[marquis1955]

Just wondering if there are many folks in the Pentax world that even care about a decent tethering platform for our gear. I love my Pentax equipment and this is an area where I feel me the " pro-sum-er " falls behind in an area that should be a small thing to fix. So why can't I find a program that works ? I would be willing to help with some money towards a tethering system and I have seen others on the forum say they would also chip in.

Does anyone know of anything in the pipeline ? I wonder if Adobe or Correl etc is working on something for Pentax ? Lightroom is showing lens support for us, bottom line it would be Really nice to tether my camera or cameras,

P.S. I have tried the PKtethering software simply POS

[Barry Pearson]

Just wondering if there are many folks in the Pentax world that even care about a decent tethering platform for our gear. I love my Pentax equipment and this is an area where I feel me the " pro-sum-er " falls behind in an area that should be a small thing to fix. So why can't I find a program that works ? I would be willing to help with some money towards a tethering system and I have seen others on the forum say they would also chip in.

Does anyone know of anything in the pipeline ? I wonder if Adobe or Correl etc is working on something for Pentax ? Lightroom is showing lens support for us, bottom line it would be Really nice to tether my camera or cameras,

P.S. I have tried the PKtethering software simply POS

I've used PK Tether with my K-5IIs. I got some shots, but it was limited and hard work

I've ordered the Pentax-Flucard for my K-3. It may arrive today. I hope that will be a good solution. We'll see.

[Stone G.]

One can only guess. Pentax *ist D, K10D and K20D all had tethering software (Remote Assitant 1 and 3) and firmware as a standard. 645D has it as an option (and a fairly costly one that is).

Embedded in later camera models' firmware, the thethering capability was still being retained. PK_Tether proved that.

It could look as if PENTAX/HOYA/RICOH wanted to reserve thethering for high-end semi-pro cameras???

Anyway, as technology evolves, wireless remote control as we see it with the K-3 seems to be the way forward (to me at least).

[rawr]

There's tethering and there's tethering.

To some people tethering means remote control of the camera (shutter, aperture, focus etc), to others it means just finding a way to instantaneously transfer your photos into Lightroom or C1 Pro during a studio shoot so others can review them as you shoot. Some people are happy being able to do this with a 6m cable connected to the camera of the lead photographer in the studio whereas others want only wireless access. Some are happy just getting still images dumped into Lightroom or Capture One, others need a full Live-view feed via tethering. Some consider the only acceptable tethering solution to be native Lightroom or Capture One control of the camera, others are happy with external solution or stand-alone apps controlling the tethering. Some people want an app for it for their handset/tablet, others need PC software integration.

I don't think there is ever going to be a single tethering solution that will do everything people want. But many of the individual elements of the tethering puzzle are already there for Pentax.

[Kayaker-J]

Does anyone know: How does the Toshiba FlashAir Wi-Fi card (and Ol.Share app) I got with my Olympus E-PL5 relate to the Pentax "exclusive" Flu card? Or those Eye-Fi things? Can I get some sort of useful function with what I have on my new, "It's in the mail", K-3?

[rawr]

You can probably use any WiFi SD card on a camera like the K-5, K-3 or anything else to do basic stuff like copy images from camera to computer/tablet/phone.

Full functionality sometimes depends on the software that you have with the card, but you may not even need any software - eg some WiFi cards (like the non-Pentax Flucard and perhaps the FlashAir) run a small in-built web server that you just point your browser to if you want to get ahold of images from the camera.

[Kayaker-J]

You can probably use any WiFi SD card on a camera like the K-5, K-3 or anything else to do basic stuff like copy images from camera to computer/tablet/phone.

Full functionality sometimes depends on the software that you have with the card, but you may not even need any software - eg some WiFi cards (like the non-Pentax Flucard and perhaps the FlashAir) run a small in-built web server that you just point your browser to if you want to get ahold of images from the camera.

Thanks, rawr -- that last possibility sounds especially cool... and particularly simple. Would you think that I can swap the one FlashAir card between K-3 and E-PL5 pretty seamlessly, with the critical bits happening more or less automatically? Could you possibly incur any excessive "wear and tear" on the card's read/write circuitry by using it this way? That seems unlikely, but this sort of thing, i.e., memory card technology, is not really up my alley.

[Pkaye]

With the announcment today of the Pentax 645Z (cropped medium format) camera and commentary that its price is 15% down on previous models due to the leveraging of Pentax K3 technology advances, it would be nice to see RICOH releasing a K3 firmware update that ports the tethering functionality across from the 645Z to the K3. The assumption is the hardware/firmware similarity between the 645Z and the K3 supports this and comments that it uses the same SAFOX system as the K3 should bode well for other technical consistencies between both cameras.

The Pentax Flu-card is a better solution than existed with previous K series cameras but file transfer speed leaves a bit to be desired. The K3 has high speed data transfer capabilities via the new USB3 port, so why not utilise it and allow K3 owners capabilities to use the higher resolution imaging in studio environments where cable tethering would be practical.

Just another step to justifiably claiming the Pentax K3 as a profesional level camera and not just an enthusiast level.

[rawr]

it would be nice to see RICOH releasing a K3 firmware update that ports the tethering functionality across from the 645Z to the K3

Agreed.

The new 645Z tethering software isn't out yet. But it would be interesting to see what happens if someone just installed it and tried it with their K-3. Maybe it will work like PK_Tether or pktriggercord - no firmware update required.

I can't remember if anyone tried to do something similar with earlier versions of the 645D tethering software ('Pentax Image Transmitter' v1) on a K-5/K-5IIs or even a K-3. Maybe support for tethering via the 645D software has been lurking in the K-5 and K-3 all along.

[Kartynas]

Do you have to offload the images via the wifi connection on all wifi cards? I just want to be able to view the images on an iPad or iPhone as I capture them (with my K-5iis) and then upload them through my SD card slot on my computer later. I bought an Eyefi card and unless I've set it up wrong, you have to save the images to your device over its wifi connection. My card readers don't recognize it.

I really like the idea of the Flu card / K-3 set-up where you can even change the settings on the camera, but that is not a financial option right now and if you have to offload via wifi on it too, that will be a pain.

[adwb]

I use a wifi card to get instant views on a ipad for clients.
You don't need the expensive version that handles raw, just the cheaper one for jpegs and use raw + and set the mb ton2 and quality to 5 star.
Yes you get some lag in display but you also get lag with tethered lightroom for Canikon regs as well.

"I bought an Eyefi card and unless I've set it up wrong, you have to save the images to your device over its wifi connection. My card readers don't recognize it. "

Yes you have set it up wrong, contact eyfi they are very very helpful and will point you to the instructions on how to use the card as a wireless hotspot that your ipad finds

[Pkaye]

Poor show by Pentax, Hoya and now Ricoh disapointingly continues the tradition.

I continue to be annoyed that tethering once available on Pentax DSLRs has been missing for too long and impacts my workflow and percieved professionalism when using my wonderful Pentax K3. Tethering with automatic upload to Lightroom is on my XMAS wishlist. If anyone at Ricoh are listening, XMAS 2015 would be really nice, earlier even better but I've got used to waiting from Pentax.
I use the K3 in the studio and without the AI filter and using good glass it delivers superb images for portrait and fashion photography. I have also read that it would help in focussing for photostacking for product photography and better than squinting at a 3" display. So the flagship K3 is up there with the Canon and Nikons in image quality, but it looks a poorer cousin when I cannot tether to a PC with large screen and Lightroom to show clients. I have read that the Pentax 645Z Medium Frame camera uses the same image processing engine as the K3. Other than the obvious physical difference, the same ports exist on the 645Z and the K3 so why doesn't Ricoh/Pentax update the software to recognise and work with the K3 and provide code to automatically upload to Lightroom?

The Flucard is good but it is slow and once again makes the K3 appear sluggish and inferior to the Canon and Nikon cameras. Furthermore its functionality does not provide a method of directly downloading images and having them auto-import into Lightroom.If the software exists to remotely control the camera and transport images via the Flucard why can't this be ported to provide a hardwire tethering via USB to Lightroom?

Then there is the donationware tethering software PKTether, which has become the defacto tethering software for the most recent incarnations of the the K series APSC cameras. Why hasn't Ricoh/Pentax worked with this developer to lift this from the defacto to a fully-fledged Ricoh/Pentax supported product?

If Ricoh are truelly wanting to engage with loyal Pentax users I hope they are reading, listening and hearing what Pentax devotees are requiring to push Pentax into the big league. With the developments by Canon, Nikon and more recently Sony, Pentax cannot afford to be travelling in the dust and smoke of the competition when Pentax can deliver images that side by side from all cameras look equally impressive.

So again there are at least 3 tethering paths for Rich/Pentax to pursue:

1. Why doesn't Ricoh/Pentax update the 645Z tethering software to recognise and work with the K3 and intefrface to Lightroom?

2. Why can't the Flucard software be ported to provide a hardwire tethering via USB to Lightroom?

3. Why hasn't Ricoh/Pentax worked with the developer of PKTether to lift it from the defacto to a fully-fledged Ricoh/Pentax supported product?

The best example to show the K3 (ideally teamed up with the 31mm FA lens) is up there with the other big boys is having us out there promoting the Pentax/Ricoh Product by live example.

Is there anyone out there from Ricoh/Pentax who is listening and willing to help us or am I just pushing electrons into the WWW in despair and futility?

[rawr]

Is there anyone out there from Ricoh/Pentax who is listening and willing to help us

I think there are people in Ricoh listening. The wired tethering support for the 645D and now the 645Z shows that they know that various serious users need it. And the existence of the Flucard, however flawed, shows they know that people want some form of tethering, and remote liveview, and remote control, and wireless support.

Ideally Ricoh should overcome their seemingly closed company culture and, as you suggest, perhaps work with the PK Tether developer to build a stable version of PK Tether that supports all current cameras (and supports Mac too, not that I am a Mac user). And release a Pentax SDK to allow commercial developers (like those in Adobe, Phase One and DNA Software) and others include tethering support into their own applications, and make software that extends Pentax cameras in other creative ways too.

They have gone some of this way with the Theta SDK, so it's certainly not impossible for Ricoh to open up a little bit on the software side.

EDIT: I just downloaded the demo version of the wired Lightroom tethering plugin for Pentax from DNA Software, and with my K-5 and Lightroom 5.7 (Windows), it seems to work fine - takes photos via Lightroom, saves them immediately to LR, etc. Not as sophisticated as a stand-alone tethering program, but it does the job. [Note I didn't pay $30 for the full-version, just the free demo]. But they haven't done a K-3 version yet. Anyone interested in a K-3 version should contact them directly and ask for an update. And buy a looonnngggg USB 3 cable.

[adwb]

This subject was covered recently at some length, but it's interesting that both pk tether and the commercial version for LR from DNA do not work with the k3 and as you say the 645 had tethering although not directly to LR a.f.i.k.
I suspect that the price of the 645 is a barrier to developers buying one to reverse engineer the tethering.

The lack of tethering stopped my ever upward precession in purchasing Pentax and in fact has lead to me buying an other brand just for the studio tethering although the Dna for k5II versions and Lr is quite satisfactory and beats a flue or wifi card both the later of which I have used but found very slow unless you save small jpegs

[Pkaye]

Thanks RAWR and ADWB, appreciate your replies and making this a real forum with interaction, feedback and ideas.

Will be interesting if the whispers about a FF Pentax DSLR come to fruition. May be they will compliment that model with full tethering functionality as it would befit a true professional FF body camera.

In the mean time, as I have a K5 I can still use all my good glass and use the tethering solution you describe. $30 is a small price to pay if it improves my workflow.