We've been celebrating the return of the Leica M6 35mm rangefinder camera... primarily as an indication that the revival of film camera photography is finally gaining some heavyweight industry support, but also because it’s always been such a fine camera. Arguably more significant, though, is the announcement by Ricoh Imaging – the custodian of the Pentax brand these days – that it’s working on a new film camera project. The details are still pretty sketchy, but it looks pretty serious and, from we’ve seen so far, it will be a 35mm SLR and will be badged Pentax.
Ricoh Imaging emphasizes it hasn’t pressed the ‘go’ button yet, but it would be pretty silly not to... for a number of really good reasons. Firstly, the Pentax 35mm SLR heritage is a rich one, with the original company essentially pioneering its affordability and popularity in the 1960s through the legendary Spotmatic series. There would certainly be legitimacy – and credibility – in a new Pentax 35mm SLR. Affordability would again be the big plus too, because, desirable though the new M6 undoubtedly is, it’s eye-wateringly expensive... and that’s even before you add a lens, especially one made by Leica.
