[clickclick]

They have done enormous work on the autofocus

This is really nice to hear, yet again. It sounds like this is one of the best parts of the upgrade.

[david94903]

I got mine done in Canada and have been impressed with the autofocus improvements. No issues with magenta cast. Typically that is a software issue post, where it mishandles out of range values.

They did a very nice job on the CLA which always in my experience makes the body feel like new. Kudos to Sun Camera. They turned it around in two weeks including shipping across the country both ways, and everything feels new. Previously I would feel shutter shock in my hand at some shutter speeds and it seems to be less.

There are lots of things that are different is subtle ways, and may be a false impression. The metering is different in some way, and I haven't quite nailed it down yet. The SR is different, seems better to the point of not noticing it at all, especially when tripod mounted. I thought I made a stupid mistake throwing away a great shooting opportunity when the shutter speed was 1/400. I was on monopod shooting a shorebird. There were a few where the bird movement was blurry, but the majority were very good. I don't credit my technique.

I feel that I'm not fighting limitations of the body to get results. That definitely was the case with the K1 autofocus and the 150-450 + K1 shutter induced vibrations. As I shoot through the full cycle of the seasons and lighting conditions I will find the limits.

As for IQ I have notched the high iso limit up to 12800. It seems the workable limit is higher. I didn't get many good ones at 6400, with some notable exceptions. I suspect it will be the same at the higher level. I find when I get a new body that I have to rework all my post processing assumptions and baselines, which takes a bit of time as the full range of images come through. So far my impression is that there are more details and images at high iso that can be worked with. There is noise, it's characteristics are different, the correction levels that I applied to the K1 are too aggressive. I have images which have enough detail in the subject where a skilled (which I have yet to develop) application of soft smoothing to the background to get rid of the graininess would end with a nice photo. The noise presets for the K1 Mark II in Darktable aren't done yet. I have experienced quite a few situation where the application of presets and moderate noise reduction makes the image worse.

Something of note. In both full frame and crop mode, if I start shooting multiple exposures, then hit the AF button, af-c, the speed of the recycle doesn't change. They have done enormous work on the autofocus logic, and no doubt the additional processor helps.

Great feedback on the upgrade. Especially the improvements shooting the D-FA 150-450. I use that lens a lot. Making me rethink my thinking...

[wanderer2]

I wonder why Ricoh limited the upgrade so it's not available after this month. I emailed them asking if the time might be extended and got a reply simply saying to watch their website for further news. Nothing yet.

I'm very conflicted and undecided on the upgrade. I use my K-1 exclusively for landscapes on a tripod with BBF and my only perceived reason to get the upgrade is for hand held PSR. There are times when the tripod isn't practical or sometimes possible so I think I would use HHPS occasionally. But, reviews seem to vary a lot on how useful HHPS is and how good the results are. Focusing speed, etc. don't matter to me.

Obviously I'm going to have to decide soon. Any opinions would be appreciated.

[noelpolar]

I'm in the same boat.... but have two K1's ..... so sending one off isn't an issue.... but $700 here will be about half the cost of the K3II replacement..... plus I assume my DXO and LR6 copies won't work with it..... so ..... probally will let it pass.... lots of non photogtaphic stuff to spend money on in retirement.

[clickclick]

plus I assume my DXO and LR6 copies won't work with it

I was able to open the K-1 II DNG samples SirTomster posted with my desktop version of Lightroom 6.14. You can also install the newest version of Adobe DNG Converter (Adobe Camera RAW) to convert files if they are not recognized.

[johnkrumm]

I was able to open the K-1 II DNG samples SirTomster posted with my desktop version of Lightroom 6.14. You can also install the newest version of Adobe DNG Converter (Adobe Camera RAW) to convert files if they are not recognized.

Thanks everyone. I think I will go ahead and send it in next week or so.

[tax]

After collecting all relevant information about K-1 II, then using a borrowed one for one week, evaluating my own use cases and careful consideration, I decided not to upgrade my K-1 for the following reasons:
1. Claimed noise reduction in K-1 II at higher ISO's can be achieved to the same degree if not better by post processing K-1's raw images in Darktable.
Noise reduction in K-1 II is applied to the whole image uniformly. I can apply noise reduction in Darktable selectively by drawn mask to preserve fine details of the main subject, which otherwise will be softened by the accelerator unit in K-1 II. Sure, it requires some work and manual fiddling with noise filters, but you have full control over the resulting image for printing.
2. Even at lower or base ISO's, K-1 II's accelerator unit sucks battery power, thus reducing number of shots by 90 or roughly 12% in comparison to K-1. 90 shots could be a whole extra day of shooting on a tourist trip. There is no way to physically turn off the accelerator unit in K-1 II to reduce this unnecessary power consumption at lower ISO's, unless it performs some additional functions that we are not aware of.
3. K-1 II's improvements in SAFOX 12 auto focusing algorithms seem to be related to AF-C mode not to AF-S mode, which remains the same. Those who do not shoot birds in flight or sports would not benefit much from these improvements. I would petition Ricoh along with other K-1 owners to include improved SAFOX 12 auto focusing algorithms in one of the future K-1 firmware updates. Hell, I would even agree to pay up to $50 to Ricoh for such an update to keep them interested in implementing it.
4. K-1 II's hand-held 'Dynamic' Pixel Shift mode, while nice to have but not very useful in a real life situation. If I really pressed to have a perfect studio or static shot, I would use a tripod and a standard Pixel Shift mode anyway.
5. It is hard to justify $550 price tag for the upgrade to K-1 II. Currently, there is $200 difference between brand new K-1 and K-1 II bodies. Which means that the whole new motherboard with the accelerator unit costs less than $200. At least $350 (a speculative cost of labor) goes to Precision Camera as a middle man. I always try to eliminate / exterminate middlemen like worthless parasites whenever possible. In short, you will save more money just by selling your old K-1 and buying a brand new K-1 II if you really really need it.

---

Last edited by tax; 09-03-2018 at 04:22 PM.

[clickclick]

Earlier in this thread I mentioned I had downloaded a series of SirTomster's comparison shots of an underexposed scene taken with a K-1 and a K-1 II. In this particular set of shots, i didn't feel like I was seeing the magenta cast, at least nothing like other sample shots posted. I took the original DNG files SirTomster shot, which were underexposed by 5 stops, and imported them into Lightroom 6.14 (last desktop version). I increased exposure +5 and exported them as .tiffs. I then made these jpegs from those .tiffs for posting.

So, I can't account for shots we have seen that had a strong magenta cast, but there would seem to be some variation here.

And of course, maybe you'll all post back that you can see the hue on these two, and I'm really color blind.... Hope not!


.

[leekil]

5. It is hard to justify $550 price tag for the upgrade to K-1 II. Currently, there is $200 difference between brand new K-1 and K-1 II bodies. Which means that the whole new motherboard with the accelerator unit costs less than $200.

That's not what that means; it just means they decided to price the two cameras that way. (Though I suspect the whole motherboard costs Ricoh significantly less than $200, much like the entire K-1 costs them significantly less than $1799 or whatever the price is.)

[tax]

That's not what that means; it just means they decided to price the two cameras that way. (Though I suspect the whole motherboard costs Ricoh significantly less than $200, much like the entire K-1 costs them significantly less than $1799 or whatever the price is.)

Well, regardless of how Ricoh decided to price K-1 vs. K-1 II, my point is that you are paying an insane price to a third party for a marginal camera upgrade.
I'd better wait for and spend my money on a next generation FF Pentax DSLR with a higher resolution BSI sensor, faster data transfers and other significant improvements.

[derekkite]

Earlier in this thread I mentioned I had downloaded a series of SirTomster's comparison shots of an underexposed scene taken with a K-1 and a K-1 II. In this particular set of shots, i didn't feel like I was seeing the magenta cast, at least nothing like other sample shots posted. I took the original DNG files SirTomster shot, which were underexposed by 5 stops, and imported them into Lightroom 6.14 (last desktop version). I increased exposure +5 and exported them as .tiffs. I then made these jpegs from those .tiffs for posting.

So, I can't account for shots we have seen that had a strong magenta cast, but there would seem to be some variation here.

And of course, maybe you'll all post back that you can see the hue on these two, and I'm really color blind.... Hope not!


.

Magenta cast is usually software not handling out of range values of their calculations properly. I would say 3/4 or more of the 'issues' with the K1 Mark II IQ are post processing errors or bugs.

[clickclick]

Magenta cast is usually software not handling out of range values of their calculations properly. I would say 3/4 or more of the 'issues' with the K1 Mark II IQ are post processing errors or bugs.

I think this would be "good" - it should be fixable. I've read if you change the exif to report it's a K-1 instead of a K-1 II, the cast goes away. I'll be playing with ExifTool (ExifTool by Phil Harvey) tonight to see what happens on these shots.

[noelpolar]

I was able to open the K-1 II DNG samples SirTomster posted with my desktop version of Lightroom 6.14. You can also install the newest version of Adobe DNG Converter (Adobe Camera RAW) to convert files if they are not recognized.

Thanks for that. I only now need to know how much improved is the DFA 150-450 on a K1.... then my $700 might be in jeopardy. Is it worth a birthday present credit?

[clickclick]

Thanks for that. I only now need to know how much improved is the DFA 150-450 on a K1

Welcome, but I must ask how you mean the 150-450 improved on a K-1? If you're thinking of small critters like birds, then perhaps not. I prefer the crop factor of my K3 II for things like this with my 150-450 over my K-1. The area of the sensor of the K-1 that is equal to the crop area is about 16 MP versus the 24 of the K3 II, so if I can't fill the frame with the K-1 doing telephoto work, I prefer the K3 II instead.

[derekkite]

Thanks for that. I only now need to know how much improved is the DFA 150-450 on a K1.... then my $700 might be in jeopardy. Is it worth a birthday present credit?

I would do it. The autofocus is remarkably better. I gave up on birds in flight shooting with the K1; they would fly out of focus by the time it took the exposure. It was frustrating; I would see it in focus in the viewfinder but the shot would be out of focus.

The update made it much better.

This Prairie Falcon was flying straight towards me. I got off three shots, it was so quick, and one was in focus. The other two I couldn't keep it centered in the viewfinder. AFC 9 auto. I wouldn't have bothered with the K1.

The continuous shooting rate in both full frame and crop doesn't change noticeably when you hold down the AF button. That makes it quicker than the K3 in crop mode.

The IQ has changed, I haven't seen any negatives yet, but definitely have to rework my post processing defaults.