[awa355]

A question, if photographing people in a large well lite function centre as I will on Saturday, what camera settings would suit?. Av, wide aperture (which seems to pick a slow shutter speed) or Tv, a slowish shutter speed?. . The camera is my K50 and I will only have the DA 18-50 lens. No sense taking a zoom lens.

[GUB]

A question, if photographing people in a large well lite function centre as I will on Saturday, what camera settings would suit?. Av, wide aperture (which seems to pick a slow shutter speed) or Tv, a slowish shutter speed?. . The camera is my K50 and I will only have the DA 18-50 lens. No sense taking a zoom lens.

Is the lighting going to vary much in the room. IE can you be on manual? Are the people moving around in relation to you or are they say on a stage at a constant distance. If they are reasonably stationary (and so are you) then with image stabilization on you could arguably get the shutter down to say half the focal length (1/25 for 50mm) or even more if you have to. Aperture, say, one stop closed from wide open (a good argument for a fast prime). Then take up the slack with the Iso or utilize Iso-invariance
Iso invariance - PentaxForums.com
Don't let the camera do the guessing for you - you probably have a fairly controlled environment where decisions at the beginning will stay true.
A great opportunity for manual and saving to raw to give you good gains.

[GUB]

DA 18-50 lens. No sense taking a zoom lens.

?????????? The DA18-50 is a zoom!!

[awa355]

?????????? The DA18-50 is a zoom!!

Only a little zoom !!! Unlike
' SOME LENSES !!!!!.

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Last edited by awa355; 09-26-2017 at 02:49 PM.

[richandfleur]

A question, if photographing people in a large well lite function centre as I will on Saturday, what camera settings would suit?. Av, wide aperture (which seems to pick a slow shutter speed) or Tv, a slowish shutter speed?. . The camera is my K50 and I will only have the DA 18-50 lens. No sense taking a zoom lens.

My thoughts here would be to lock down how the camera meters the scene (I most often use centre weighted) to ensure you get the subject exposed correctly.
Examples of issues can be where someone walks in front of a bright window, and the camera meters for the bright parts, ensuring you can see what's outside the window, but your subjects are now really dark.


Watch for minimum shutter speeds, which cause blur if they dip too low.


If you can get the metering working well, then I'd probably pick Av mode myself, or stepping up to TAv if the camera is calculating too slow a shutter speed, so I could lock that at a suitably fast (but not too silly) speed.


On all my Pentax cameras, I lock the ISO at a max of 3200, or dropping to 1600 if light conditions allow. The noise is just too much after that, in my opinion.

Moving to the K-3 unlocked all the controls over the auto modes, which weren't there in the K-30, giving you the ability to tell it what to prioritise in it's auto calculations.


Other option is to use a Prime lens, so you can let in more light than the kit lens by selecting an aperture like f2.4 on the 35mm of f1.8 on the 50mm for example.
Narrows the depth of field though, so watch the focussing is bang on.
I tend to use single centre point focusing for this type of work, assuming you're not trying to track people walking towards you or away from you.

Sorry, lots of content there, and I hope some of it is useful?
All the best.

[Transit]

A question, if photographing people in a large well lite function centre as I will on Saturday, what camera settings would suit?. Av, wide aperture (which seems to pick a slow shutter speed) or Tv, a slowish shutter speed?. . The camera is my K50 and I will only have the DA 18-50 lens. No sense taking a zoom lens.

keep the shutter speed up Bro...noise no one notices, blur is another matter.
close that sucker down at least one stop
TAv is your friend

[Kiwigeezer]

K3 II on TMe, good reserve, low s/count but really ugly looking internally around the mount -pretty sure they don'y ship from the factory looking like that. Suspect somebody's tried to mount a lens with an extended shroud, or over-long aperture actuator lever? I recall some Ricoh lens need the lever or shroud ground down to avoid scraping. It's a tempting proposition, but that apparent damage makes me a little wary.

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Last edited by Kiwigeezer; 09-27-2017 at 12:36 AM.

[NZ_Ross]

It's a tempting proposition, but that apparent damage makes me a little wary.

That is a lot of camera for the money - but I know what you are saying about the damage. If you did buy it the damage will make it harder to resell down the road - for the same reasons you have hesitations now.

[zkarj]

What is the swap actually going to cost you if you brought this one, and sold your other one.....

Good question. But stuffed if I can find reliable data on value. The standard ED sells new locally for $1,100 or so (which is close to the cost of mine many years ago), but I can't find a local price for the WR new, nor a used price for the standard ED. Then again, there's both the WR ED and the PLM WR RE.

So I find it hard to gauge whether the $250 (reserve) is a steal or not. Certainly it is a quarter the price of it's lesser specced sibling new. I guess I may wander into Photo Warehouse in the next couple of days and ask them for list prices for all versions available.

If only we had a decent distributor.

[awa355]

Thanks for all the advice, much appreciated.

[Kiwi645hauler]

Good question. But stuffed if I can find reliable data on value. The standard ED sells new locally for $1,100 or so (which is close to the cost of mine many years ago), but I can't find a local price for the WR new, nor a used price for the standard ED. Then again, there's both the WR ED and the PLM WR RE.

So I find it hard to gauge whether the $250 (reserve) is a steal or not. Certainly it is a quarter the price of it's lesser specced sibling new. I guess I may wander into Photo Warehouse in the next couple of days and ask them for list prices for all versions available.

If only we had a decent distributor.

That certainly is not a bad price for one, Our current price on the HD-DA 55-300mm WR is $1049 and can be found here

---------- Post added 09-27-17 at 01:11 PM ----------

Thanks Mark, both your statements are very true.

This evening has been a lovely calm, fine, warm evening here in Timaru. Straight after work I took the FA*250-600 down to Caroline Bay and set up on the Board Walk viewing platform. In each case I have added a perspective image from the iPhone followed by the image from the FA*250-600.

All images were taken in Aperture Priority to allow the lens to autofocus ok. The amount of zoom available is staggering. I am also very happy with the image quality.

Image Set 1 - Hydro Grant Hotel - iconic, but derelict - due to be knocked down soon
Image Set 2 - Port of Timaru - port crane and North Mole fishing
Image Set 3 - Waves on Dashing Rocks - tongue of rock mid picture in the iPhone perspective image

---------- Post added 26-09-17 at 07:56 PM ----------

Public Service Advisory

Very nice looking HD 55-300 WR on TM - I have one of these so will not be bidding.

The advantage over the previous versions is the HD lens coating, and the WR, which is why I brought my copy. I have had my copy out photographing in the rain with no issues at all.

They are amazing pics, i do love the way it also compresses the DOF at 600mm, makes everything look so grouped together..
It sucks they are going to demo the Grand, i always loved its architecture

[NZ_Ross]

They are amazing pics, i do love the way it also compresses the DOF at 600mm, makes everything look so grouped together..

Thank you Hayden - I was reflecting with a photography mate last night how using the FA*250-600 makes the 55-300 seem like a toy by comparison. What the 55-300 has going for it is it's portability and zoom range.

It sucks they are going to demo the Grand, i always loved its architecture

It is a very nice building but unfortunately is now earthquake prone, derelict and a fire hazard - it is basically unsafe to enter. Time for it to go...

[GUB]

It is a very nice building but unfortunately is now earthquake prone, derelict and a fire hazard - it is basically unsafe to enter. Time for it to go...

Yep - we have some beautiful old buildings here in Wangas- but history or not they are death traps. The problem is the total lack of class in the replacement buildings here.

[richandfleur]

The problem is the total lack of class in the replacement buildings here.

Yep, I wonder if this period will be defining by the current architecture trends moving forwards, like Napier is as the Art Deco city for example.

It's interesting to see the increased focus on energy efficiency now, and how much it's influenced by building design. Not making all your walls glass is a good start.


We've had some heritage buildings earthquake strengthened and fully renovated at work. Some code failings are pretty easy to address, like actively tying key parts together, but the big one required gutting, building a steel frame skeleton inside the building, and tying the block work to that. It's really involved at that stage.

[Kiwi645hauler]

Yep - we have some beautiful old buildings here in Wangas- but history or not they are death traps. The problem is the total lack of class in the replacement buildings here.

I know here in Dunner's the council has been most supportive of companies and people rebuilding/repurposing the old buildings around the city. The DCC has a heritage building team that works with those who are restoring/repurposing our heritage building stocks can even apply for funding and rates relief to bring the old buildings up to new codes. Our old warehouse district has been a major benefactor in this as there have been about 12 buildings so far that have been restored for use.