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GR: First Impressions only (unfortunately)

S

Spode

New Member
I received my GR on Thursday and discovered by Monday that it had a dust speck or dead pixel. Returned it today but not before I took some test shots and formed some initial impressions. Have to agree for the most part with John's earlier assessment and tend to agree with Don that we will be better served treating it as a wholly new camera and not as an upgrade to the IV. Anyway, below are some test pics. The rest of my impressions and pics can be found here:

http://spode.zenfolio.com/blog/2013/5/f ... s-ricoh-gr
 

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Thanks for the compliment Don.

BTW, I really think you should get yourself a GR. It is my humble opinion that if you like the IV/ III you need (heaven forbid) 2 28mm cameras to complement each other. Working on the assumption that one likes the 28mm FOV, here's why:

GRD IV: good for street in the instant (sharper through the range ... f1.9 - f9); great for test-shots and slice of life sketches (great tonal range/ jpeg output despite small sensor); great for still-lifes and macros.

GR: good for themed/ topical street (shallow DOF/ f2.8 - f16); great for final products that constitute your impressionistic painting (greater dynamic range and larger sensor produces sharper images); great for the in-your-face portrait and close interiors and certain types of travel photography.

Anyway, just my 2 cents. :)
 
Bad luck with the dust spot. Nice examples though, for sure a capable sensor.

Thank you for posting,
Wolfgang
 
Spode! did you return your camera through a dealer/seller? or to Ricoh? I just received my GR as well last Friday, I used it two days and I got dust on the sensor and ALSO noticed a dead pixel on the LCD maybe a day later! I would really like to know how you dealt with this, the seller I bought my GR from through Amazon offered a replacement when they get more GR's in stock, interesting to see another user with this same issue so early on. I wonder if these are defective pre-production models or whatnot, either way the camera is still excellent to use and produces some good stuff. I've posted on serious compacts forum, but I had to make an account here after seeing your thread and comments. You are not alone! what a bummer!
EDIT: just looked through your blog and by context it seems as if though you sent it back to B&H, have you contacted Ricoh at all about this issue?
 
No, I did not. It really was a bummer as I had less than 20 keepers (spotty as they are) out of a possible 100 (the personal and face shots were especially marked (literally)!

Maybe I will write to Ricoh. Sorry about your camera. B&H said that they would try and get me another piece by the middle of June.
 
Sorry about your camera too Spode! those are nice images and I'm sure you were having fun using the camera, it's nice B&H is taking care of it so well as they should.. I'm sure you were patiently waiting for your pre-order from them as well, and now this! Hopefully this isn't an issue with the first batch of these cameras they really are something great and hopefully you get it back sooner (problem free, hopefully, for you me or anyone else) and it'll make more of a presence on your blog and photos to come. Some other things to note if anyone else has this camera and thinks they have dust issues or dead pixels, dust on the sensor is more noticeable when using smaller apertures, spots are most prevalent from f8 and smaller, it's super sharp at f11 and when using a wider aperture, say up to f2.8 it becomes more blurry or smudgy. Dead pixels on the LCD are basically only noticeable when changing to the menu, in a completely black background, I didn't notice the dead pixel while using the camera until I switched to the menu. Thanks for letting me clutter up your topic Spode.
 
Nick, this is a closed unit. It's not supposed to let dust in (although in reality of course there are always limitations how airtight you get it).

While it's not yet time to switch into typical internet panic mode, I start to get concerned hearing about dust problems from two independent users within short time.

Wolfgang
 
Grrr, it wouldn't be the first time Ricoh had problems with dust entering into their compact cameras would it?

..........Rushes off to check my GR files closely ....... :(
 
wok64":i0ft8naf said:
Nick, this is a closed unit. It's not supposed to let dust in (although in reality of course there are always limitations how airtight you get it).

While it's not yet time to switch into typical internet panic mode, I start to get concerned hearing about dust problems from two independent users within short time.

Wolfgang
Click to expand...
Sure, but with a sensor 9 times bigger you are also more likely to get dust on it.

I think implementing a dust removal feature would have cost less than the bad advertisement they are gonna get if this thing goes viral.
 
Just received my replacement GR tonight!!!! Look forward to testing more extensively in the next few days!
 
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