[kayasaman]

Your experience with your old K1 is not germane to the performance of the K3III. Your K1 was built with landscape shooters in mind, and for that genre it's an amazingly effective camera 5 years later that still holds its own against most current flagship mirrorless cameras. Had you tried the newer Pentax crop camera designed for action you would have an entirely different opinion of Pentax capabilities and likely referred to the K3III as a speed-demon that nails the shot far more often than not.

As for the sharpness of your *300 on your K1 I suspect you had it mis-calibrated. IIRC you had questions about how to do a fine-focus adjustment on it, and perhaps never did understand how to do it properly. Star lenses are highly regarded even by photographers using other systems. For example, out at a photo shoot another photog noticed I was using Pentax and told me to try this amazing lens he had in the bag for his A7II: A Pentax *200 adapted for his camera. Said it was the best outdoor portraiture lens he owned, preferred over his Sony-branded 70-200, and rendered so beautifully on his mirrorless. I did graciously accept it for a few scenes, at the same time telling him I had one at home. Yup, great Pentax glass.

Thanks gatorguy!

Yeah I've never played with the K3 iii and of course it's a different camera then the K1/ii. Maybe down the line I may opt for another Pentax body as I truly do love the cameras and the community - best group of people around :-)

The FA* is calibrated using fine adjustment. I have it dialed in at -10 and it's the best I can get using AF. MF with it gets similar results. Perhaps it's just my copy?? The imaging quality is very similar to my DFA28-105.

Maybe the lense needs to be looked at professionally and calibrated that way? Though it seems that maintenance on the lens has already been done before I bought it as there is a screw missing from the front plastic ring.


You're going to be able to compare and contrast the D500 and K3 iii soon in any case, so I'm really looking forward to that!!


If you're like me, you won't like the layout of the D500 or the menus and will definitely miss the Tav mode.


I don't seem to understand much about 'normal' photography in any case, so for me I can spend all day in the same patch shooting bees or insects in macro mode. The Pentax macro lens is still an old screw drive I think (will need to check it again), the only lens I could find with fast AF capability was the Sigma 105mm. Even Nikon guys say to stay away from the Nikon macro lens.


My 18-300mm is currently at the 300mm end and that's really the only focal length I'm using with it at the moment. It's too short!! Which is why I can't wait to get the Sigma 60-600mm, though I may end up having to add a TC on that if I can't get close enough. No, I don't intend to splash out $10k+ on a lens lol


But that's just me. For landscapes I love wide, as wide as possible!! Irix 15mm or even Laowa 12mm wide. On the other side I need close, extremely close. In the middle I just get confused I guess lol


I would really love to compare the modern * line with my Korean lenses and see which type I prefer. One observation of the Ken Rockwell website was that Korean lenses tend to be over sharp. Maybe that is what I'm seeing and liking??


One thing that I can say about the K3 iii is Astro Tracer gen. 3 totally rocks!! From the amount of images I've seen and how people use it with out the need for calibration, it's definitely an amazing leap forward. That is really why I bought my K1 ii in the first place. The night time is when I really enjoy imaging and so far I know I made the right choice.


I guess I probably really suck as a daytime photographer


Lastly, thanks so much @gatorguy for continuing your support

[Robert N]

As we know, the bells and whistles that are imbedded into the K-3 III when it comes to AF can be, well, are confusing.
"Do I use subject recognition? Zone, Full Auto, SEL-EX (S, M, L?), SEL, Spot, AF.S, AF.C" and the list goes on and on and on.
Through the past year of concentrated shooting to figure out all the ins and outs of this new to Pentax Marvel of AF, I'd like to help others understand what the camera is doing when set to certain settings and when you should use one setting over another.
Keep in mind that my findings are not endorsed nor has any info been provided by Pentax. This is solely my own trial and error over the many firmware updates that have been released.
Your mileage may vary which I will attempt to also explain why in this post.
Note I will be focusing on the latest firmware as of this posting (1.41). From my experiences, previous Firmware's (although improvements end over end) were spotty regarding reliability if you used any sort of tracking AF setting.

Okay! Let's begin...
We'll start by looking at the camera itself to show the correlation of AF point vs intended subject over a variety of scenes.
Full Auto with a busy scene
Here are all the settings that were used. Notice the AF red dot that shows where the camera placed focus.


Now let's zoom in and see EXACTLY where it focused in the scene itself.

So what the heck happened here?! Why is it out of focus when it clearly showed an AF point was used?

Well, there's a few things at play here.
For one, the AF points on the screen or in the OVF don't actually mean the subject is in focus.
They only show which AF point was active during capture (if any).

The 2nd thing is using the Type-1 AF setting (which links both the RGBir metering sensor and the AF system together).
I personally leave this setting on, but it's important to know what to expect when using it.
On the surface it sounds incredible! 307,000 pixels to assist the 101 point AF system for improved accuracy and speed in tracking? It's a no brainer right?
Well, not so fast. Yes it does track very well and very fast, however, 307,000 pixels don't divide that well into 101 AF points.
There's gaps between the 101 AF points which many times is the reason you'll get images that show no AF points were used at all, or you'll get a sharp image but the AF point is just off the target.

I think what's happening is that the RGBir sensor is telling the AF system where to focus but there's no actual focus point at that location so it picks the next closest actual AF point.
In other words, the RGBir sensor is picking AF locations that fall in the "cracks" between the AF sensors 101 points.

Now the 3rd thing is how busy is the actual scene? The subject recognition uses color, shape, and a database of pre-programmed things to recognize.
If the scene has many shapes and/or colors (especially if they're similar to the subject itself) it will make it more difficult for the camera to isolate the subject for focusing. This is especially true if using the "Full Auto" setting that uses all 101 AF points which is shown in the above picture (for this scene, Zone would be a better choice (if you wanted the eye detect AF to be more reliable).

Zone AF with a busy scene
Just like before, take a good look at the screen and note the AF point location


Now let's zoom in and see how it looks!

Well that's weird! Why is this one so much more in focus?!
By using Zone, you're limiting the area the camera will scan for moving subjects and things to focus on.
This is a great setting to use for complicated scenes with a subject large enough to fill most of or all of the Zone area.
Don't forget, you can also move the Zone around with the joystick just like using Sel AF.

Here's an example of using Zone with a subject on the smaller side of things.


And let's zoom in...

Well that totally failed. So, ummm, what happened this time?
Color information is too similar between both the subject and the background so it picked an AF point that it believed to still be the correct subject.

For better or worse, I made a video regarding the "PENTAX" folder that's in the SD cards, what some of the data contains and how it correlates to the subject recognition.
Surprise!!!! Clouds is one of the subjects! So if you're experiencing issues with maintaining focus on a subject when using Full Auto or Zone with a cloudy background, it's probably because the camera is recognizing more than one subject at a time and doesn't know exactly which one to stay latched to.
Don't forget that both Auto and Zone AF allow for the recognition of eyes in the scene (as long as subject recognition is turned on).

So what settings should be used in AF.C to capture certain subjects since it seems to be really picky about everything?
It's not as complicated as it seems to be on the surface.

Larger subjects are tracked beautifully with no issues at all (Motorsports, birds in flight that take up at least a full 1/4 of the image area).

But wait!!! What about the shooting speed? Isn't a faster burst speed better?
Well, I've done a lot of playing around and analyzing this, and these are my findings...
The burst rate to use is actually determined by the speed of the subject you're trying to capture.
I know, say what? What does the burst rate have to do with the cameras focusing system?
Well, from all my field testing, it actually does, but not in the "traditional" sense.
The camera has a new predictive algorithm for focus targeting estimation and that's an important thing to understand.
For example, if you're shooting a car coming towards you at 100 mph (160 Km/h) and it's taking up approx 3/4 of the image area and you're shooting with continuous MED (7 fps), it's very possible for the camera to under/over predict the in focus location for the next shot. so the full 11 fps would get you more keepers as the camera better matches the subject speed with the "next frame" focus location. However, if the car is travelling at 40 mph (64 Km/h) and you're in full 11 fps burst, the AF location target will be a bit all over the map since the vehicle just isn't travelling fast enough for the cameras settings, so 7 fps would actually be the benefit here.
The same holds true for birds in flight. Faster smaller song birds require faster settings. Larger/slower birds require slower settings.

At the end of the day, the K-3 III is what I call a "deliberate" camera. You need to think about what you're shooting to apply the correct settings to maximize the keeper rate. Gone are the simple, meh, spot, single shot, I'll get something generalist approach. Now don't get me wrong, I know some of you are doing that and it's working for you, I'm not knocking it. I'm just saying that for more intense split second shooting, you need to apply some thought into the settings and base those settings directly to the subjects that you'll be shooting.
It took me quite a while to figure out what was going wrong because everything I did with my K-30 and K-3 just did not work so well with the K-3 III (to the point where I almost sent the camera back to get checked). But I figured there must be something I'm missing here so I just kept testing EVERYTHING to figure it out.

So, in a nutshell, smaller subjects erratic movement/faster motion = 11 fps.
Larger subjects with more consistent/slower movement = 7 fps.

Busy scene taking advantage of subject recognition: Zone AF
Isolated subject taking advantage of subject recognition: Full Auto AF (all 101 AF points).

Now, you can also use SEL S/M/L which I found does a great job of sticking with the subject under most conditions. It also allows you to start focusing from the center point before the camera will begin tracking.
Conditions where SEL M/L don't work seems to mainly be shooting subjects around water. I strongly think this (again) has to do with color information and the fact that the camera is a deliberate system as I explained before. When I'm shooting swans, ducks, geese out in the water, I switch to AF.S so the system won't try "finding" things that are moving.
It seems (to me anyway) that AF.C specifically "scans" for movement which causes AF issues such as jumping from the subject to something else moving. This is especially the case if the intended subject is barely moving but something else in the scene is moving more.
AF.S is how it's always been, so there's nothing new (except for Zone AF, the subject recognition and eye detection) that we aren't already used to.

Here's some more examples with the settings that were used.
Remember, where I've zoomed in is where the AF target is located.












Notice this one shows No AF target but it's still sharp



I probably missed a couple of things here and there (I'm currently under the Covid weather) but I hope this post helps at least one person out when coming to terms with the whizbangetry of the K-3 Mark III with all it's doohickies and whatchamacallits and how it all comes together into one amazing thingamabobber.

Kobie, many thanks for your excellent efforts. Unfortunately the K-3iii manual does not specifically discuss eye detection, and the range of AF settings it is applicable to. It is assumed it is active with zone and auto AF as these incorporate subject detection, however from my experience when photographing static small birds from hides and using select AF in AF-S mode, it has nailed the eye focus consistently. Also for birds in flight, AF(M) in AF-C has been very successful in getting sharp head and eye focus. Hence it appears the eye focus is active over a range of AF capture settings. Images have been taken mainly with the 150-450mm f4.5-5.6 ED DC AW D-FA HD lens. Perhaps others can expand on their experiences with different AF capture settings.

[Kobie]

Kobie, many thanks for your excellent efforts. Unfortunately the K-3iii manual does not specifically discuss eye detection, and the range of AF settings it is applicable to. It is assumed it is active with zone and auto AF as these incorporate subject detection, however from my experience when photographing static small birds from hides and using select AF in AF-S mode, it has nailed the eye focus consistently. Also for birds in flight, AF(M) in AF-C has been very successful in getting sharp head and eye focus. Hence it appears the eye focus is active over a range of AF capture settings. Images have been taken mainly with the 150-450mm f4.5-5.6 ED DC AW D-FA HD lens. Perhaps others can expand on their experiences with different AF capture settings.

It's easy to test, you can't really test for eye detection with BIF due to composition and differences with panning and focal plane.

Shoot a person (even yourself), do some in SEL M and SEL L both in AF.S and AF.C. Then repeat the same using Zone and Full auto AF. Looking at the preview on the LCD, press info button until you see a small thumbnail of the image and the AF display. Look at where the AF point(s) are red and zoom into the image and see where it prioritized the AF. That'll tell you if it's getting the eye or not.

[sebberry]

My parents just got a chocolate lab puppy.
Boy I sure wish there was proper animal eye-AF on the K3-3. Out of 100 shots, maybe 5 were in focus. Half of the 100 I chalk up to an energetic puppy, but many should have been better. Lower light, shooting at 1.4/1.8 and the camera picked mostly either the things the dog was chewing on or the bed it was resting on. I think I have as many in-focus pictures of her plush monkey toy as I do of the dog.

[gatorguy]

My parents just got a chocolate lab puppy.
Boy I sure wish there was proper animal eye-AF on the K3-3. Out of 100 shots, maybe 5 were in focus. Half of the 100 I chalk up to an energetic puppy, but many should have been better. Lower light, shooting at 1.4/1.8 and the camera picked mostly either the things the dog was chewing on or the bed it was resting on. I think I have as many in-focus pictures of her plush monkey toy as I do of the dog.

If you can catch her in one of her calmer moments you might give the new XS focus mode a shot. Our own Kobie just did a video demonstrating how effective it is when there's competition for a focus point, in this case the plush toy.

[idontstairs]

My parents just got a chocolate lab puppy.
Boy I sure wish there was proper animal eye-AF on the K3-3. Out of 100 shots, maybe 5 were in focus. Half of the 100 I chalk up to an energetic puppy, but many should have been better. Lower light, shooting at 1.4/1.8 and the camera picked mostly either the things the dog was chewing on or the bed it was resting on. I think I have as many in-focus pictures of her plush monkey toy as I do of the dog.

This sums up the last 18 months with the K-3iii for me. Or I can just pick up my Nikon Z6 and watch the yellow focus box track my dog's head as he runs around the yard. It's like the Wright brothers plane versus the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and the Z6 is old camera technology now.

[sebberry]

This sums up the last 18 months with the K-3iii for me. Or I can just pick up my Nikon Z6 and watch the yellow focus box track my dog's head as he runs around the yard. It's like the Wright brothers plane versus the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and the Z6 is old camera technology now.

I suspected as much. It's frustrating - I bought the K3-3 so I wouldn't have to re-buy lenses if I switched systems, then it became clear my DA* screw-drive converted lenses aren't cutting it, so I bought the DFA* 50 1.4 (contrary to my "I don't want to buy newer lenses" statement) and while somewhat better, it's still maddeningly difficult to get some in-focus shots.

By the time I set up my little light to illuminate the puppy in her bed and composed the shot, she kept moving before I could get anything in focus :/

Another frustration is the constant racking focus from close to infinity before it settles on... something.

[simon_199]

This sums up the last 18 months with the K-3iii for me. Or I can just pick up my Nikon Z6 and watch the yellow focus box track my dog's head as he runs around the yard. It's like the Wright brothers plane versus the Millennium Falcon from Star Wars and the Z6 is old camera technology now.

I understand the frustration expressed in the last few posts, as I have recently tried to take some family portraits indoor and it's tricky. New mirrorless cameras have raised the expectations and significantly expanded the window of lighting conditions where one expects to have robust results. I don't know how the K-3iii fares against other DSLRs in such difficult situations, but I see former Canikon DSLRs users regard their new ML bodies as an absolute game changer when it comes to AF performance, especially in those situations, therefore I think the keeper rate was rather low even with the more highly regarded DSLRs by the big players.
Personally I've just come to accept the limitations, rapidly moving subjects (that is, people running around) are a no-go indoors. But for relatively stationary targets (even babies who are certainly not still) I have reasonable success with the 20-40Ltd, that has more precise DC focusing and I use it at 20-23mm f2.8 with "acceptable" light, that is where you can comfortably expose at 1/200s f2.8 and ISO1600 max. Using a mixture of zone AFC with (supposedly) eye recognition and single point AFC. Sometimes I also make do with AFS and the keeper rate for the kind of shots I expect is surprisingly decent, in the aforementioned "acceptable" conditions. If light is so dim that one needs F1.4 at ISO3200 and/or maybe use slower shutter speeds...it's pretty much better to avoid shooting Maybe ML cameras don't miss a beat even in such conditions but...the're quite extreme, "unfortunately", technology (mirrorless) has enabled effortless shooting in dim light and we got used to it.
Among screwdrive AF lenses the only one that gets decent results is the DFA 100mm Macro. For some reasons the 35Ltd or the DA50 are not very accurate when focusing on "non perfectly still" subjects.

[Robert N]

It's easy to test, you can't really test for eye detection with BIF due to composition and differences with panning and focal plane.

Shoot a person (even yourself), do some in SEL M and SEL L both in AF.S and AF.C. Then repeat the same using Zone and Full auto AF. Looking at the preview on the LCD, press info button until you see a small thumbnail of the image and the AF display. Look at where the AF point(s) are red and zoom into the image and see where it prioritized the AF. That'll tell you if it's getting the eye or not.

I have been conducting a set of AF tests with my SMC Pentax-DA 35mm F2.4 AL lens set at f2.8 on the K-3iii, with model (my reluctant wife) 1m away. I ran through all AF active area settings and in every case the eye focus was precise. I use the standard rather than the detailed information display. For me the proof of the pudding is in the viewing, which proved consistent eye detection, which I am very happy with.

[Kobie]

I have been conducting a set of AF tests with my SMC Pentax-DA 35mm F2.4 AL lens set at f2.8 on the K-3iii, with model (my reluctant wife) 1m away. I ran through all AF active area settings and in every case the eye focus was precise. I use the standard rather than the detailed information display. For me the proof of the pudding is in the viewing, which proved consistent eye detection, which I am very happy with.

Robert, I hear what you're saying but the simple fact that using AF SEL with a single point of focus, unless you're actually aiming that focus point on an eye, the camera isn't detecting the eye as something to focus on even though it may be sharp due to the depth of field. This is why it only works in Auto modes (Zone and Full auto AF) since those are the only modes where the camera can analyze the scene and actually pick a subject it recognizes. Any other mode outside of that just won't work since you're essentially in a user controlled AF mode.

Now don't get me wrong here, I have plenty of images where eyes are sharp but it's not specifically where the camera placed focus since I was using a user controlled AF mode (SEL, SEL S, SEL M, SEL L). The only way to know what the camera chose as the primary focus point is by viewing the detailed playback screen that actually shows the AF that was used and then zooming in. It zooms in on the primary focus point. You can aim the AF point at a person's nose and still have the eye sharpz but when you zoom in, it'll zero in on the nose and not an eye.

At the end of the day, as long as you're happy with the performance, that's all that matters. I'm just trying to explain how the eye detection for AF works and how it doesn't and why.

[Demiles]

I just want to say thank you to all that have posted and replied about the K3 mk iii AF. As a novice photographer switching from the KS1 to the K3 mk iii the options on this camera is quite intimidating. All this AF talk has helped me understand the AF process and I am very happy with the results I have achieved.

[sebberry]

This would have been a much better photo if eye detect AF was a thing...

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[Kobie]

This would have been a much better photo if eye detect AF was a thing...

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Zone? Full Auto? SEL?

[gatorguy]

This would have been a much better photo if eye detect AF was a thing...

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FWIW the pup's single eye just a couple centimeters above the edge of the dog bed is not so obvious, and I would have used the new XS focus to capture that image sharply. But the latest firmware that enables it might not have been available yet when you took that shot, so I understand you use what 'cha got.

BTW, what focus mode did you use? Eye focus has been pretty reliable for me when using the correct settings, and there are correct ones.

[Robert N]

Robert, I hear what you're saying but the simple fact that using AF SEL with a single point of focus, unless you're actually aiming that focus point on an eye, the camera isn't detecting the eye as something to focus on even though it may be sharp due to the depth of field. This is why it only works in Auto modes (Zone and Full auto AF) since those are the only modes where the camera can analyze the scene and actually pick a subject it recognizes. Any other mode outside of that just won't work since you're essentially in a user controlled AF mode.

Now don't get me wrong here, I have plenty of images where eyes are sharp but it's not specifically where the camera placed focus since I was using a user controlled AF mode (SEL, SEL S, SEL M, SEL L). The only way to know what the camera chose as the primary focus point is by viewing the detailed playback screen that actually shows the AF that was used and then zooming in. It zooms in on the primary focus point. You can aim the AF point at a person's nose and still have the eye sharpz but when you zoom in, it'll zero in on the nose and not an eye.

At the end of the day, as long as you're happy with the performance, that's all that matters. I'm just trying to explain how the eye detection for AF works and how it doesn't and why.

Kobie, out interest I shoot with back button focus and with this setting the red focus confirmation points on the detailed playback for zone or auto focus do not show up.
For moving subjects in AF-C, AF select/ expanded and burst modes, I keep AF button continually pressed whilst shooting and get excellent results. A solid technique delivers solid results.