[biz-engineer]

Also, when enabling interval exposures, with live view mode, the mirror goes all the way up and down for each exposure, that's doesn't make sense except if refocus is enabled.
Why can't I use a full electronic shutter in any of the bulb drive mode (single, remote, interval, interval composite)? The minimum exposure time in bulb mode with timer enabled is 10 sec and stars aren't moving that fast that it would create any rolling shutter effect, so why can't I enable ES for silent / motion free exposures? Would there be a solution about that limitation?

There are other limitations in other camera systems (on the Z7 you have to keep pressing the shutter button for the full length of the exposure... that's dumb), so I'm not saying other brands are better, but it would be nice if camera UI would be logical. On the D850, users can enable full time ES (silent) for interval exposures and long exposures, why not on Pentax K1?

Has it ever came to mind of camera maker to have their UI tested by real photographers before doing non nonsensical feature disable?

Please give us the freedom to enable or disable ES whenever WE estimate that rolling shutter is not a concern.
It's not up to software engineers to decide for me what I can do or can't do with the camera.
If I get rolling shutter if the setting is inappropriate , it's my problem to deal with it.

Where should we ask Ricoh to make a firmware update for the K1 and K1 II ?

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Last edited by biz-engineer; 09-26-2019 at 12:42 AM.

[MJKoski]

I suggested firmware fix for electronic shutter few years ago to fix shutter shock when doing frame averaging and stacks. Currently it is braindead implementation and pure laziness on Pentax's part. Pixel shift already uses fully electronic shutter to create the 4 frame stack very fast.

Actually I have suggested it 2 times in the feedback section. Now I have to bang mirror and/or shutter 600 times if I want to average 600 frames. Current flagship DSLR is left with no love when it comes to firmware updates. Mark 1 got many improvements. WORK IS NOT YET DONE.

[biz-engineer]

Now I have to bang mirror and/or shutter 600 times if I want to average 600 frames

Normally on long exposures, the effect of vibrations is negligible. But my concern is slight displacement of the camera block is not using an heavy tripod with very tight junctions, due to many mechanical shocks applied at camera level over many exposures. I thought about using an cable release intervalometer , in manual mode LV+ES but still the shutter would go up/down for each exposure. I can otherwise do a single exposure for one hour, but I evaluated that dark current correction can only work reasonably well up to 30 minutes exposures. Beyond 30 minutes exp. at 100 ISO, dark current noise starts to hit the max range of the A/D, at which point dark frame subtraction doesn't work anymore. Full ES for B mode would be nice to have.

---------- Post added 26-09-19 at 10:46 ----------

WORK IS NOT YET DONE.

I feel like there is no communication between camera companies and customers. Camera companies are like ivory towers in Japan.

[MJKoski]

With 100mm WR macro, doing for example 30x30sec averaging frame after frame in continuous mode visibly damages sharpness. This turns 36MP into ~10MP.

I have to put a wait of several seconds in between to minimize the shutter shock and/or mirror slap.

[biz-engineer]

I have to put a wait of several seconds in between to minimize the shutter shock and/or mirror slap.

I'm not sure that doing so improves.
In camera stacking using IR remote + LV ES gives a sharp resulting image.
The same stacked capture with camera programmed interval automatically switches to DSLR mode (mirror / shutter up / down), CAN give visible image SHIFT.
That's (I suppose) because of the way SR works. Even when SR is disabled, the sensor coils align the sensor in the middle of the frame. In LV mode, the sensor is continuously held in the center by magnetic force. In DSLR mode, the sensor SR only activates when an image is about to be taken and hold for 3 seconds or for the length of the exposure if there is an exposure; after the exposure the magnetic force is relaxed and the sensor goes back to floating. INT mode goes to DSLR mode, so when using internal camera stacking mode, the alignment between frames rely on the reproducibility of positioning the sensor in the center for each new exposure of the stack. The sensor is never comes back at exact the same place, that's why some stacks look like some frame are slightly shifted relative to other frames of the same stack. Mirror vibration shouldn't be significant for long exposures, because the vibes dissipate quickly relative to exposure time. In LV mode there is a single SR positioning of the sensor from start to end of LV mode => no concern about reproducibility of positioning the sensor in the center. => the camera INT mode is under-performing compared to using an external intervalometer or IR remote. I've used the IR remote to trigger multi-exposures, that's ok for shooting a dozen of frame over 5 minutes... but not for an hour long multi-exposure.

---------- Post added 26-09-19 at 13:56 ----------

All that means, obtaining perfect sharpness of stack with B / INT mode requires to enable x save process and align the image stack with external software.

[MJKoski]

Well I'm sure it improves situation great deal. I just did such stack yesterday with 100mm WR Macro. It was 64x4sec and 4 second intervals, outcome was acceptably sharp compared to interval set to minimum or shooting continuously with remote cable release. But that is bubblegum fix in place of proper solution.

[biz-engineer]

It was 64x4sec and 4 second intervals

Adding intervals between exposures is not good for star trials, trials aren't exactly continuous then. And for exposures longer than 1 s. vibrations shouldn't matter.
The problem is down to full ES not being available with the built in camera interval shooting modes, and having SR block powered On and Off for each exposure (and it's weird that SR can be enabled for INT modes, together with Astrotracer!, I think it's a bug). Also noted, the SR mechanism stays powered in B mode with LV, with remote composite exposure, but in that case the camera won't save each frame separately like it does with INT mode.

[MJKoski]

Gah! Sir, vibrations with long focals matter a great deal. If there is enough point light intensity and a long lens is used, the whole frame will be messy garbage at pixel level should the setup vibrate even a bit.

But, with wide angles I can do continuous shooting series like 120x30sec easily without blur. So yeah, star trails with 100mm lens is a real PITA if a stack is used.

[DeadJohn]

I agree that the long exposure features of the K-1 seem cobbled together, rather than a cohesive whole. That's partly because of the questionable decision to stick exposures above 30 seconds into a special timed-bulb mode, rather than manual mode. Electronic shutter, interval shooting, and some other key things work differently between manual and bulb.

A personal peeve is that the astrotracer and interval shooting functions are poorly integrated with each other. The K-1 is still a good camera, but upgraded firmware would help get even better photographs from the same hardware.

I have zero expectation that this thread will lead Ricoh to do anything differently. Pentax/Hoya/Ricoh (and much of their competition) only releases firmware updates to fix major bugs and for compatibility with new lenses.

[biz-engineer]

By the definition of what B mode is supposed to be used for (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulb_(photography)), I understand why there is no benefit of using ES in B mode.
Interval shooting duration could however last from a few minutes up to 24 hours. For a 24 hours long interval, ES with continuous SR power would drain the battery in a few hours. For an hour long interval (for stacking), ES could still be used.

[biz-engineer]

Gah! Sir, vibrations with long focals matter a great deal.

More effect with longer FL. Regarding ES, I realized that Pentax K1 is really ES and not EFCS but wait... the mechanical rear curtain still closes after the electronic rear curtain of an ES exposure and open again when live view come to life again . So in fact the ES mode is actually like a PS mode with a single frame... and since it is a full time ES (I know it because I compared the scanning speed of electronic shutter in ES mode and single frame of PS mode and the line scanning speed is the same in both cases), that's why it is disabled in burst mode (to avoid bit of images scattered here and there within a burst).

[MJKoski]

Pixel-Shift still takes 4 image series. So maybe a stack could be possible?

[biz-engineer]

Pixel-Shift still takes 4 image series. So maybe a stack could be possible?

I thought about it... separating each frame with RT and treating each PS frame as a normal bayer frame, then stack each frame after shifting back 1 pixel each frame. Gee, that's more work! And PS captures are very slow to save in memory card after each PS exposure. Wouldn't it be great if the sensor would expose electronically (zero mechanical motion) and each frame adds up to previous frame in camera buffer? =>> Resulting in top noch sharpness, zero read noise, and no pixel spikes from dark current.

[jeffshaddix]

I thought about it... separating each frame with RT and treating each PS frame as a normal bayer frame, then stack each frame after shifting back 1 pixel each frame. Gee, that's more work! And PS captures are very slow to save in memory card after each PS exposure. Wouldn't it be great if the sensor would expose electronically (zero mechanical motion) and each frame adds up to previous frame in camera buffer? =>> Resulting in top noch sharpness, zero read noise, and no pixel spikes from dark current.

Hey biz, did you get anywhere with this? For astro work I've been using PS mode and splitting the subs before stacking. I just recently realized I can run in live view to get the ES benefit without the sluggish performance of PS.

Still, it would be nice to use astrotracer with ES, or bracketing for HDR...

If there's a place to sign a petition I'd join in.