I have had the Pentax Q for around a year now having acquired it just before my twentieth birthday. Now approaching twenty one and with more knowledge of cameras and photography under my belt. And the Q having two holidays abroad and numerous other shoots under its belt I felt I might as well as give my thoughts on it.
The Q is for fun, it is not for professional use, it is for fun. Let me stress that. I own a Canon 600d and have used 5d Mkii before. I am also eyeing up moving into the Micro Four Thirds sector due to size and space compared to DSLR's. And as a filmmaker the GH4 has piqued my interest. I currently only own the 01 Standard Zoom lens for the camera and seeing as buying any other other (non-toy) lenses would cost me more than what I paid for the camera and 01 lens I currently don't see myself making a purchase anytime soon. (No matter how much I want more flexibility with the system).
The quality of the Q is surprisingly good. Though grain can become an issue very quickly and make images look horrendous but other than that it handles itself very well. The zoom itself is a good lens starting wide-open at f2.8 but then moving to f5 by the time it is fully zoomed in. This slightly annoys me as the telephoto zoom offered for the system is a constant 2.8 why not have the same for the standard zoom so that they are on par?
The build quality of the camera is brilliant. It feels solid and robust in my hands the only cheap thing about it to the touch is the lens. I actually prefer the Q's build quality over my Canon. The screen at the back is good and clear though the focus assist could be improved with peaking to make it much easier to determine focus, something which I have missed without realising it until editing later. The pop flash annoys me, its cool and reminds me of a transformer and can be convenient in some rare moments but not always.
For the year I've had the camera I've wished for an EVF on it. It makes taking a picture for candid or street photography much easier in my opinion and helps calm my nerves (relatively new to street photography) about photographing strangers. I've puzzled over how an EVF would work in the camera itself and it wasn't until I saw Sony's RX100 Mkiii that I saw the solution. Throw in peaking and this camera would be a fluid brilliant nifty little thing.
Autofocus is reasonable in its speed, its not lightening quick but its good. However it struggles when people are moving into frame and on occasion has caused me to miss a shot. The camera's RAW handles well and allowed me to edit a picture taken with the built in flash and recover a lot of over highlighted areas and restore white balance and so forth.
I enjoy the art filters though I generally have mine stuck in Monochrome shooting Jpeg and RAW allowing me control later but also allowing me to see in B&W not sure what other Photographers think of this but I enjoy it, I enjoy seeing the world in Monochrome through a camera. To me Monochrome is timeless and to me the whole point of Photography is capturing a moment forever.
Colours can be evocative and inspiring drawing emotions out of people, but when you eliminate them the picture seams to tell a story so much easier and quicker. Allowing a viewer to truly see the moment frozen in time.
Overall I love the camera itself. I love how small it is and its convenience of use. Keeping it fully manual as well gives a pleasure point and shoots don't really give whilst shooting. My main problem with the camera is its focusing aids and lack of EVF. Though the latter is truly just my own opinion as I have still managed to get some great shots with it which shall be uploaded in a separate entry. Or you could look at my flickr account as some of the photos in there are from the Q.
Flickr Account: https://www.flickr.com/photos/98471286@N05/
Note: I am not a professional Photographer, nor am I a paid reviewer, these are purely my own thoughts for more details on spec look elsewhere either written or YouTube cheers.
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