[Laurentiu Cristofor]

How does wanting more flexibility with your ISO setting turn into only shooting on automatic settings? And you don't need to throw in "just go buy a P&S" that's rude. And most beginners in shooting with a DSLR do use many of their automatic features. I am guessing if you polled most amateur DSLR user you would find they shoot in AV mode, I'm sure they tweek a few settings as well.

Who are you addressing anyway? When did the poster or anyone in this thread starting talking about the automatic settings?

You said the following regarding the choice of K-r over K-7:

When you were brand new to photography what did you need more. more flexible shooting parameters or more controls and setting to change, weather sealing etc.

I thought those "more flexible shooting parameters" that are available for K-r but not K-7 (since you implied a tradeoff) are the automatic shooting modes, hence my tirade about getting a P&S instead. If that's not what you meant, what did you mean? How does the K-r give you more flexible shooting parameters than the K-7?

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

IMHO higher iso capabilities is more beneficial for beginners in most circumstances.

Fair enough, but note that the OP has owned a film SLR before, so while he may be acquiring his first digital SLR, even the K-7 should provide him with better high ISO performance than he could get from film.

[pjthiel]

Sorry to not let this drop but I looked again at hcc's post and I can't figure what I must be missing in his post that implies he is comparing the K& to other brands of cameras rather than the ISO of the KR in question? What exact part of his post are you inferring this from?

My apologies ... I just re-read hcc's post and it was this remark that I mis-read:

Further the K-7 is good as any others at low ISOs.

My (tired) brain transposed low for high...

Sorry for the confusion.

[kheldour]

so, if I get that whole discussion right, the K7 is good until ISO1600 and just ok at 3200?

I have an offer to trade the K-r against a K-7. I'm definitely an advanced amateur and shoot a lot Manual (M42). Main photographic topics are people, landscape, architecture.

So far I haven't had the K-7 in my hands, but what I can see (and read) is, that the ergonomics is much better on the K-7. WR is a nice to have, but I could also wait for this specific feature until I can afford the K-5. Next investments will go into two more lenses and a good flash.

[Designosophy]

If you shoot a lot of manual lenses, then the K-7 has clear advantages over the K-r. The 100% coverage, pentaprism viewfinder is a huge improvement. I moved from the K-x to the K-7 primarily for this reason. I do miss the low-light capabilities of the K-x, though. If I could afford a K-5, I would get one, but I would not trade the K-7 to get a K-r. That's me, though.

[HEEGZ]

so, if I get that whole discussion right, the K7 is good until ISO1600 and just ok at 3200?

This has been my experience. Even in extremely dark situations using ambient light I was getting printable images easily at 800, 1100, and 1600. ISO 2200 was pretty good and I only about 1/3 of my 3200 images were worth processing. I was using in camera NR and I am currently experimenting with NR in Photoshop CS2 and ACR to see if I can get better performance at high ISO. So far it looks like I can actually use up to ISO 5000, but 6400 seems un-salvageable. Here are some intentionally high ISO images with the K7 using ambient light only and camera NR:

Incredible Pizza 2011 - a set on Flickr

The ergonomics of the K7/K5 are very nice, and I preferred it to all of the other brands and models that I tried at the store. The K7's only real weakness is it's high ISO performance. I don't own a K-x or K-r, but I'm pretty sure their images only require minimal NR at ISO 3200, where the K7 definitely requires time spent cleaning up the images. That said, I rarely shoot past 800 or 1600, but I am trying to push the envelope. I was originally discouraged about the K7 based on my initial attempts and confirmed by people's comments on the forums. However, with some effort I find that the K7 has more use at high ISO than what is generally ascribed to it here. I posted this image the other day because it is a good example of what I am referring to:

Pentax K7, 35mm f2.4, ISO 3200, in-camera NR, no post-processing, just resized

[1r0nh31d3]

Ha. I guess we are both misunderstanding each other. A consequence of communicating only in writing. What I meant by more flexibility in shooting parameters is that if you have a broader range in your usable iso you have more flexibility to shoot at either narrower apertures or faster shutter speeds. Basically if I have the option to shoot at 3200 I feel I have the flexibility to not shoot wide open or shoot with a wider variety of shutter speeds. Where if I am limited to shooting at a max of 800 ISO (I am not saying this is the case with the K7 just using 800 ISO to make my point) then I know I am either going to need to shoot at a wider aperture or slower shutter speed, or a mix of both. Therefore broad range of ISO opens up a wider range of shooting parameters and more flexibility. Am I off base in this evaluation?

You said the following regarding the choice of K-r over K-7:



I thought those "more flexible shooting parameters" that are available for K-r but not K-7 (since you implied a tradeoff) are the automatic shooting modes, hence my tirade about getting a P&S instead. If that's not what you meant, what did you mean? How does the K-r give you more flexible shooting parameters than the K-7?

[Macario]

This has been my experience. Even in extremely dark situations using ambient light I was getting printable images easily at 800, 1100, and 1600. ISO 2200 was pretty good and I only about 1/3 of my 3200 images were worth processing. I was using in camera NR and I am currently experimenting with NR in Photoshop CS2 and ACR to see if I can get better performance at high ISO. So far it looks like I can actually use up to ISO 5000, but 6400 seems un-salvageable. Here are some intentionally high ISO images with the K7 using ambient light only and camera NR:

Incredible Pizza 2011 - a set on Flickr

The ergonomics of the K7/K5 are very nice, and I preferred it to all of the other brands and models that I tried at the store. The K7's only real weakness is it's high ISO performance. I don't own a K-x or K-r, but I'm pretty sure their images only require minimal NR at ISO 3200, where the K7 definitely requires time spent cleaning up the images. That said, I rarely shoot past 800 or 1600, but I am trying to push the envelope. I was originally discouraged about the K7 based on my initial attempts and confirmed by people's comments on the forums. However, with some effort I find that the K7 has more use at high ISO than what is generally ascribed to it here. I posted this image the other day because it is a good example of what I am referring to:

Pentax K7, 35mm f2.4, ISO 3200, in-camera NR, no post-processing, just resized

I did look at your pics, and I do have to ask you, you did cheat didn't ya??? As clearly the K-7 can't take such pics without much noise visible. Or so they say. I think you just proofed, that you can easily take 3200 shots, it just also depends on what you will use it for, how big they will printed or shown on a screen.

[HEEGZ]

I did look at your pics, and I do have to ask you, you did cheat didn't ya??? As clearly the K-7 can't take such pics without much noise visible. Or so they say. I think you just proofed, that you can easily take 3200 shots, it just also depends on what you will use it for, how big they will printed or shown on a screen.

I am not sure what you mean by cheating. That is a ISO 3200 image taken off of my K-7 with no post processing. The image size is reduced from the original for uploading to the internet, and resized again from Flickr for forum posting. The only processing was done in-camera where it was converted to a JPEG and NR was applied. I'm pretty sure my in-camera NR settings during that shoot were the ones suggested by Adam in the High ISO thread. I have been shooting ISO comparison images and the 3200 images have noise, but are definitely usable. I don't think I would print any of the 3200 images I have larger than an 8x10.

That said, I have only a month ago just started shooting images at greater than 800 ISO and I have been increasingly impressed with the ISO performance up to 3200 with my K7. I believe with practice I will be able to shoot up to ISO 3200 regularly, but I am still in the process of figuring out how to do that. I think the K7 is capable of better high ISO performance than what most people assume, myself included. I am just relaying the information that I am learning by experience. I would not have attempted the pictures above with my kit lens, but with a fast prime they have turned out pretty good I think. There is another series of pictures in my link above titled "walter_k" where I have been experimenting with NR. I am currently reading a CS2 Camera RAW book about how to use the NR features, and I hope to eventually purchase a newer program that offers better NR.

For the sake of discussion, I have uploaded the original file as downloaded straight from my K7. I am impressed with the lack of noise at ISO 3200, as I have taken noisier images with my K7 at ISO 1100. I believe there is more to my K7 than meets the eye when it comes to making cleaner images at these high ISO settings. I will probably quit posting about this topic here after this comment and perhaps start a new thread specifically about this (or use an existing one). Anyways, if you have any further thoughts about this image Macario I'd love to read them.

All sizes | PK7_4255 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

[Macario]

Yes, you do see noise when looked at 100%, but I have to say it isn't that bad at all. When you resize it, you do not see the noise at all. And that is one of my points\. When, apart from screening your pics, you look at them at 100%. I don't, I like to look at the pictures. Not just a part of it, As 100% does not fit your screen, or even when printed, you can print it pretty big, as the bigger you print, the further away you will be when looking at it., and the less the noise will then show to your eyes.
In my opinion you are not suposed to look at pictures through loops, at 100% on screens to see if there is noise, if it super sharp etc. It all depends on how you will present the pictures.

btw, I do like the pic anyway, funky colors.

[HEEGZ]

Thanks Macario. I know that if I can perfect my skills at NR, perhaps with new software, then I should be able to routinely take ISO 3200 images with my K-7. Once I finish reading this book about using ACR and Photoshop CS2 for processing RAW data I plan to make a new thread to document my exercises. This will probably happen in May, though I am already spending a significant amount of time on this already.

I agree with all of your comments about 100% viewing. It is good for image manipulation, but only the largest size prints will ever see this sort of resolution. For most shooting and printing purposes I think the K-7 sensor does very well up to 1600 with minimal NR required. After that, 2200 and 3200 are very usable with post processing treatments.

Last night I was experimenting with NR in RAW (I always shoot JPEGs) by taking sequential shots from full range ISO 100-6400 at both 1/2 and 1/3 EV steps. The shots at 4000 and 5000 ISO were very comparable in noise to 3200 and the only ISO that I felt couldn't be fixed with NR software was ISO 6400. But for fun I converted the two extremes using very similar ACR settings. I combined them then reduced the image for uploading, but this is the full ISO 100-6400 range of my K-7 using a tripod:

All sizes | Pentax K-7 ISO 100-6400 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!



I suppose the top image is better than nothing, but there is a ton of detail lost. Incidentally, the ISO 5000 image colors were very close to the 100 image here, but for some reason the 6400 color was very off and could not be quickly color corrected in ACR. I am certain I could correct it in Photoshop quickly, but I didn't apply any PP after conversion to JPEG. I'm going to have to quit with this conversation for now and start a dedicated thread about this tomorrow perhaps. Too interesting to let it go now. Hopefully some of this discussion was helpful to the OP. Cheers.

[Designosophy]

Here's a photo I took yesterday at ISO3200 hand-held, with a cheap 70-300mm lens at 300mm. It's noisy, but not too noisy. I wasn't extremely aggressive in PP noise reduction. I overexposed a little bit and then brought it back down in PP to help preserve details in darker portions of the photo. It was also downsampled a bit, though it's still 8" x 10" at 240dpi.

All sizes | Acrophobia 3 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

[hcc]

Nice one! The K-7 can indeed produce some results in low light conditions.

[Laurentiu Cristofor]

Ha. I guess we are both misunderstanding each other. A consequence of communicating only in writing. What I meant by more flexibility in shooting parameters is that if you have a broader range in your usable iso you have more flexibility to shoot at either narrower apertures or faster shutter speeds. Basically if I have the option to shoot at 3200 I feel I have the flexibility to not shoot wide open or shoot with a wider variety of shutter speeds. Where if I am limited to shooting at a max of 800 ISO (I am not saying this is the case with the K7 just using 800 ISO to make my point) then I know I am either going to need to shoot at a wider aperture or slower shutter speed, or a mix of both. Therefore broad range of ISO opens up a wider range of shooting parameters and more flexibility. Am I off base in this evaluation?

Got your point now. And it's valid, but you're just giving it a greater weight than I do. Which is fine too, I'm just stating the facts.

I look at these things differently. When I use the K-x, I usually limit it at the same ISO as the K-7 when shooting indoors - ISO 800. It is superior to the K-7 at 1600, but I prefer the K-x at 800 to the K-x at 1600. So, just because the K-x is better than the K-7 at 1600 doesn't mean that I am eager to use it at 1600. So the ISO advantage in the end only comes into play in very few situations. Mostly, I decided to use the K-x with my mirror lenses, because there I need ISO 1600 easily.

Coming back to the recommendation of a camera for a beginner, I still think that a higher end body is more desirable, for the following reasons:

- it has better features (better SR, better viewfinder, better shutter, ...)
- it provides more feedback (LCD screen) and more controls, which can make it easier to form good habits of checking and adjusting features
- it will most likely last longer - the shutter is rated and tested for longer, for example

[1r0nh31d3]

I definitely agree with you. If you refuse to use the KR at higher ISo then the K7 is better.

Got your point now. And it's valid, but you're just giving it a greater weight than I do. Which is fine too, I'm just stating the facts.

I look at these things differently. When I use the K-x, I usually limit it at the same ISO as the K-7 when shooting indoors - ISO 800. It is superior to the K-7 at 1600, but I prefer the K-x at 800 to the K-x at 1600. So, just because the K-x is better than the K-7 at 1600 doesn't mean that I am eager to use it at 1600. So the ISO advantage in the end only comes into play in very few situations. Mostly, I decided to use the K-x with my mirror lenses, because there I need ISO 1600 easily.

Coming back to the recommendation of a camera for a beginner, I still think that a higher end body is more desirable, for the following reasons:

- it has better features (better SR, better viewfinder, better shutter, ...)
- it provides more feedback (LCD screen) and more controls, which can make it easier to form good habits of checking and adjusting features
- it will most likely last longer - the shutter is rated and tested for longer, for example