[caliscouser]

My only concern is AF/tracking speed and I have held back putting in an order until I see it in action, I have been burned before by Pentax's autofocus promises.

Perfectly reasonable. The proof is in the pudding. The AF hardware upgrades at least suggest this could be a big leap forward.

[mtkeller]

yeah, that old safox often prefers the background to the subject. It should only care about contrast, i think...
I can't wait to test the k-3iii; can we say, problem solved?

Fingers crossed!

Mike Muizebelt's tests and Rene Fisher's showcase images on the Ricoh Imaging USA give me hope.

[ThorSanchez]

Yeah, that old SAFOX often prefers the background to the subject. It should only care about contrast, I think...
I can't wait to test the K-3iii; can we say, problem solved?

During the first soccer game I was shooting Saturday evening I took 52 photos. About 15 had some kind of focus problem, mostly focusing on something behind the subject. Sometimes the far background (trees, etc), sometimes the far sideline and coaches, fences. Sometimes just other players well behind the subject.


Hopefully the new SAFOX helps significantly with this. But it's not going to help with the 15-20 shots that just weren't that interesting, or I had a bad angle to what was happening, or a random opponent stepped in between me and the person with the ball. In any case, I'd take five bad focus shots instead of 15.


What the K-3 III should also help a lot with is the 2nd game that was after the sun went down and the lights were not great and ISO 12800 came into play more often than not.

[noelpolar]

..........I have been burned before by Pentax's autofocus promises.

Just my opinion of course.

Fwiw.... I have a view that... say.... from K5 to K3 to K1 to KP that the AFC has not been worth chasing through these camera models (to any great extent).... so I can understand this feeling. Off course.... I'm quite confident that this camera will provide a more pleasing AFC experience in combination with it's other refinements.... so I have purchased one.

[mtkeller]

If they put all those new AF points in there and gave us a joystick to control AF point selection (and made a new grip so it would have it, too!) and didn’t greatly enhance the rest, then there is something seriously, seriously wrong. I have enough confidence in Pentax to believe they have done this right. Is it delivery day yet?

[RedBoomer]

Fwiw.... I have a view that... say.... from K5 to K3 to K1 to KP that the AFC has not been worth chasing through these camera models (to any great extent).... so I can understand this feeling. Off course.... I'm quite confident that this camera will provide a more pleasing AFC experience in combination with it's other refinements.... so I have purchased one.

I would differ somewhat with Noel, for my use I have found significant improvement in AFC across my cameras (K20, K5, K3, K1ii). Over the years, I have had regular need to photograph basketball (many games), track & field, soccer, Australian football, rowing. I generally use back-button focus with AFC 27 Sel centre point. My process is to centre the viewfinder on the athlete, hit and hold the back-button and hit and hold the shutter (continuous shooting). If the camera loses focus on the subject then re-hit the buttons. Since the K3, in my experience, AFS does not come close in performance to AFC for moving sports, I would never use AFS for sport (or BIF) and it surprises me that others find AFS preferable (I can only think that it is technique or setup or both?). I am looking forward to the K3iii and expecting a further decent upgrade in AFC performance (and 11 fps will be fantastic).

A few weeks ago I photographed some women's softball and took a sequence of 15 shots as a player ran from 3rd base to home. Using the K1ii and DFA 150-450 at 250mm/ 1/2000s/F7.1/iso 400-640, I was positioned (~25m) behind the runner (she was running away from me) and all 15 shots were sharp. The 1st , 5th, 10th and 15th shots are shown below. You can see in the 1st shot that the home base is clearly out of focus and the camera tracks the runner perfectly to beyond the home base.

I find, for my use, that the AFC in the K1ii works well (its not 100% but I am rarely disappointed by missing a shot due to focus).

The K3iii has been a long time coming but I am confident it will be worth the wait.

[reh321]

During the first soccer game I was shooting Saturday evening I took 52 photos. About 15 had some kind of focus problem, mostly focusing on something behind the subject. Sometimes the far background (trees, etc), sometimes the far sideline and coaches, fences. Sometimes just other players well behind the subject.


Hopefully the new SAFOX helps significantly with this. But it's not going to help with the 15-20 shots that just weren't that interesting, or I had a bad angle to what was happening, or a random opponent stepped in between me and the person with the ball. In any case, I'd take five bad focus shots instead of 15.


What the K-3 III should also help a lot with is the 2nd game that was after the sun went down and the lights were not great and ISO 12800 came into play more often than not.

Honestly, when I first got my KP, I sometimes would use the lowest possible ISO, and perhaps I was too cautious. If you think 12800 ISO will suffice, you might be better off going another step up.
I tended to get more noise by being “conservative” and under-exposing than by using as much ISO as was really needed.

[noelpolar]

I probally should clarify.... people and pelicans are not my focus targets for this camera so much.... more smaller faster moving stuff with complex backgrounds.... or must get bride shot in dimly lit place. Hopefully this camera is a proper leap in performance.... not a 10% improvement.... I anticipate it will be.

As far as noise goes... there are two different worlds here.... out of camera jpeg stuff..... and raw through best tech noise reduction.... 2 stops or even 3 apart at times for me. For ever random'ish jpeg I shoot.... there would be 4 or 5 considerations I don't have time for that I can later do to a raw.

[Paul the Sunman]

I probally should clarify.... people and pelicans are not my focus targets for this camera so much....

From my perspective, people and pelicans are the same thing...

[reh321]

I probally should clarify.... people and pelicans are not my focus targets for this camera so much.... more smaller faster moving stuff with complex backgrounds.... or must get bride shot in dimly lit place. Hopefully this camera is a proper leap in performance.... not a 10% improvement.... I anticipate it will be.

You will have to tell the camera which is the bride - not a pelican - then it will give you good photos.

[JPT]

The Pentax Official site has started a series on lenses you want to try on the K-3 III. The first one is the DA20-40 Ltd.

K-3 Mark III??????????? ??1???? | PENTAX official

There are a number of images that by default open up rather small.

What I found was that by copying the image address and removing "-scaled" from the image title, the images will open at full size.

[aslyfox]

Reading about continuing delays in vehicle manufacturing over chip shortage and wondering if that might slow release of the K3 III

[reh321]

... more smaller faster moving stuff with complex backgrounds.... or must get bride shot in dimly lit place. Hopefully this camera is a proper leap in performance.... not a 10% improvement.

Shortly after I got my KP, I took a series of photos in a church setting. I was pleased by the quietness of the shutter. After taking several images at 12K, I raised the shutter speed to 1/250 to force the ISO up to 25K {I was using TAv and aperture of f/5.6}. Iso 25600! - PentaxForums.com





Unless your brides move even faster than mine zoomed down the aisle, I expect the K-3iii to produce acceptable focus, as well as pleasing noise, colors, and DR, Most wedding photographers I have seen use flash in any case.

added: The red on the music and the blue on her dress matched what I was looking at. I was very pleased with the resulting colors at this ISO - one of the reasons I keep dragging discussion away from noise to fidelity of colors.

[Kobayashi.K]

The Pentax Official site has started a series on lenses you want to try on the K-3 III. The first one is the DA20-40 Ltd.
K-3 Mark III??????????? ??1???? | PENTAX official
There are a number of images that by default open up rather small.
What I found was that by copying the image address and removing "-scaled" from the image title, the images will open at full size.

Most photos are taken with Custom Image Flat, which is designed for editing in post.

What is Custom Image? | Custom Image modes and functions
Give further expression with PENTAX "Custom Image" | RICOH IMAGING

---------- Post added 04-14-21 at 12:41 AM ----------

Reading about continuing delays in vehicle manufacturing over chip shortage and wondering if that might slow release of the K3 III

I think this could have been the reason of the delay we have already seen, and that Ricoh fixed this issue and then told us that the camera is available end of April.

[Smolk]

Is the release date still expected to be 23 April? (The number of posts here are such that I can't find the answer easily.)
Ricoh will inform me of the shipping date - but I'm also travelling shortly afterwards.