[vonBaloney]

I am really worried that people are setting themselves up for a fall. The preliminary excitement about every new camera often very much exceeds the end result. My hope is to have a Pentax camera that has image quality and auto focus (maybe even flash support) that is close to other company's flaship APS-C models. Nothing "bigger" than that.

Set up too high expectations and then they fall flat.

Coming this late to the party it really *should* be the best APS-C on the market. Anything less will be disappointing as they will still be playing catch-up in the main market they are in. So that would be "good enough", I guess, but if they really want to impress it needs to be the best APS-C by a mile (but how -- there is only so much they can do, especially since they are using the same sensor others are I'm assuming). So maybe it has some ground-breaking new features? We'll see...

[aleonx3]

I'm just hoping I can get a bargain K5ii out of a K3 release lol

Me too... I have been waiting for the chance to get a backup camera for my k-5 since I sold my k-7 some months ago. A bargain price for the k-5IIs would be great for me.

[jswilson64]

+2

Although I don't consider it a laughing matter.

When the 'event' is a wedding that someone has paid me to photograph, and 60-70% of the 'special moments' I managed to pre-empt and capture during the course of 10 hours shooting are out of focus, it is NOT FUNNY AT ALL, it's a disgrace!

And yes, I've grown quite angry, my patience with Pentax is almost exhausted. As far I'm concerned K-3 is the last throw of the dice with Pentax. If the AF hasn't improved significantly I'm finished with the brand.

I volunteer to shoot a high school marching band: low light, black uniforms, subjects moving in 3-d, etc. I don't have a ton of out-of-focus shots with my K-x and "slow" kit 70-200. Not sure what you're doing but blaming it all on the AF system isn't fair.

[monochrome]

I am really worried that people are setting themselves up for a fall. The preliminary excitement about every new camera often very much exceeds the end result. My hope is to have a Pentax camera that has image quality and auto focus (maybe even flash support) that is close to other company's flaship APS-C models. Nothing "bigger" than that.

Set up too high expectations and then they fall flat.

That's what I meant. If all the things I wrote are actually in the camera, for $1299, we have a scream shot on our hands.

[Barry Pearson]

I volunteer to shoot a high school marching band: low light, black uniforms, subjects moving in 3-d, etc. I don't have a ton of out-of-focus shots with my K-x and "slow" kit 70-200. Not sure what you're doing but blaming it all on the AF system isn't fair.

My problems are with aircraft in flight at airshows, birds in flight, and motor sports. I'm getting too many failures shooting at 7 fps using AF-C with my K-5IIs.

I'm convinced my K-5IIs is better than my K-5. (Even though the promoted advantage with the K-5II(s) is low light AF, which I also welcomed). I'm getting more keepers with my K-5IIs at airshows and motor sports. (Perhaps I suddenly improved my technique?) But I want better.

I wonder if others who want better AF are shooting fast action and motor sports, etc, or marching bands?

[wpompen]

I had the AF fine tuning of the 70-200 set to 8 steps + in order to get the head of the dog that is running towards me focussed and not its tail haha

[mamethot]

Oh I understand, just imagine with an older generation of camera... How many shots to get close to in focus...

Airshow:


Remote Control:

[tuco]

I volunteer to shoot a high school marching band..... I don't have a ton of out-of-focus shots

I think that amount of action is just one step up from standing still.

[RonHendriks1966]

My problems are with aircraft in flight at airshows, birds in flight, and motor sports. I'm getting too many failures shooting at 7 fps using AF-C with my K-5IIs.

I'm convinced my K-5IIs is better than my K-5. (Even though the promoted advantage with the K-5II(s) is low light AF, which I also welcomed). I'm getting more keepers with my K-5IIs at airshows and motor sports. (Perhaps I suddenly improved my technique?) But I want better.

I wonder if others who want better AF are shooting fast action and motor sports, etc, or marching bands?

Well when AF is set to focus accuratesse (is that correct) then you only get a little less then 3 fps at max with moving objects. With framerate priority you get up to the 7 fps and not to many off them in focus.

I don't do it to often, not Always easy but nice when succesfull.

[jswilson64]

I think that amount of action is just one step up from standing still.

Could be... But if the AF system can keep up to a race-waking trumpet player on a poorly-lit football evening, it should be fine at a wedding which is what I was replying to).

[cbope]

The US gets the higher end ones/better equipped. I think your view is rather distorted.

You might not have seen the stripped down VWs in Germany, then. You're also incorrect about the assertion of being "cheaper and much less equipped".

1. The US doesn't tax these vehicles like crazy. In fact, they are cheaper for me to buy in the US, comparably equipped, than in Germany. The same goes for me buying most German products in Germany. The first part of the puzzle is the shady value added tax (19%). The next is all political and not for this thread.

2. The US is a larger single market than the segmented EU market.

3. Every manufactured car is made in part or whole in LCCs. Take apart any of your cars to repair them and you will see "China", "Malaysia", "Phillipines", "American Samoa", "Czech Republic", "Slovakia", "Kaliningrad", "Belarus", and so on. In fact, go to Bad Schandau on the CZ-De border, stand over the train tracks, and one will see freight trains over and over with thousands of German cars coming IN from eastern Europe to Germany. Thousands of assembled Mercedes, BMWs, VWs, and so on. Not to mention their parts, like for the Phaeton, which receives final assembly in my former city, Dresden, but the parts are all trained in from Eastern Europe, transferred before the main train station to special trams, then sent directly into the factory's basement.

At this point, the vehicles are mostly only assembled in Germany and this trend will increase now due to Germany having the highest energy costs in Europe (again, another discussion topic).

4. They equip cars for how they will be bought. For instance, the golf in the US covers everything from low operating cost transport to upscale sport. The exact same in Germany and in fact, one can buy such things as an E-class mercedes, stripped down, cloth seats, 2.0L engine, and so on in Germany.

There's a wide market VW covered successfully in the US. Not entirely not due to the US rebuilding the company, by the way and under an official plan of deficit spending to prop up German manufacturers. But that's another topic.

Who said anything about Germany? I certainly didn't. I'm in Finland and I still stand by my remarks. Many of the advanced engines that VW offers in Europe are *not* available in the US. Try and find a 1.4L TSI engine in the US, especially the Twincharger version. You won't. It's an awesome engine, by the way. You'll find tons of the old workhorse 2.5L in the US, which is much less efficient and less powerful than the newer and more compact turbocharged powerplants. New VAG platforms are available in Europe sometimes years before they come to the US. A few years back I had a Mark V Golf and was getting a Mark VI around the same time the Mark V was finally being launched in the US. There was a 2-3 year gap between the Golf platform change in Europe compared to the US. I've seen interior and exterior trim levels on VAG cars here that are not available in the US market. I'm an ex-pat American and visit the US very often, and I have never seen VW's spec'd as they are here. Cars are definitely not cheap here, we pay even higher VAT than Germany, 24%, plus additional taxes on engine displacement and CO2 emissions. But we still pay less than in Denmark!

Now, let's stop this car talk and get back to arguing about when we are going to get FF and an upgraded Pentax lens lineup!

[Barry Pearson]

Well when AF is set to focus accuratesse (is that correct) then you only get a little less then 3 fps at max with moving objects. With framerate priority you get up to the 7 fps and not to many off them in focus.

I always use "Focus priority" rather than "FPS priority".

I've just had a look in Lightroom at sequences of aircraft in flight, looking at the time in the metadata. Within a minute or so of looking, I was able to find a sequence where there were 6 images (a Storch!) within the same second (10:16:08 on 1st September 2013; but this was one hour out because I hadn't taken account of summer time). Raw (DNG), no JPEGs, DA* 60-250mm f/4.

Whatever the theory, in practice I can sometimes get close to 7 fps in AF-C mode using "Focus priority" with my K-5IIs. Mostly they are in focus. But sometimes they are not, and often the fps is significantly less than this. I want better!

[willdmo]

I dont know why AF acuracy is such a big problem,
If you set cour camera to spot metering and set the AF point in the middle it is quite good, with any cam, any brand. If it is a difficult situation and a moving subject, off centered it is not always that easy for your cam to know, what is the subject to focus on. With a thin DOF especially people can be hard to shot, fucused on noses is not a good picture, but no cam in this world can fix that. Its always up to the user and can be cured with manual manipulation on quickshiftlenses. If I shot action, I trap my subjects rather than hunt it. Unless the K-3 wont teach how to make pictures of fast moving subjets, AF reliability will even with big improvement only improve results a little.

[normhead]

What on earth could be bigger than new AF, new sensor, new imaging engine, new video, new frame rate, (potentially) new flash sync to go wiuth the FGZII's?

I mean, really, what could be bigger?

Apart from wifi and tethering and a built in GPS you mean?

I'd love to have improved video with head phones connected. Would help working with microphone and get things right...if only they would raise the limit for video lenght...
Also new focus system sounds really good to me, with great ISO and DR...What I would not need is that 24 MB sensor because of bigger files, but wit out AA, it will improve my lenses performance, so why not.

Yes! From me for vide too.

Every lens, going from my k-5 to the K-3 should gain about 400 lw/ph, a 20% increase in resolution. That to me is the kind of change that causes new camera purchases. if you have a K-5 IIs, the change isn't so dramatic, less than 10%. Those guys have a much tougher decision, unless the AF is a lot better.

[Barry Pearson]

I dont know why AF acuracy is such a big problem,
If you set cour camera to spot metering and set the AF point in the middle it is quite good, with any cam, any brand. If it is a difficult situation and a moving subject, off centered it is not always that easy for your cam to know, what is the subject to focus on. With a thin DOF especially people can be hard to shot, fucused on noses is not a good picture, but no cam in this world can fix that. Its always up to the user and can be cured with manual manipulation on quickshiftlenses. If I shot action, I trap my subjects rather than hunt it. Unless the K-3 wont teach how to make pictures of fast moving subjets, AF reliability will even with big improvement only improve results a little.

I do set AF point to the middle. And my K-5IIs still doesn't get it right often enough shooting at 7 fps in AF-C mode with "Focus priority".

I'm puzzled about how you can use manual manipulation on quick shift lenses or trap focus when shooting continuous fast action such as aircraft or birds in flight. Are we talking about the same sort of photography?