Considering the recent crash of the price of the Pentax Q, what do you think it is a reasonable price for a camera like the Q in the market these days? Do you think these prices are sustainable?
I honestly think the prices we see these days are massively under the production and R&D cost of these devices - Eg the Pentax Q at $299 - the cost of the parts can easily be above $200. How can a manufacturer survive in these conditions?
I have no idea what the bill of materials can be for a manufacturer, but I'd guess it's far lower than $200; I think development and marketing costs were the major one with the Q.
To answer your question, I think a reasonable price is preceisly what it's going for in the USA; about $279 for the single lens kit.
This puts it more-or-less in line with other 'enthusiast compacts' such as the DMC-LX7 and Canon S110, etc. Except it's a bit cheaper and has no zoom lens with the standard kit, but a nice low-light lens regardless.
The Q is a unique camera and the negative talk was more related to the price more than anything. Good to see it's at a more sensible level now, though its successor, the Q10, is still priced too high.
It would be interesting to know how many original Qs they sold at the maximum price, then the discounted price, then the heavily discounted price.
Given the R&D costs needed for a new model I suspect Pentax is losing a lot on both the Q and K01 based on the prices in the current market. The cameras are not selling and Pentax are probably trying to recover as much as possible for the stock that is sitting out there in the retail channel.
I've worked previously in a camera business and have used many of the CSC cameras including both of the Pentax ranges and in my opinion Pentax have missed the mark with both. The unique selling point of the Q is it's size and the K01 has a good sensor along with the mount that allows you to use all existing Pentax lenses.
The Q is an ok camera, it is very small and the photos are ok. Nothing special. Using the camera itself is the same - it's nothing special. The image quality is no better than a good point and shoot.
With a CSC camera you are investing in a system, not just a single camera, so you need to consider the cost of additional lenses and accessories - it's an investment and the Q platform doesn't give you a good enough reason to invest in it.
The K01 is the same - the styling is very polarising so you either love it or hate it. The styling did nothing for me and I found it too big and it has no viewfinder. Yes you get access to all pentax lenses but if I'm spending that much money and carrying something that size I want a viewfinder not just the screen on the back - these are crap in bright sunlight.
Personally the one decent CSC camera in the Pentax / Ricoh range is the Ricoh GXR. This is such a nice camera to use, very much designed for photographers - I found it very hard to return this one when it came time. The image quality from both of the APS-C lens modules was superb - I was marvelling over some of the shots I captured with this camera. Unfortunately the lens modules are pricey and it's not a very popular system unfortunately so I couldn't justify investing in the platform.