[Stavri]

I just see at a minimum the same detail and often, even at high-ish iso more detail with the K3 than with the K5.

iso 1600



iso 3200

Great samples Rondec, correct me if I'm wrong by K5 you mean K5iis, I know its marginal but the lack of AA makes in my eyes.

Wow, now let's not start the crazy talk, check out the 300mm plus club. I don't see too many people who feel they are starting a few seconds behind.

You seriously need to define who "everyone else " is, because there are a lot of "everyone else's" that don't even approach Pentax's AF.

Thank you Norm for the link, I am familiar with the 300mm club thread. The "few seconds behind" statement was suggesting that we are limited in good glass primarily on the telephoto range. Pentax has great modern glass which is reasonably priced up to 300mm. I agree with most people that K3 is a great APS-C camera at the top of its class. I'm not acting as a contrarian here, I'm very happy with my Pentax gear (i'm on my third body) and have accumulated some nice Pentax glass over the years. I had a Nikon D300 for a bit, with an old Sigma APO 400mm f5.6 Macro, i felt it displayed better overall AF performance, tracking and higher keeper rate then my K5iis with Sigma300mm f2.8. BTW the average price on a Sigma AF APO 400mm f5.6 for Nikon is $400 (even less for Canon), on Pentax last time I saw one sell for $900 on the forum (to date I never seen one on Ebay) I think we can all agree that we all feel the lack of good long telephoto lenses offered in Pentax mounts. The high prices long telephoto Pentax primes go nowadays ( FA 600 f4 sold for $5.500, which is reasonable in retrospect since a new Sigma 500mm f4.5 sells for $5000) and a F* 250-600 f5.6 sold for $5000 a few days ago. I'd like to see 10 year old glass, Pentax or otherwise be more affordable too keep this hobby going.

Right now the Pentax wildlife and birding community feels a bit exclusive, we need more options, and more affordable good quality glass in the 500-1500 price range to strengthen our ranks.

I had a conversation with a very nice retired gentleman from Texas whose first Pentax was a K-5 and Sigma 500mm f4.5 + 300mm f2.8. I was astounded by his initial investment on this system. He then sold his Sigma 300mm f2.8 to me, kept the 500mm f4.5, added an AW 1.4x TC,, upgraded to the K-3 and added a Canon 7D + long telephoto primes. I follow him on Flickr and he seems to use both Canon and Pentax in equal measure nowadays with great success.

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Last edited by Stavri; 08-21-2014 at 08:03 AM.

[rawr]

Are you judging at equal resolution, or same print size? If you want less noise in you K-3 images, just add more noise reduction. There's no reason for K-5 photos to look better.

I am not dissing the K-3. It works fine and the images process well at high ISO. I just judge the images from the camera(s) as I process them full size, then process them for web, and have people print them sometimes. It's a marginal issue, maybe the K-5 has 5% better SNR/DR/tonal range than the K-3 past ISO 3200. It is noticeable when shooting the same event - eg night bull-riding - one year with the k-5, and another year with the K-3. After pushing 1000+ high ISO DNG's through Lightroom per event, you notice some difference between cameras, and so you adjust your workflow and processing accordingly, that's all. Decent results can still emerge.

[stevebrot]

Yes, so it was kind of a disappointment for those of who shoot birds, because we bought it to crop

Things could be worse. You could be shooting a "clean" FF and cropping to smaller than APS-C to get the same composition.

I don't generally shoot wildlife or birds and did not realize how pervasive the extreme crop is for those subjects. I belong to a local facebook photo group that includes a number of very avid bird and wildlife shooters who frequent a local refuge. One posted an incredible photo of a dragonfly IN FLIGHT fully filling the frame and taken with a D600 and a 300mm lens. Yes, it was sharp, but nothing about the photo made sense until the photographer (an expert with birds in flight) shared his technique* and posted the original photo. The wingspan of the dragonfly occupied only about 10% of the frame width. That is what I call an extreme crop. The result is good enough for the Web, useless for printing, and a compelling testimony to the planning your shot.


Steve

* Dragonflies tend to hover, dart off, and return to almost the same spot. The trick is to preframe and prefocus that spot and (in his words) "wait for a blur in the viewfinder" and let the Nikon do its best to attain and track focus while shooting burst at the max 5.5 fps. He claims about 60% are reasonably sharp. Shots By Gary on smugmug

[tim60]

Like all things in photography - tradeoffs.


Low ISO, low noise, but potential for movement in long exposure when choosing to take photos in low light, even with wide apertures.
High ISO, more noise (depends on details how much) but demands longer exposures in dull light, possibility of slightly closed apertures.


Obviously the aesthetics of the pictures will be different.


Choose what suits the situation and the desired aesthetic of the result.


Nice to get the choice in a single body - unlike film days when you had to co the same to all the pictures on the roll.

[audiobomber]

maybe the K-5 has 5% better SNR/DR/tonal range than the K-3 past ISO 3200.

Yes, but only because of the K-5's non-optional noise reduction. If the K-3 file is noisy, increase the NR. The extra resolution in the file will make up for the loss of detail due to noise processing, and everything should equal out. As you said, you need to adjust your processing accordingly.