My budget is around $1000 for a complete system right now. Should I get a K5 ($250 on these forums), a K5 II/s ($400) or the K3 ($600)?
I'll be mainly shooting competitive business type competitions (minimal action) with people/groups of people. Lighting is usually good at local/state competitions as they are hosted in schools or conference centers. It's not optimal lighting but I do plan to get a Yongnuo speedlight for around $70 as well.
However, when you get to the international competition, it's a rather big event with about 20,000 people. The awards ceremony is in a giant room or arena (they rotate locations every 4 years) with a big stage usually in the middle with tons of bright moving lights and lots of bright cheerful colors. When people go up to their awards, it's a very fast paced process and I need to be able to catch their expression and joy as they receive their award.
Will the AF tracking on the K5's be enough? Or should I go for the K3 with better AF? Or should I just pick up the K5 and invest more money in lenses?
Here's what the international competition looked like last year, it was in Atlanta. The international competition was in Orlando this year and looked similar, except the stage was in the middle with 4 camera men on each side broadcasting live to 4 big TV screens on top of the stage.
The picture above was taken with a Canon T3i with the 18-55 kit. I did not take the picture, I just found the image online and pulled the data from EXIF.