[pcarfan]

Andras, that is sweet for 2500. I think the K-x will be nice even at 3200 for available light indoor portraits. At 3200, with my fast primes, the K-x should be amazing for family snapshots and outdoor night shots. For the first time ever, i am actually thinking of getting the K-x...........please soembody talk me out of this, as I love the K-7 and rather get another lens.

P.S: I think I'll wait and see whether Pentax infact releases the 30/1.4, then I can still shoot at iso 1600 anf get 1/60+ shutter at f1.4 indoors.

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Last edited by pcarfan; 12-17-2009 at 05:16 AM.

[planedriver]

Andras, that is sweet for 2500. I think the K-x will be nice even at 3200 for available light indoor portraits. At 3200, with my fast primes, the K-x should be amazing for family snapshots and outdoor night shots. For the first time ever, i am actually thinking of getting the K-x...........please soembody talk me out of this, as I love the K-7 and rather get another lens.

P.S: I think I'll wait and see whether Pentax infact releases the 30/1.4, then I can still shoot at iso 1600 anf get 1/60+ shutter at f1.4 indoors.

Well as I have posted this in another thread I'm very very happy with my k200D's results up to iso800 although AF performance is not up to the task all the time-now the with K-x I feel I have a good kit together (maybe later when the price of the K7 goes down hahaha...). Looking around the net before I pulled the trigger on the K-x it became clear that the low iso performance is nowhere near punchy and spectacular as my k200d's but looking at the price side I thought it will be a nice complement to my other camera and lenses I also thought about selling the kit lens (with another) so the investment can be reduced a little bit.

talk you out of this......well I think it doesn't matter which you buy first-a good high iso platform or a sharp fast glass-sooner or later we end up with the same result

there are some pictures I took with the K-x on the first page of this site:

Flickr: kererika's Photostream

and this was one of my first pictures taken with the K-x:

iso6400 DA16-45 26mm 1/20 f4 in-camera NR off



Andras

[pcarfan]

I can't live without the dual wheels, and I already think the K-7's buffer is too small, and yearn for the shutter to be even quieter. So, yeah the K-x wouldn't cut it for serious shooting for me. But, it would be awesome to take family snapshots and not having to PP, and after dark vacation shots (these I don't mind PP, so K-7 is fine).

At anything above 3200, I think even the Kx loses some character on the faces, like the K-7 does anything above 1600. So, evevnthough I may use iso 2500 in RAW for buldings and such, for face I will only go up to 1600 in my K-7 and it looks like the K-x may goi up to 3200. if so, that would be nice.

[Pentaxor]

I can't live without the dual wheels, and I already think the K-7's buffer is too small, and yearn for the shutter to be even quieter. So, yeah the K-x wouldn't cut it for serious shooting for me. But, it would be awesome to take family snapshots and not having to PP, and after dark vacation shots (these I don't mind PP, so K-7 is fine).

At anything above 3200, I think even the Kx loses some character on the faces, like the K-7 does anything above 1600. So, evevnthough I may use iso 2500 in RAW for buldings and such, for face I will only go up to 1600 in my K-7 and it looks like the K-x may goi up to 3200. if so, that would be nice.

don't you want to have another shot at ETTL?

btw, I don't mind getting an ultra-lowlight dslr myself which I would and could use at 12800 and over. but that's not the k-x. I would rather wait for a new body next year and that is 5-6 months away from now and that is pretty close since time passes quickly ( I can't even imagine that it is 5 1/2 months had past already since I had the K-7). I think we should just save our money for a 2nd body to use alongside the K-7. mind you that the k-x lowlight capability is very good but found the camera kinda limiting for me.

p.s., I highly prefer a full-frame camera as a second body btw !

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Last edited by Pentaxor; 12-17-2009 at 12:19 PM.

[Marc Sabatella]

I use firefox.

Me too. Try the Exif Viewer add-on (tools->add-ons, then use the "find add-ons" command). Lots of cool stuff available.

[Pentaxor]

Me too. Try the Exif Viewer add-on (tools->add-ons, then use the "find add-ons" command). Lots of cool stuff available.

I use one myself. although some photos don't have an exif data on them. bummer !

[planedriver]

K-x iso3200 FA50 1/50 f2.5



Andras

[pcarfan]

don't you want to have another shot at ETTL?

btw, I don't mind myself getting an ultra-lowlight dslr myself which I would use at 12800 and over. but not the k-x, I would wait for a new one nexty year and that is 5-6 months from now and that is pretty close and not to long. I think we should just save our money for a 2nd body to use alongside the K-7. the k-x lowlight capability is very good but found the camera kinda limiting for me.

p.s., I highly prefer a full-frame camera as a second body btw !

I tried ETTR (it is R as in right of the hisogram I think). But, I just don't like the way it renders faces. I couldn't get anything close to what you presented. The FA35 is sharp at f2 and and at iso 1600 I am mostly getting 1/60, so I am ok for now. I laso realized that quite a few of my lenses needed AF correction to perform at their max., and I cannot live without that.....I am going to try the F35 over the hoildays for some snapshots and see how that goes, may be even shoot at 2500 but ETTR and see whether that is better than 1600 with regular exposure.....

[pcarfan]

Pentaxor, tried the ETTR and did some careful NR and was able to get nice iso 3200 portraits with the K-7. I am going to pass on the k-x, as I think family snapshots at 5X7 prints can be easily done with K-7 at iso 3200.

[jheu02]

I haven't followed this thread completely, but here's my thoughts:

I think expectations have gotten a little out of hand anymore. Would you even have been able to get ANY shots that were acceptable (by today's whiny standard) 10-20 years ago with film? When did ISO3200 even become available, even with the grain issues it has?

Among my other hobbies is collecting FM tuners and listening to a lot of music (distant/low power FM stations). I wouldn't really call myself a DXer, but a statement I found while researching tuners and modifications I feel applies here. There's ceramic filters in these tuners of varying bandwidth to block out adjacent stations so you don't get 91.9 while trying to listen to 91.7 for instance. The narrower the filter, the more noisy it is in general. But the question posed is: would you rather be able to listen to a station with background noise than not even know the station is there because the local hiphop flamethrower is drowning it out with its high signal strength?

Or the photographic equivalent: would you rather get a photo that has some grain issues or NO PHOTO AT ALL?

I submit 3 photos for consideration as I was playing around with ISO 3200 just for fun as I wanted a stopped-down aperture for DOF. Sure, I could've gotten decent DOF w/ F8, but this was my experiment. All shots handheld, late afternoon, last one MF (and I missed it a bit). These are only resized for the web... No PP whatsoever, not even sharpened post resize.

Personally, I'd rather get some shot, grain and all, than get nothing, but YMMV.

K20D, Promaster 28-200mm @ 40mm, 1/400", F13, EV +0.7, ISO3200, AF.S


K20D, Promaster 28-200mm @ 200mm, 1/100", F13, EV +0.7, ISO3200, AF.S


K20D, Soligor 85-300mm @ 300mm, 1/250", F?, EV +0.7, ISO 3200, MF

[Pentaxor]

Pentaxor, tried the ETTR and did some careful NR and was able to get nice iso 3200 portraits with the K-7. I am going to pass on the k-x, as I think family snapshots at 5X7 prints can be easily done with K-7 at iso 3200.

that is just great pcarfan. a more sensible upgrade would be a full-frame with an ISO limit higher than 12,800. I'm really after the FOV and ultra-thin DOF of a full-frame right now. the higher dynamic range and higher ISO performance (not what I'm really after) are just an added bonus and the ISO can very useful on a very few of the more/most demanding lowlight shots. although if you are going to use the K-7, it is more than capable of shooting at ISO 3200 with very nice results.

p.s. what lens did you used btw? and how is your new FA35/2 doing?

[pcarfan]

that is just great pcarfan. a more sensible upgrade would be a full-frame with an ISO limit higher than 12,800. I'm really after the FOV and ultra-thin DOF of a full-frame right now. the higher dynamic range and higher ISO performance (not what I'm really after) are just an added bonus and the ISO can very useful on a very few of the more/most demanding lowlight shots. although if you are going to use the K-7, it is more than capable of shooting at ISO 3200 with very nice results.

p.s. what lens did you used btw? and how is your new FA35/2 doing?

It was the FA35. It is pretty sharp at f2.

P.S: Now, I tried the FA24/2 with ETTR and I am getting noise free jpeg images at iso1600, and thus I may not have the need for the 35. Oh1 well!, if I feel like it in a few months will put it for sale. 3200 is sort of unpredictable.

Also, FF is not really a choice for me, as the size is a factor for me, and I am not seeing the value at 2k over the K-7. $500 something is ok.

[UnknownVT]

I can use ISO3200 on the K-x with impunity....

EXIF data still attached -

[RobG]

The southern sky at ISO 1600, 131 second exposure. Pentax K200D, Pentax DA 16-45 at f4.

[Pentaxor]

K55/1.8 taken at ISO 3200. camera jpeg w/o NR at all.