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11-07-2012, 01:25 PM   #31
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QuoteOriginally posted by Navmaxlp Quote
Are you sure about this? I've read, if you are interested in video, the K-30 is better to get unless you need an external microphone input or an HDMI out port.
It is. The K30 can take modern h264 video, whereas for reasons known only to themselves Pentax lumbered the K5 and the newer (than the K30) K5 II/IIs with M-JPEG 'video' so we can all party like it's 1999.


Last edited by MrCynical; 11-07-2012 at 01:30 PM.
11-07-2012, 04:52 PM   #32
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QuoteOriginally posted by MrCynical Quote
It is. The K30 can take modern h264 video, whereas for reasons known only to themselves Pentax lumbered the K5 and the newer (than the K30) K5 II/IIs with M-JPEG 'video' so we can all party like it's 1999.
I do not claim to know much about compression schemes but isn't h264 more like shooting jpeg, compared to M-JPEG being more like shooting in RAW, as far as preserving detail or amount of original data?
11-07-2012, 11:44 PM   #33
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I did a job the other day and did this picture using HDR. I attached the two photos that I made the HDR photo. I was pretty happy with the results.

Racerdew

Last edited by Racerdew; 01-04-2015 at 07:55 PM.
11-07-2012, 11:59 PM   #34
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QuoteOriginally posted by Racerdew Quote
How do you do your bracketing? I do some HDR with the camea, but that is all. I would like to learn more about bracketing.
Thanks,
Racerdew
Set the camera to do an exposure row. It's where you can set the self timer for example. Keep the shutter pressed until it has taken all 3 photos. Later you load the photos into Photomatrix for example. Just don't overdo it, try to stay a bit subtle. You can also manually fuse the images in Photoshop, but that's going a bit far in this thread.

@Navmaxlp: In terms of compression efficiency the K-30 wins hands down. The K-5 basically only saves JPEGs, which means videos are huge. However the K-5 does use the mechanical SR system for video, the K-30 doesn't. Instead the K-30 picks the center part of the sensor and picks a different portion if you shake the camera. This means there is no noise from the SR system, BUT you get a video, that while steady just blurs once in a while, or even gets light streaks. Also the rolling shutter effect stays, so for example the top part of the image is steady, but the bottom wobbles left and right, up and down. It is better to deactivate SR, makes for a much more acceptable video. Also because of this system you lose a bit of wide angle, even when you have deactivated SR. On the other hand you have more control over the settings with a K-30 and can shoot slow motion (but the quality seems to suffer?). You also have AF while recording video, but to be honest when I tried (under not very hard conditions) the thing would often miss or pump around before finding focus, even when the correct focus point was nearby.
To me the K-30 is only on paper better than the K-5. Unfortunately.

MJPEG is great for editing. They are sticking with it because the CPU of the K-5 isn't fast enough. And not all h264 implementations are the same, there are huge differences. I could easily cut the K-30 files into half in terms of size without losing quality, just by using higher settings for my h264 encoder (you do only get maybe 5 fps on a i5 with 4.3 GHz though...).

I think the first photo is too strong, the others need a bit more light and contrast in the lower regions. Shall upload one or two pics later, if I don't forget it.

11-08-2012, 08:19 PM   #35
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Thanks Kadajawl,
I do know where the bracketing is on the camera and I a have played with it once. I think the cameras auto HDR works pretty well if you adjust your settings in your camera before using so you don't get over saturated situations. I lower the lighting and crank up the contrast first.
So what i have learned is that the bracketing is just a photoshop or Post processing system. I use Corel Paintshop pro X4 and I think the only thing it does is HDR. I haven't seen bracketing that wont use the dynamic lighting. I have played with photomatrix but I don't have a handle on it.

There is always so much to learn!!! I feel like I am just now getting a handle on realistic HDR.

I am not very interested in video with any camera. So that is not a factor at all for me in decideing which camera to buy. I think my mind is made up and I want the k-5 IIs. I think for my real estate photography it will be great and a nice step up from my k-r.

Thank you fo your impute and knowledge.
Racerdew
11-09-2012, 12:49 AM   #36
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You might want to buy Lightroom too. I'd rather get the K-30 and Lightroom, perhaps the most important tool in my workflow. Makes life so much easier, and helps with getting good photos. Big time saver.

Personally I never use JPG, especially for work. Being able to adjust the white balance later is very useful, for different purposes I need different colors for the same photo (stand alone is different from a set where everything has to match).

If it weren't for my istDS dying I would still be working with that old and outdated camera. To me the body is not so important, the camera is good enough to make the client happy
11-09-2012, 01:21 PM   #37
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QuoteOriginally posted by Ex Finn. Quote
I do not claim to know much about compression schemes but isn't h264 more like shooting jpeg, compared to M-JPEG being more like shooting in RAW, as far as preserving detail or amount of original data?
M-JPEG, as the name might suggest, basically just involves taking a JPEG image for every frame of the video. 25 two megapixel photos per second of video and you can see what the problem is. M-JPEG needs roughly 2-3x the storage spage of h264 video of equivalent quality, and was outdated five years ago.

11-09-2012, 02:45 PM   #38
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QuoteOriginally posted by MrCynical Quote
M-JPEG, as the name might suggest, basically just involves taking a JPEG image for every frame of the video. 25 two megapixel photos per second of video and you can see what the problem is. M-JPEG needs roughly 2-3x the storage spage of h264 video of equivalent quality, and was outdated five years ago.
Thanks for the reply.
So the only real advantage of H264 in the K-30 over the M-JPEG in K5 is the savings in storage space due to compression?.
I was always under the impression that uncompressed rendered better images v.s. compressed.

Cheers.

edit: kadajawi`s post from 01:59 yesterday clarifies it.

Last edited by Ex Finn.; 11-09-2012 at 02:59 PM.
11-26-2012, 01:44 AM   #39
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hello everyone,
I am happy to say, tonight at midnight, I ordered a k5 IIs from B&H for $1049!!!! I might have to wait a week or two before it ships, but I got it at a great price and I am happy with that decision. In the mean time I am going to shoot just in RAW with my k-r to see if I like the editing better in PP for my real estate photography. I have a job in the moring so I wll find out after the shoot.

Thanks to everyone for all of your imput in helping me make my decision betweent the k-30 and the k IIs. It was tough, especially seeing the price drop on the K-30 with the 50-300 mm lense. That lense is tough to walk away from. Also I almost said for get the body and buy the SMCP 50-135 mm lense for $750 instead of the normal price of $1600. that is a crazy good deal! I think I really need the body so I bought the k-5 IIs. I think it will make me better and help me get the right shots faster. Best camera made by Pentax outside of medium format right?

Thanks,
Racerdew
11-26-2012, 08:27 PM   #40
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@Racerdrew: I'm about to join you on the K-5 IIs. I've been teetering on the decision for a couple weeks, and now with the "Cyber Monday" deal, it's go-time!!! FWIW, I fully endorse kadajawi's recommendation (above) as far as Lightroom goes. It's an amazing piece of software, and I couldn't survive (as a photographer) without it.
11-26-2012, 10:12 PM   #41
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Hey Jasonwarth,
great for you getting the camera!!! The deal is too good to pass if you are considering a camera. I am using Corel Pro x4 to edit my photos. I know it really well and have it down pretty good. I downloaded lightroom and and did the free trial. I used it a little but just didn't get it and I didn't like it as much as the Corel. I know lightroom is just that , light but I can do more in paintshop prox 4. I think I would have to take a class in photoshop to fully understand the program.
Today I did shoot in just RAW and it was a little scary. All of my photos were very dark and did not look like the histograma and screen. I had to do a lot to them to brighten them up. I did notice a different effect to the pictures compared to JPEG. If I continue in RAW I have to learn the light again with the camera to make it work. My tripod and HDR saved me with these darker shots. Plus the pictures in RAW do not show as much color as the JPEG files.
I will give it more time but it feels like a step back.

Enjoy that new camera when you get it. Might take a couple of weeks.

Racerdew
11-26-2012, 11:50 PM   #42
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A short while ago I went for the K-5. Quite happy so far Congrats on your new cameras!

As for RAW... well, it is RAW. You'll have to nudge it into shape. The good thing is that you can.

Lightroom is not good for local adjustments (well, it's ok to a certain degree), you'll use it to adjust the exposure of photos, to change the saturation, denoise, get the right white balance. For those it is absolutely awesome, and once you have determined the white balance you can just sync the settings for many photos, rather than having to do it for each and every photo.

It's also great to organize your photos (I can come back with hundreds of photos from a shoot... being able to pick the right ones is important, and Lightroom makes it as easy as possible). Don't uninstall Paint Shop Pro (Corel bought them, right? Still remember using it back when Jasc was behind the product. Good software), because sometimes you'll still need it to put the final touches on the photos. Like remove an object, or add another, change the color of things...

Without Lightroom I couldn't work with RAW. And if I had to rely on Photoshop I would have to spend much, much more time per photo. So yes, while PSP and Photoshop can do so much more than Lightroom, Lightroom will get you where you want to go so much faster... it's like programming in Assembler instead of Java or C. You won't be able to do without the can do it all software, but you'll only have to use it for certain things, once in a while.
11-27-2012, 12:06 AM   #43
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I have been house hunting recently, and really, if you are shooting real estate pictures like these, your sale probably pretty good. They do add value to the house.
11-27-2012, 12:11 AM   #44
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QuoteOriginally posted by kadajawi Quote
As for RAW... well, it is RAW. You'll have to nudge it into shape. The good thing is that you can.
Hi Kadajawi,
Yes I used RAW but I had to make more adjustments than I normally do when I am using JPEG. Suprisingly even though they turned out very dark, the looked pretty good after much PP. What is the primary advantage of using RAW? Is there more of an advantage than being able to change settings like it was still in the camera? The best thing I can say is after I had my final picture converted to a jpeg and edited, there was not what I would call cheap looking light. Or that low quality glow. The thing that bothers me is that the pictures looked real good on my camera and the histogram showed well with the shots I wanted. But when I uploaded them they all were so very dark and underexposed.

All that being said, I would like to get a handle on it because the k-5IIs and the k-5 have 14 bit raw files.


Thanks,
Racerdew
11-27-2012, 07:16 PM   #45
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QuoteOriginally posted by Racerdew Quote
I can do more in paintshop prox 4. I think I would have to take a class in photoshop to fully understand the program.
Today I did shoot in just RAW and it was a little scary. All of my photos were very dark and did not look like the histograma and screen. I had to do a lot to them to brighten them up. I did notice a different effect to the pictures compared to JPEG. … Plus the pictures in RAW do not show as much color as the JPEG files. … I will give it more time but it feels like a step back.
@racerdew: In the hopes of steering you in a fruitful direction with regard to post-processing software and methods, I want to share my general perspective with you.

PaintShop Pro: I can't speak to it, since I've never used it;
Photoshop: I have 17 years experience in Photoshop, and I continue to use it extensively for my design work (and the occasional, specialized-edit to a photograph);
Lightroom: I have been using Lightroom since early 2008 (~ 5 years), when I got my first DSLR (Pentax K-20D). It's is a top-notch application. For processing photos—especially RAW photos—it is the undisputed king, in my opinion. I have a great appreciation for all that Photoshop can do, and almost two decades of experience with it—but it's almost irrelevant to me now because Lightroom is that good.

With regard to your RAW "issues" specifically (i.e., muted colors, less vibrancy, etc.): Generally speaking, that's actually a good thing. When you're shooting RAW—and using a powerful RAW editor like Lightroom—the "character" of your photos is more successfully derived from your desktop processing (vs. on-camera processing). It takes a while to get used to bland, drab photos coming out of your camera—but the payoff is significant, in that you are starting with source material that is more neutral, and thus, more flexible from a creativity standpoint. The apparent downside to this is that you have to invest a lot more time and effort "making" your photos into what you want them to be—rather than simply "taking" them with the camera. However—the beauty of an application like Lightroom is that it is designed specifically for batch processing large amounts of photos, quickly and non-destructively. This is the feature that really ties the room together, as they say :-) If you find yourself constantly wanting to bump up the exposure, the saturation and the contrast (for example)—just make a preset which does exactly that. Then, every time you import a batch of photos, you can apply that preset in one or two clicks, and voila. Once you build up a nice little library of presets, you can really motor through your images and perfect each one relatively quickly.

I hope that makes sense, and is helpful. Again—I don't know anything about PaintShop Pro, but I can wholeheartedly recommend using Lightroom (and shooting in RAW) as a fantastic solution to photography. The final piece of the puzzle is to get yourself some nice hardware (i.e., computer / display). I use a Mac Pro (2008) with lots of RAM (24GB) and a couple SSDs—and that makes everything much, much easier.
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