[Phil Thomson IPA]

I am extremely happy with the K 5 and it is a whole new ball game after the K20D.
I was wanting to know if there was a listing of suggested uses, situations etc., for the Custom Image settings, ie. Portrait, Natural, Vibrant, Reversal Film?? And in particular which is the preferred setting for shooting weddings? Most of my shooting is landscapes but the occasional wedding.
Regards,
Phil Thomson.

[Adam]

The best thing to do is for you to take a photo in raw and then experiment with the custom image setting on your desktop using the pentax Digital Camera Utility software. It will show you real time what any given (raw) photo would have looked like had it been taken using those settings.

Btw, this thread should be moved to the k5 forum.

[Skog]

I shoot DNG, since it's an open format and widely supported by software. I don't really see any benefits of using pentax own proprietary format.

As for the different settings, I cant really help you with anything spesific, since I shoot raw and adjust each picture myself. But have a looks at the post here by Adam : https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-dslr-discussion/124971-k-x-custom-image-settings.html. This way you can easily see for yourself how the different settings affects the image.

[JeffJS]

Welcome to the club.

If you have software to translate it, I would use PEF. I don't really know why but it's what I've always used. If you don't, then DNG as most packages don't require expensive updates to handle it. As for other settings, for me, they don't really matter. I work almost strictly from RAW and create my own JPGs in post processing. I find I get the most possible control of the final image that way. Especially when I've missed something like WB or exposed improperly or ....

[civiletti]

It can be fun to play with in-camera processing profiles, but if you are picky, shoot in one of the raw fomats. You are more likely to get what you want with post-processing. I use DNG with Lightroom3, but there are other programs as well.

If you are in a hurry, I think the jpg settings that give maximum dynamic range would be good. That white dress looks better with detail, and you don't want everything else solid black inorder to get that detail. White balance according to your source, of course.

[rfortson]

I shoot DNG, since it's an open format and widely supported by software. I don't really see any benefits of using pentax own proprietary format.

As for the different settings, I cant really help you with anything spesific, since I shoot raw and adjust each picture myself. But have a looks at the post here by Adam : https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-dslr-discussion/124971-k-x-custom-image-settings.html. This way you can easily see for yourself how the different settings affects the image.

On the K20D, I shot in PEF and then converted (automagically) to DNG when I imported into Lightroom. The reason being that the PEF files were smaller on the card so I could maximize card space. Now that I have the K5, I still do the same, but I'm not sure if the DNG files are still larger in camera than on the disk.

[Rondec]

I think from the K7 on, Pentax has used a compressed DNG file format. It used to be that PEF files were smaller, but now they seem to be the same size. Since DNG is more widely used, I prefer to use it, versus the PEF format.

[rfortson]

I think from the K7 on, Pentax has used a compressed DNG file format. It used to be that PEF files were smaller, but now they seem to be the same size. Since DNG is more widely used, I prefer to use it, versus the PEF format.

Thanks, I thought that might be the case, but I haven't looked at it closely (obviously).

Do you use LR, and if so, do you import the DNGs directly into LR? Any issues? If I can speed up the import into LR, I'm all for dropping the PEF to DNG conversion.

[Skog]

@rfortson: I get like 3-5 more pictures on a 8GB card from choosing pef. (on the k-x)

[Smeggypants]

I think from the K7 on, Pentax has used a compressed DNG file format. It used to be that PEF files were smaller, but now they seem to be the same size. Since DNG is more widely used, I prefer to use it, versus the PEF format.

On the K-5 PEF files are smaller than the DNG files created by the camera.


I used to shoot DNG, btu now I shoot PEF to get more on a card.


I thin kthe difference in size is not so much to do with compression but to do with the size of the embedded jpg preview.

[waxsage]

I am extremely happy with the K 5 and it is a whole new ball game after the K20D.
I was wanting to know if there was a listing of suggested uses, situations etc., for the Custom Image settings, ie. Portrait, Natural, Vibrant, Reversal Film?? And in particular which is the preferred setting for shooting weddings? Most of my shooting is landscapes but the occasional wedding.
Regards,
Phil Thomson.

As others have said, try those settings in post processing to see if they suit you and/or your customers. I use DNG as I had problems with PEF files on a Mac laptop using the Silkypix software supplied by Pentax. PEF files work with this version of Silkypix on the windows platform.