Hi all. I've had my K7 less than a week, and everything seemed fine until this situation started:
In low light levels the camera starts acting exactly as if the lens cap is still on. (It's not!!
) That is, all the indicators are flashing in the viewfinder. This happens in every mode, it seems. (I'm haven't really checked with the green mode). For example, If I'm in Av, and almost wide open - "almost", because the kit lens, at 18mm is sticking at f4 when it should go to 3.5 -- at the highest ISO (1600 or 3200, either one, or at any ISO) the camera simply stops choosing shutter speeds. It might stop at 1/15 of a second, or 1/5, or 1'' -- there seems to be no rhyme or reason to it. If I then dial in a narrower aperture, then the slower shutter speeds will start being chosen, but of course the lights are still flashing because the camera still isn't finding the right exposure.
Similar things happen in the other modes. In TV, when I dial in a long exposure, the aperture is stuck at a high f-stop. In other modes, the ISO might get stuck at 100. On manual, again I can't get the camera to accept the settings I need. Just now, with ISO at 1600, manual mode only got what seems to be correct exposure with 1", f7.1! Anyway, the exposure compensation dial is centered, picture seems ok, but the lights still never stop flashing. Then a little later, it looked like the issue was gone, lights stopped flashing, in manual no over or under exp was indicated, but I ended up with a black picture.
if I point the camera toward better light, it'll stop flashing, and the exposure looks ok, but the settings will still be bizarre -- it might refuse to let me set a lower ISO, even though the camera has chosen very high shutter speeds, for example.
Now, for days I was happily shooting in very similar, or even dimmer, light without a problem. (though once on my first night using the camera this sort of thing did seem to happen, but I assumed it was just user error, due to me misunderstanding what the modes, and eventually the problem went away, until today.)
I tried resetting all custom functions, but that didn't help. If anyone is wondering, I haven't done the firmware update -- and I'd rather not, because even if the problem seemed to go away after the update, I wouldn't know for sure if the update fixed it. (Unless this is a known issue?) Also, I have about a week left to return the camera to Adorama, and I'm not sure whether I should be messing with firmware in the meantime (does anyone know what their policy is on that?)
It can't be an over-heating issue; it's been quite cool here.
Switching between matrix and center-weighted makes no difference.
Switching between shooting RAW and jpeg makes no difference.
Just now, I tried moving the switch from AF to MF and back, doesn't help.
It doesn't seem to be a lens issue; happens with three different lenses.
I'm absolutely in love with the camera, and if all this is caused by my missing something stupid and obvious, I will be more grateful than embarrassed if someone enlightens me. But it looks to me like I just got a lemon. Has anyone experienced something like this with the K7?
Thanks for any help you can give.
- Bruce