[Wheatfield]

Hand held. I've never seen anyone do event photography with a tripod. Also, repeating similar experiments yields results with front/back focus far greater than any movement forward/backward that I may have done between locking focus and taking the photo. Again - the inconsistency is what puzzles me - if the camera was defective from something like a misalignment of the focus sensor, one would think that the focus error would at least be consistent. As you can see, it's perfectly capable of sharp photos. Just not every time.

One of the problems with AF sensors has always been that they are not 100% colour blind. This means they will often back focus or front focus in the same situation depending on the colour that the focus spot is seeing. The K5 was an extreme example of this where Pentax tried to fix a known issue and got it horribly wrong.

[Eric Seavey]

For what it is worth I saw the focal point on the Queen. He cannot take the Queen with his Knight. It is one column off. The boy cocks his head toward the camera making part of his forehead almost in focus. Depth of field is shallow as there is no flash.
We can now debate the advantages and disadvantages of flash photography. The movement of chess pieces is not debatable.

You haven't heard of the Knight's special move? Just kidding, good catch I didn't see that correctly.

---------- Post added 01-06-2023 at 10:42 PM ----------

I figure this is a fair thread to post this in...

My issue is with focus consistency - sometimes spot on, other times a little back or front focused. Makes using AF fine adjustment difficult given the inconsistency.

I suppose my question is this - what is the acceptable 'hit rate' for in-focus shots? What defect in the camera would cause this sort of inconsistency? Or is this acceptable and I simply have to hope that when my nephew blows out his birthday candles I happen to get an in-focus shot?

I uploaded some photos from an experiment. Standing about 4 or so feet away I took several photos of this lovely half-eaten bunch of bananas. Each shot I had the focus point precisely over the label on the banana. As would be the case when photographing people at an event, I de-focused the lens and re-composed a little between shots.

Using AF-S and SEL XS, some of the photos were tack sharp, others were a 'little off' and a few were useless. I haven't uploaded them, but doing this test with just a little less light produced much greater inconsistency between shots, so lower light indoor family events would still remain a struggle.

Anyway, take a look through the photos to see what my chief complaint is about inconsistency. I have titled several of them ranging from "highly acceptable" to "are these apples?" to give you an idea of how I'd categorize the quality.

https://www.flickr.com/gp/sebbles1/m5Wtny1CJ6

All shot with the K3-3 on latest firmware and the DFA*50 1.4

I was hoping with good lighting and high contrast subject would not throw off the phase detect AF, but sometime it does and also depends on the AF points/zone chosen. Using contrast AF it will be spot on pretty much every time in my experience. It seems to be important what "zone size" is used when using phase detect AF.

---------- Post added 01-06-2023 at 10:46 PM ----------

One of the problems with AF sensors has always been that they are not 100% colour blind. This means they will often back focus or front focus in the same situation depending on the colour that the focus spot is seeing. The K5 was an extreme example of this where Pentax tried to fix a known issue and got it horribly wrong.

I was very disappointed with the AF of the K-5 in low light conditions, especially when the color was reddish. The K5II fixed that problem and was a great camera that I used for many years. Now the K3III seems to still be sensitive to red colors, especially when focusing with larger zones.

[angerdan]

So will you stay?
And did you let calibrate your lenses with the camera?