and locked in, presumably overpaid, management could see no end of this rolling wave of cash and refused to plan for change in their industry.  Perhaps if film had been cheap enough then the stumbling first attempts at digital would never have built up steam.  The chants of "digital will never replace film" have now morphed into "nothing will replace the mirror box" - something will.  The dslr is still a good piece of equipment but Metabones have shown that there is another way.  Good on them I say ...

Meanwhile dally a while with Ricoh, but sample the flowers and other beautiful things that surround us in camera world, Ricoh will either sink or survive on their own efforts and there is very litle we can do about it other than rage a bit.

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Tom Caldwell

What the heck is a Cadillac Escalade?  Was it the aborted successor to the Canon 60D that never appeared?

Mercedes make those little manual focus cameras with the mechanically geared optical window focus device?  ... right, gotcha ... (wink)

It makes no sense for Ricoh to rush something to market that is not 100% finished.  They have walled themselves into a corner and surrounded themself with consumer "expectations". That is their loyal bunch of present owner's expectations - those that believe in other camera brands couldn't care less but might raise just a sniff of passing interest is if something radically new got a byline on dpreview.  Think of the standout technology in the new Metabones adapter - Metabones who? Those that go to trade shows would bee-line straight to the stand of their favourite camera shutter-squeeze.  There might not be crowds at he Ricoh stand.  But those that got sick of pushing through to counters might casually look at a Ricoh stand to assuage their boredom.

Other manufacturers might churn out gear and have enough new stuff in the locker to make a trade show stand interesting.  But if Ricoh were to (say) release a single new camera in that hoopla it would look lonely indeed no matter how exciting it might be.

Therefore as long as the devoted members of this forum have survived their breath holding experiment I have to point out that they have worked themself, and myself, into a frenzy of expectation of something remarkable under the Ricoh hood.  If Ricoh were to release whatever it is before it's time and it were flawed then the skin would simply be flayed off the poor wee thing in ten seconds flat.  Fuji gets this and survives but Ricoh cannot risk a flawed product and the longer it take then the better, more advanced, and more reliable it has to be.  Release a prototype and an anticipated availability date?  Good point, but after an excited discussion on how marvellous this product might be, a crackling of credit cards putting down pre-order deposits, would suddenly be replaced by bitter words of dismay as release dates are postponed whilst some final firmware or other bugs are sorted out.

Ricoh simply cannot win. They can't exhibit a dummy box and say "we will have this to market in three months".  They cannot exhibit a beta copy and say "you can't have it yet because we are still testing it". They cannot make something if a key component is not available because of a delay by a third party manufacturer.  They can't even simply upgrade a model (such as the CX6->7) if it has been phased out due to market pressures or even is part of the new scheme of things.  Why make a CX7 if (say) the new product is a GRD-size camera back that takes GXR mount rails - naturally this would be the CX7 with the choice of P10, S10 or a nw up-to date small sensor zoom module?  The GRDV would be a slection of aps-c prime modules - some already available and some to be packaged into modules released with the new back.

LED's around the lens - mmm look forward to a LED unit replacing the inbuilt flash unit in the new GRD GXR-type camera back.  Dispense with the present flash unit and the hotshoe and you have nearly slimmed down the present GXR back to GRD-form factor size.  I think that Ricoh always intended to make the module/mount-rail system universal and this was why the S10 and P10 units have existed.  That they were premature is only because the engineers underestimated the difficulties of bringing the module mount package down to GRD proportions.

People love rumours, speculation, no matter how logical, has no followers.

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Tom Caldwell

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Tom Caldwell

Make it what you like they are not saying anything.

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Tom Caldwell

It is always the same with the rapid development of new technology.  When new advances start to taper off the marketing department steps in with fashion and gimmicks.  No need for this if you have raw technology to sell.

Think the excesses of tailfins in US cars once the "modern" cars of the 50's changed to the holding pattern of the 60's.  Of course it took the recovering battered countries to push technolgy once they had re-built their industries.  Nothing like "we have no new banana designs so we will paint them another colour".

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Tom Caldwell