Originally posted by MMVIII Hi, interesting position. I can somehow understand this POV, even if it stays very vague. Clarity and transparency are two, how should I say, quite hard to evaluate qualities. Do you still think it might be possible to illustrate it with some examples? I fully acceppt if you say that you don't want to waste time with technical comparative testshots and don't think your points are less valid. I just noticed that an emotional aspect seems to play a big role when analysing and assesing images, especially these very subtle and vague qualities. Like pixie dust. And in this context it also might not be by chance that some of these observations or feelings come up when the technology is disputed for the k-1 II, and obviously it did not became observable or noticable in the years before, this sensor/processing already exists for some time.
I think it might be an interesting observation, but I also think that it is so slight that it might have never become an issue to almost all photographers and never noticed by any observer of the images.
I just finished setting up the new K3II and took some test shots.
Immediately, the familiar look to the images is back, and I can concentrate on taking images again, with a short trip waiting next week.
I can undertsand what you are saying. At the same time, I have gone through quite a few camera's and got very familiar with their RAW files. I went from Sony (A100- A700) to Olympus (E3, E5), to Pentax (K5, K5IIs, K3, KP and now K3II). Next to that I shoot Sony FE mirrorless and went from the A7R to the A7RII.
So I am quite familiar with a (sometimes drastic) change in RAW quality and "look", and am also quite familiar with different RAW converters like Adobe Camera Raw, Capture one (all the way from v4 up to the current v11), DxO optics, all of which I have owned and used extensively.
I was not all that happy e.g. going from the Pentax K5IIs to the K3 initially: losing some DR and a certain "look". I wás immediately very happy to go from the Sony A7R to the Sony A7RII. I was not happy with the Olympus E5.
But I never returned a camera before and switched back to the previous model. So believe me, the loss of very fine detail and image clarity going from the K3 to the KP is very real for me, and I gave my eyes two months to absorb around 1000 KP images, so as to know whether I will enjoy using the KP with the DA560.
You are absolutely right that it is a subjective decision, which I try to nuance, but it is far from an emotional decision.
In short: to me, the road Pentax is on with the increased use of heavy RAW image processing, is not one that wildlife/birding shooters will only benefit from. And I really do hope that they will take a different approach with the next coming K3 successor.
For general, landscape, cityscape shooting, and especially low light shooting, the image processing in the KP may be very welcome.
B.t.w. my reason for posting this, is because it may be of help for users looking to replace an aging K3 or such. I lost some money going the KP route, which I could have put into saving up for a good lens. It is not about proving the KP is a bad or worse than K3II camera, which it is not. But in my view, it is certainly not an optimal wildlife, birders camera.
My new K3II is much more responsive than the troubled K3 I had, AF is snappy and secure with the DA560, so ultimately, the switch K3 > K3II is a good one. I could have saved quite a bit of money if I had directly switched.
On the other hand, I now am no longer waiting for a K3 successor. Not until I know what Pentax has in mind regarding IQ for the next flagship. If they optimize it for rich landscape, cityscape and low light shooting similar as the KP, then I'm out.
Chris