[UncleVanya]

Wildman - why does your Exif data sometimes have focal length and sometimes not - in both cases having unknown lens id's? Was one of those a lens that communicated focal length and the other something that did not or is something else involved? I know on my K50 if I set a shake reduction focal length that's what is reported for manual lenses - just curious how the Q works.

[wildman]

Wildman - why does your Exif data sometimes have focal length and sometimes not

It's due to the difference between the original bios and the upgrade. The upgrade requires me to input a focal length before I can operate the camera and remembers it and uses it in ExIF. Some don't have any EXIf data at all because of the way they were PP.

Of course there is no lens id because there is no electrical contact between the lens and the body.

[barondla]

Great images everyone.

Reh321, it depends on a lot of things. My thought process works like this:

Rare subject behavior - higher shutter speed. Don't have all day and 100's of shots to get one sharp image. Let ISO go as high as 400. Reduce noise later in post processing. Would rather have sharp but noisy image vs grainless blur.

Subject sitting still exhibiting no rare behavior - ISO 125 and take 100's of shots to get a few sharp images. Better image quality and far less post processing time required. More time is used shooting and editing out soft images.

Also depends on color and tones in scene. Less noise in brighter subjects ( light gray to white) and more noise in darker fur, feathers, etc. Blue and black colors get noisy fast. I try to expose to the right on the histogram. One of my favorite deer shoots was at ISO 800 on an overcast day.

hope this helps
barondla

[johnmflores]

Great tips everyone. Thanks! I'm taking up birding photography as a result of the missus taking up birding. I've now got the DA55-300 attached to the Q7 via a genuine Pentax Q-K adapter. I've also got an LCD loupe and have been playing around with a monopod with fluid pan video head. Now if only the birds would come out from this bitter cold spell, I could stop taking photos of distant car tires...

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Last edited by johnmflores; 01-08-2015 at 08:29 PM.

[reh321]

Great tips everyone. Thanks! I'm in a similar situation as the OP, taking up birding photography as a result of the missus taking up birding. I've now got the DA55-300 attached to the Q7 via a genuine Pentax Q-K adapter. I've also got an LCD loupe and have been playing around with a monopod with fluid pan video head. Now if only the birds would come out from this bitter cold spell, I could stop taking photos of distant car tires...

Does the Pentax adapter have some means of changing the aperture? If so, have you found it to work well?

[johnmflores]

Does the Pentax adapter have some means of changing the aperture? If so, have you found it to work well?

Yes it does. It's a stepless aperture control close to the Q end. Marked from Open, 1, 2, etc. I wish there were detents so that I could feel how many clicks I was stopping down without looking. Seems to work fine though.

Question for the group-any preference for mechanical or electronic shutter for sitting birds? How about moving birds/BIF?

[arnold]

Here's an additional shot taken with this scope - full frame, crop and and an additional one just for the hell of it.
I have some very good conventional photographic lens' but I think the scope has, perhaps, the highest resolving power of all of them simply because ot it's optical simplicity. Taken with a k20 not a Q....
Attached Images

They don't come better than these. Beautifully clear and detailed.

[johnmflores]

They don't come better than these. Beautifully clear and detailed.

Agreed. I'll be happy if mine are half as good.

[barondla]

johnmflores, welcome to Q birding. With practice and patience it can be very rewarding.

The leaf shutter in the OEM Pentax adapter is the best way to shoot adapted Lenses. Your images will be sharper, especially if there is any subject movement. The electronic shutter reads a line at a time and can cause some "fun house mirror" effects.

thanks
barondla

[Antonio Marques]

@Sandy, that is the most beautiful moon shot I have ever seen in my life.
TBH, before looking at this, I didn't know what moon shots were for, since the moon is, well, a gray ball that always looks the same. Not yours!

[Sandy Hancock]

@Sandy, that is the most beautiful moon shot I have ever seen in my life.
TBH, before looking at this, I didn't know what moon shots were for, since the moon is, well, a gray ball that always looks the same. Not yours!

Thanks Antonio: you'll make me blush
Maybe it looks special because the moon is upside down in Australian

[hnikesch]

Lots of good advice, only a few things to add, you WILL have to add sharpness and contrast in post and lots of it. The Pentax adapter is a must if the camera or subject moves even a little even at 1/8000 shutter speed. I use my Q with DA 55-300 @ 300 hand held with SR on but you must be very very steady and have a LCD hood. I like the zoom because you can zoom out to 55 acquire your subject then zoom in. For focus use a LCD magnifier or hood with LCD magnifier and use focus peaking and 6X manual focus zoom. Adapted lenses are all manual focus so get the best (old cheap) lens based on the adapted lens post, assuming you don't already have a *300 or a Sigma 500mm 4.5 lens they seem to work great on a Q or Q7. At the cheaper end the DAL 55-300, SMC F 80-200, SMC M f4 200 or SMC M f3.5 135 all work great

[reh321]

Lots of good advice, only a few things to add, you WILL have to add sharpness and contrast in post and lots of it.

Adding contrast is straight-forward, but sharpness is something I'm not very good at. Which techniques do you personally use for adding sharpness?? Roughly what parameters do you find work well with the Q?? I'm not sure that I see anything of benefit from my attempts to add sharpness, so I'm not sure I'm even in the right territory, and need advice of how to get close to useful.

[Michaelina2]

From a previous post...

Try this in LR (should take less than 10 seconds)...

1. Open the DNG file in the DEVELOP module.
2. Open the DETAIL dialog box and go to the Noise Reduction set of sliders.
3. Press the "Alt" key on your PC to turn the image to B&W, then with your mouse pointer, push the Luminance slider to the place on the scale where the noise speckles start to fade, then adjust to suit your fancy (some like to leave a few speckles to keep the image from looking plastic...). Be patient as it may take a moment for the effect to become apparent.
4. Press the Alt key, again and adjust the COLOR slider to remove the color speckles. Again, be patient as it may take a moment or two for the color speckles to dissolve.
5. Go to the SHARPENING set of sliders (above the NR set in the DETAIL dialog box).
6. In your mind, subtract the Luminance adjustment number from 100 and enter that calculation into the AMOUNT slider's adjustment result box. For example, if your Luminance number was 30, enter 70. Notice that the luminance noise you erased earlier has returned. UGH ! Get rid of it by...
7. Press the Alt key on your PC, again, and adjust the MASKING slider to the point that your image appears to be a B&W line drawing.
8. Release the Alt key...

BINGO ! You have killed the image noise AND sharpened it, as needed to fit your taste. Now, let's get that pesky WB under control...

Read more at: https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/172-pentax-k-3/283047-wow-i-didnt-think-h...#ixzz3UG4Hbj5y

Also, check this out...

You Tube

You Tube

Good luck & cheers... M

[Canada_Rockies]

Son of a gun! Works a treat. I just ran my flag shot ISO 12800 using the steps in your 10 second special. Thanks a lot for the post.