Question on how to get photo as sharp as this with Pentax ?

RioRico · 03-21-2010, 06:35 PM

Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER!

Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are:

#1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing)
#2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult)
#3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now)
#4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job)
#5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens)

Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers).

Marc Sabatella · 03-21-2010, 08:25 PM

If you're looking at work on a computer screen, you're basically seeing a 2MP image. At that size, it's not about the camera - any camera with at leats 2MP could do as well. It's not really about the lenses either at that size; although presumably he is using good lenses. But your camera and lenses should be perfectly capable of rendering equally sharp pictures hen reduced to 2MP. Perhaps posting some example you are not happy with would help.

tokyoso · 03-22-2010, 02:29 AM

Originally posted by RioRico

Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER!

Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are:

#1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing)
#2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult)
#3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now)
#4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job)
#5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens)

Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers).

I believe somebody here had introduced/mentioned a #6 factor, Luck. :smile:

Wheatfield · 03-22-2010, 06:25 AM

Originally posted by shadowbecomeswhite

Ok ... from time to time I look at various people's photos. This guy's portfolio blows me away .... Fullframe v/Atle Goutbeek

I don't know what camera he uses - I guess a Canon 5D MkII or so. But his photos have this ultra sharp and *very clean* sort of feel to them - the perfect blend of lighting, color and clarity.

I am at the point where I am starting to wonder if my K10D is not good enough or I need to learn more techniques. In general, I am beginning to question Pentax versus Nikon and Canon. No offense!

Does clarity vary impeccably if I compare 10megapixel cameras from Pentax to 10mgp in Nikon or Canaon? Or special lenses are doing the magic ? I am sure lighting & post processing plays an important role as well; but I wonder if any Pentax user on this forum knows and produces images like the ones above with Pentax gear.

What kind of gear from Pentax for the outdoor portraits will help me get this amount of sharpness ?

thanks in advance,
sbw

His website really sucks, so I only looked at one picture.
It looks like he has really good technique, and is using a very fine balance of slightly high saturation and somewhat high sharpening to get what he is presenting.

RioRico · 03-22-2010, 10:17 AM

Originally posted by Wheatfield

His website really sucks, so I only looked at one picture.

I didn't even get that far. I hate these f**king Flash photo sites. I have a 7 mbps DSL line, and I still didn't get anything after 30 seconds of loading, so I just killed the window and got on with my life. I've spent too much time with dial-up connexions, to have any patience for slow-loading pages -- evidence that some wanking website developer has no real-world experience. And I also hate sites that assume you've got a 2000x1600 pixel screen. I use laptops, sometime 800x600 laptops, and when everything runs off the edge, I just back up and go elsewhere. F**k this sh!t. Life is too short to have to deal with incompetent twits.

[/rant]

Oh wait, we were talking about how to get sharp pictures. Use an 8x10" viewcam, f/64, slowest film possible. Better yet, a 12x20" cam. Make contact prints. Don't mess around with small fuzzy stuff. Sharp is as sharp does.

aleonx3 · 03-22-2010, 10:45 AM

Originally posted by RioRico

Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER!

Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are:

#1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing)
#2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult)
#3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now)
#4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job)
#5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens)

Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers).

RioRico, good points - I also like to add another point here which is to learn and train your eyes to differentiate "great" from "good" (and also from bad) photography. I have come across so many camera owners claiming that their camera produce "great" pictures; which often tells me how much they know about their cameras except for the bragging right (how expensive it is).

**Ash** · 03-24-2010, 02:23 AM

THere are numerous threads discussing whether or not camera matters - it's generally accepted that to get the results you want, you'll need a camera that can be set to capture the scene in front of you the way you want it to. So camera matters to that point, thereafter it matters little.

Looking at any dSLR made today, they're all just about capable of capturing anything with decent sensors that can reproduce images to excellent quality. So there's the caveat to the statement: the camera doesn't matter.

stevewig · 03-24-2010, 06:18 AM

Congratulations to all contributors on this topic - excellent advice for all would-be photographers, myself included. Grant me the wisdom to realize that 95% of everything is crap and to recognize the other 5%!

03-21-2010, 06:35 PM	#16
RioRico Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: Limbo, California Posts: 11,263	my new mantra again (and thanks to Tim R!) Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER! Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are: #1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing) #2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult) #3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now) #4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job) #5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens) Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers).

03-21-2010, 08:25 PM	#17
Marc Sabatella Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: Denver, CO Photos: Gallery Posts: 10,685	If you're looking at work on a computer screen, you're basically seeing a 2MP image. At that size, it's not about the camera - any camera with at leats 2MP could do as well. It's not really about the lenses either at that size; although presumably he is using good lenses. But your camera and lenses should be perfectly capable of rendering equally sharp pictures hen reduced to 2MP. Perhaps posting some example you are not happy with would help. Last edited by Marc Sabatella; 03-22-2010 at 10:21 AM.

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03-22-2010, 02:29 AM	#18
tokyoso Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: Tokyo Photos: Albums Posts: 723	Originally posted by RioRico Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER! Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are: #1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing) #2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult) #3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now) #4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job) #5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens) Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers). I believe somebody here had introduced/mentioned a #6 factor, Luck. :smile:

03-22-2010, 06:25 AM	#19
Wheatfield Moderator Join Date: Apr 2008 Location: The wheatfields of Canada Posts: 15,987	Originally posted by shadowbecomeswhite Ok ... from time to time I look at various people's photos. This guy's portfolio blows me away .... Fullframe v/Atle Goutbeek I don't know what camera he uses - I guess a Canon 5D MkII or so. But his photos have this ultra sharp and very clean sort of feel to them - the perfect blend of lighting, color and clarity. I am at the point where I am starting to wonder if my K10D is not good enough or I need to learn more techniques. In general, I am beginning to question Pentax versus Nikon and Canon. No offense! Does clarity vary impeccably if I compare 10megapixel cameras from Pentax to 10mgp in Nikon or Canaon? Or special lenses are doing the magic ? I am sure lighting & post processing plays an important role as well; but I wonder if any Pentax user on this forum knows and produces images like the ones above with Pentax gear. What kind of gear from Pentax for the outdoor portraits will help me get this amount of sharpness ? thanks in advance, sbw His website really sucks, so I only looked at one picture. It looks like he has really good technique, and is using a very fine balance of slightly high saturation and somewhat high sharpening to get what he is presenting.

03-22-2010, 10:17 AM	#20
RioRico Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: Limbo, California Posts: 11,263	Originally posted by Wheatfield His website really sucks, so I only looked at one picture. I didn't even get that far. I hate these f*king Flash photo sites. I have a 7 mbps DSL line, and I still* didn't get anything after 30 seconds of loading, so I just killed the window and got on with my life. I've spent too much time with dial-up connexions, to have any patience for slow-loading pages -- evidence that some wanking website developer has no real-world experience. And I also hate sites that assume you've got a 2000x1600 pixel screen. I use laptops, sometime 800x600 laptops, and when everything runs off the edge, I just back up and go elsewhere. F**k this sh!t. Life is too short to have to deal with incompetent twits. [/rant] Oh wait, we were talking about how to get sharp pictures. Use an 8x10" viewcam, f/64, slowest film possible. Better yet, a 12x20" cam. Make contact prints. Don't mess around with small fuzzy stuff. Sharp is as sharp does.

03-22-2010, 10:45 AM	#21
aleonx3 Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Brampton, Ontario Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 3,996	Originally posted by RioRico Let me (as if you have any choice) restate what in now a truism: THE CAMERA DOESN'T MATTER! Five factors contribute to photography. In declining order of importance, they are: #1- the PHOTOGRAPHER (ya gotta know what you're doing) #2- LIGHT (if it's bad, everything else becomes more difficult) #3- the SUBJECT (if ya got nothing good to shoot, quit now) #4- the LENS (it's gotta be just good enough to do the job) #5- the CAMERA (it's just a box upon which to hang a lens) Photographers with vision and skill can and do take memorable shots with gear that's utter crap. This takes experience. (Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from making bad judgments. Ay yi yi.) Sometimes the correct light isn't there, so you do what you can. Read how Harry Benson shot famous photos in low-to-terrible light. Sometimes the lens is all wrong; well, the best lens is the one you're using. And remember Sturgeon's Law: 95% of everything is crap (including photos from the best photographers). RioRico, good points - I also like to add another point here which is to learn and train your eyes to differentiate "great" from "good" (and also from bad) photography. I have come across so many camera owners claiming that their camera produce "great" pictures; which often tells me how much they know about their cameras except for the bragging right (how expensive it is).

03-24-2010, 02:23 AM	#22
Ash Loyal Site Supporter Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Toowoomba, Queensland Photos: Gallery \| Albums Posts: 23,920	THere are numerous threads discussing whether or not camera matters - it's generally accepted that to get the results you want, you'll need a camera that can be set to capture the scene in front of you the way you want it to. So camera matters to that point, thereafter it matters little. Looking at any dSLR made today, they're all just about capable of capturing anything with decent sensors that can reproduce images to excellent quality. So there's the caveat to the statement: the camera doesn't matter.

03-24-2010, 06:18 AM	#23
stevewig Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2010 Posts: 773	Congratulations to all contributors on this topic - excellent advice for all would-be photographers, myself included. Grant me the wisdom to realize that 95% of everything is crap and to recognize the other 5%!