| The exposure problems due to the focus-screen only affect lenses that have to stop down to meter. Basically, that's older manual focus lenses without an "A" position on the aperture ring, and those lenses *only*. And it also is only an issue with the K10D & K20D - the other Pentax DSLR's seem to meter just fine even with those older lenses.
Since KCC didn't mention anything about using older manual focus lenses, I doubt any of that is relevant, though. I'm guessing he's just referring to the general fact that Pentax cameras tend to expose so that highlights are not blown out, on the assumption you might then brighten the shadows in post processing. If you would prefer to have your highlights blown out in order to not have to lighten shadows later, you can switch to center-weighted metering instead of multi-segment, which does a pretty good job of that. Or you can dial in positive exposure compensation - but the amount to dial in depends entirely on the scene. Some will require none, or even negative compensation (eg, a black cat will come out gray by default). Others will require a little, some will require a lot (eg, a scene with a bright light source within the picture). It's something you learn with experience. Any good book on photography that talks about exposure will give advice on this.
Oh, as for the two-second timer - it turns off SR because the assumption is that that if you're using the timer, you're on a tripod. A tripod is of coruse the best way to eliminate shake. When handholding, assume that SR works well enough that you don't need to bother with the timer. Just press the shutter gently. |