So here are some leaked shots of the upcoming Pentax K-3, the new APS-C flagship.
Of particular note is the headphone jack and lever to switch between stills and video modes. This last piece is particularly interesting, as most cameras have a video selector on the mode dial. That way works, but selecting between Program Mode, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, and Manual Mode is often a menu dive away. A separate Stills/Video lever makes it easy to switch between any of these modes while shooting videos or stills. Nice. It would have been nicer still to have this control near the mode dial and thus have all of the primary decision points in one place, but we’ll take that as progress.
The headphone jack is nice too, something that all but a few makers have chosen to exclude. But the most interesting thing for me is this bit of info from the leaked specs:
Until recently, shooting video was like shooting JPEGs – you better get things right in the camera. A small handful of prosumer cameras now offer RAW shooting; hopefully Pentax is joining the fray. We’ll have to wait and see of course, as the difference between specs and reality is often great…