[Thrashercharged]

We've borrowed Granddad's K3 (because it has a better lense than what we have for wider angle shoots) and can't seem to figure out how to display and change the shutter speed? We're wondering if he set it to some customized setting or something like that. He doesn't recall and it's been too long since he's last used the camera. I've studied the user manual (found online) and watched YouTube videos and searched the internet (including this site) and haven't found an answer.

My screen display shows something in inches in the upper left corner and immediately beneath it is the F-stop. I think that upper left corner should be displaying the shutter speed? I believe my inches display I'm seeing might be the depth of field? It has a number like 4" (which seems narrow for depth of field come to think of it).

Here's what I observe when I set it to Manual or Shutter Priority setting (where one would need to set the shutter speed):
When I move the Rear E-dial, I see that the F-stop field gets highlighted and changes in reasonable increments as I rotate the Rear E-dial. I understand that, it's apparently supposed to change the F-stop.

When I move the Front E-dial, I see the upper left field with the inches display get highlighted and it changes as I rotate that Front E-dial with corresponding changes to the F-stop number too. This is where I'm confused. I would've expected that front E-dial in Manual and/or Shutter Priority mode to control the Shutter Speed?

So basically my questions are:
Where is the shutter speed displayed? If it should be in that upper left corner, then what does this inches display mean and how do I reconfigure it to display shutter speed?
How do I change/set the shutter speed?

I'll likely have more questions as I used the camera but that's the most basic ones for now! This is a much more complex and configurable camera (Pentax/Ricoh K3) than I'm accustomed to! Thanks for any answers!

[Adam]

When I move the Front E-dial, I see the upper left field with the inches display get highlighted and it changes as I rotate that Front E-dial with corresponding changes to the F-stop number too. This is where I'm confused. I would've expected that front E-dial in Manual and/or Shutter Priority mode to control the Shutter Speed?

This is the shutter speed- 4" is 4 seconds So, all you need to do is turn the front e-dial, whether in P mode, Tv, or M mode, and you'll be able to change the shutter speed to whatever you want.

[bertwert]

That 4" is the shutter speed, " stands for seconds in this case, not inches. DoF info isn't shown or calculated anywhere.

[AstroDave]

It has a number like 4"

The " symbol is used for seconds (of time; not depth of field) - what you are after

You can get a copy of the user manual from the web - do a search on "Pentax K-3 user manual" or similar. Page 36 thereof shows you a quick overview of how to change shutter & aperture settings for various modes.

[Paul the Sunman]

Unless they've been remapped, the front dial generally sets the shutter speed in most modes (P, Tv, TAv, M).

The front dial does nothing in Sv, Av, B, X modes.

[StiffLegged]

We've borrowed Granddad's K3 (because it has a better lense than what we have for wider angle shoots) and can't seem to figure out how to display and change the shutter speed? ...


... My screen display shows something in inches in the upper left corner

The guys have already explained what you're seeing, but thank you for a really funny first post. And welcome to the Pentax Forums, there are many here much dafter than that so stick around and enjoy!

[mikesbike]

The symbol you are used to indicating inches, is now used for shutter speed in whole seconds. But whole seconds are way too slow for hand held shooting or even if using a tripod would be too slow for any movement unless you want that movement to be blurred. This includes ordinary pictures of people, as it is impossible for a live person to be as still as a stone. For those shots, of people standing "still", a good rule of thumb would be at around 1/125 sec. To get any light reading of a scene by the camera, you have to have light coming through the lens, so be sure to take off the lens cap.

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Last edited by mikesbike; 11-28-2021 at 03:32 PM.

[ramseybuckeye]

My screen display shows something in inches in the upper left corner and immediately beneath it is the F-stop. I think that upper left corner should be displaying the shutter speed? I believe my inches display I'm seeing might be the depth of field? It has a number like 4" (which seems narrow for depth of field come to think of it).

Here's what I observe when I set it to Manual or Shutter Priority setting (where one would need to set the shutter speed):
When I move the Rear E-dial, I see that the F-stop field gets highlighted and changes in reasonable increments as I rotate the Rear E-dial. I understand that, it's apparently supposed to change the F-stop.

When I move the Front E-dial, I see the upper left field with the inches display get highlighted and it changes as I rotate that Front E-dial with corresponding changes to the F-stop number too. This is where I'm confused. I would've expected that front E-dial in Manual and/or Shutter Priority mode to control the Shutter Speed?

I'll likely have more questions as I used the camera but that's the most basic ones for now! This is a much more complex and configurable camera (Pentax/Ricoh K3) than I'm accustomed to! Thanks for any answers!

Welcome, you're on the right track, but any system you are not accustomed to can be a little strange at first. You've found the online manual, which is a searchable pdf file which can help a lot. Of course a lot of things can be accomplished in different ways, that's where the manual can help figure things out, and of course anything you ask here will bring out lots of responses. The K-3 is a very capable camera, and has a lot of capabilities that you will likely never use, but they are there is you need them.

[mikesbike]

(because it has a better lense than what we have for wider angle shoots)

Of course, with this camera lenses can be changed to whatever angle of view suits your needs. But since this lens does that for you, and this is the main reason for using this camera, perhaps the best way to get started is put your mode dial on "P" (Program) for the camera to automatically set both shutter speed and aperture, according to the camera's light meter's reading of the scene. If the scene is too dark, like night time or indoors, using flash might needed, as well as increasing the ISO to 400, 800 or 1600, which would increase the reach of the flash. But flash is still limited for distance. If it is daylight outdoors, but a dark, cloudy day, you might need to increase the ISO also to obtain enough shutter speed for your needs. When in bright daylight, ISO 100 or 200 is generally ideal.

When in "P" mode, Pentax has a very unique feature called the Hyper System. In this mode, if you want a different shutter speed than the camera selects, you can override it to select your choice simply by making your selection by using the front finger dial. Just be sure you have adequate ISO to accommodate the range of choices you need. Then the camera will adjust the aperture to compensate so you will get the same exposure for your picture. A touch of the green button restores fully automated operation. Choosing a different aperture works in the same manner, by using the rear thumb dial, with the camera altering the shutter speed to compensate. With this system you can go ahead shooting with the camera dealing with changes in lighting as you point it here or there, but you can make different choices of your own quickly without having to first change the mode dial to Av or Tv. ISO is the setting that increases or decreases the sensitivity to light by the camera's sensor which records the photo (like film). If setting ISO too high, quality of the results could be visibly diminished. With this camera, best to stay below ISO 3200 at the very most. Every time you double ISO, you can get double the shutter speed under the same lighting conditions.

[UncleVanya]

It’s likely your ISO was set too low or the aperture too high which resulted in an exposure that needed 4 seconds. The aperture for sharp photos with reasonably large depth of field is around f8. The smaller the number the shallower the depth of field. If the f stop was set to f22 and shutter was 4 seconds (as a hypothetical example) changing the aperture to f5.6 would gain 4 stops so shutter speed could be changed to 1/2 second without charging the amount of light reaching the sensor. Additionally, if the iso was set to 100 initially, changing to ISO 1600 would add another 4 stops making it possible to leave the aperture at f5.6 and raise the shutter speed to 1/30th of a second. These are hypothetical since I don’t know what mode you were in, what iso was set, and what aperture you were at when the shutter speed was 4”. The point is that starting setting may have been inappropriate for your conditions.

[photogem]

I would first recommend to to a Reset, because you can't find out settings your grandfather did.
Go into the menu were you find 4 Symbols: Camera // Video // Arrow right // Wrench
You want Wrench and then 3: Down to "Reset": Right and then unwards to Reset again: Click ok

Then go to the Camera-Symbol: ISO-AUTO-Settings: Should be 100 - 51200.
If not, with the 4-way controller: Right: 100 is marked, change it with up or down
Again right: Next number is marked, set it on 51200: Press o.k.
Press Menu: Go to Auto-ISO Parameters and set the to slow

Then you can also alter the High-ISO NR to custom, which changes noice-reduction.
I usually have:
100 + OFF
200 + OFF
400 + OFF
1600 + One Step
3200 + One Step
6400 + Two Steps
and all higher Three Steps

Camera-Symbol 3: Live View: Arrow right: Focus Peaking on PEAK ON
Focus Peaking is useful when using LView

If you know about "depth of field" then Tav Mode might be useful to handle.
If not, then P-Mode (Hyper-Program) because first it is AUTO but then you can override the AUTO-Settings right away:
Front Dial sets shutterspeed (Tv)
Back Dial sets aperture (Av)
Green button resets back to AUTO
ISO is set automatically/accordingly

Another option if you use lenses such as starting from the FA-Lenses, then you can set Program Line to MTF
Then the camera choses the ideal P-Settings for the given Pentax lens:
Camera-Symbol 2, Program Line: Right: Set it to MTF, OK

If you use older lenses, MTF just won't work. Then it stays P-Mode/Hyper-Program
which is a very intelligent mode quite unique to Pentax.

Those settings + the reset will help you to handle the K3 quite quick.
Learning is fun and a sign of interest and intelligence.

[Thrashercharged]

Thanks for all the responses and helpful info! So I was actually asking for my Daughter-in-Law (it's her Grandpa that loaned her the camera) - she's relatively new to photography from behind the lens, she typically takes portraits and using Photoshop/Lightroom to post process but her generation apparently doesn't do the forum thing to ask questions so I volunteered to.

For reference, my camera expertise is almost solely from a Pentax Spotmatic which for those of y'all that don't know, was a manual SLR (before Av/Tv existed) with TTL light metering so I understand F-stop, Shutter Speed, Depth of Field and manual focus fairly well because well, film was expensive and developing even more so! Waiting a week just to get blurry and badly exposed prints taught us to figure it out real quick! But shutter speed in those days only had a range of 1/1000 to 1 second max so when we flipped through those settings on the K3 and all I saw were numbers from single digits to 30" it totally confused me.

I never flipped it far enough to get into the fractions as I've never seen that large of a range for shutter speeds. I'm accustomed to only having 11 speeds to choose from so after flipping through several and only seeing whole numbers, I assumed whole number were all there were hence my interpretation of the " to mean inches! 30 seconds for shutter speed? That's insane! Why? What for? If we needed longer than a 1 second exposure we had these cable shutter releases that would screw onto the camera's shutter release button (that's why there was a tapped hole inside the button on SLRs) so we could hold it down without shaking the camera and then time the exposure using a stop watch. Yeah, real old school as my kids say.

Anyway, thanks again for the warm welcome and helpful advice. My DIL (Daughter in Law) read your comments and she's also embarrassed that she didn't realize the " meant seconds but as she's not experienced and mainly only taken portraits, she's never used Shutter Speeds slower than probably 1/60 I'd guess so she was shocked that speeds can be so long too and had no idea either what the single digits meant. I'm reading up on this camera to learn how to use it so I'll probably have lots more questions. These new DSLRs are so much more advanced than film cameras, especially this one!

[bertwert]

I'm reading up on this camera to learn how to use it so I'll probably have lots more questions. These new DSLRs are so much more advanced than film cameras, especially this one!

There's certainly lots of options around. It may be worth getting the Pentax K-3 ebook from the forum here and giving it a read to learn.

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/donations/?ebooks=1&loginrequired=1#sub18

I've personally never read one of the books, but have herd from members here that they are very good and thorough with explaining features of the came.

[StiffLegged]

Don’t worry about it, Thrashercharged (love the name, by the way) it’s perfectly understandable. I started out with a Pentax SV and was really pleased when I finally could afford a Spotmatic. There’s lots of us here whose experience goes back to these days and now shoot digital.

From a mariner’s perspective the “ and ‘ symbols should suggest 30” is 30 seconds and 5’ would be 5 minutes, except these are minutes and seconds of arc when measuring angles! If you were shooting the kind of seascapes that blur the waves to mush or mist, you’d be using exposure times of many seconds or even several minutes. That’s what the really dense neutral density filters let us do. Lots of us find the long exposure times handy for that and for astrophotography.

[35mmfilmfan]

I've had a K3 for over a year now, and I am still learning ! Definitely recommend the e-book (as well as the manual) - the difference is the manual tells you what you can do, the e-book tells you in what circumstances you would want to do it !

My first SLR was a Practika, back in 1969, so I too have had an interesting photographic journey. My grandfather said he had one of the first cameras ever made - after looking at it, I commented 'C'est magnifique, mais ca n'est pas Daguerre' - it was actually an old Kodak.