[Hey Elwood]

Hi everyone,

Well, once again I'm seriously disappointed with my K20d. This past weekend I was out at a good-bye party for a friend of mine who is moving to Korea. Well, I brought my k20d along for the ride and sure enough there was another gentleman there shooting with a Nikon d80. He was shoting with a flash gun. I was completely amazed by the photos he was getting out of his camera versus my k20d. What was even more shocking was getting his shots with the KIT LENS. That floored me. I had to shoot with my DA 50-135 just to get anywhere close to his shots. I think I may have made a bad investment in the k20d.

Here's some examples.

Here are a few photos I got with my DA 50-135 (these have not been edited)







And here some of the pictures Adam got out of his Nikon d80 (straight out of the camera with the kit lens).

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Last edited by Hey Elwood; 06-09-2009 at 06:16 AM.

[séamuis]

and this is supposed to be all the cameras fault? we need more info. the grass isn't always greener on the other side. how long have you had your K20? what kind of background or experience do you have with photography? and I can assure you, resolution and sharpness wise. unless your 50-135 is defective ( I actually dare not say that as you will likely blame the lens next) your lens is far superior to his 'kit lens'. but if you don't get the exposure right, it wont matter how good of a camera or lens you have.....

sorry for being so cynical, but seriously your post just asks for it.

edit: those photos look no better than yours other than a proper exposure, and proper focus. are you seeing something im not?

This might hurt you felling but it's not meant to.

Stop blaming the camera.

Just a quick questions.
How do you think another make of camera is going to help you?

[eyou]

no reason a kit lens should out perform a da*. all your pictures look out of focus and over exposed (though the main subjects are nicely exposed the background completely blown out). what mode were you shooting in?

[Hey Elwood]

I was shooting on sensitivity mode and set the ISO to 200. I can pull the actual settings the k20d selected if you want. As far as the lens goes...that's not my point. The fact that I had to shoot with a DA 50-135 just to get anywhere close to his kit lens is crazy. I can only imagine what his camera would have been like with high quality glass attached to it.

Oh, and by the way...don't be a Jerk. I have a legitament concern and you insult me. I've been shooting long enough to know what I'm talking about. My point is that you have to go though so much trouble just to get the same types of shots from Nikon and I'm worried that I made a bad investment.

[mel]

if you weren't using a flash and he was there's the difference right there. you exposed for the darker subject causing the brighter background to be blown out. he brightened the subject with the flash allowing the brighter background to be properly exposed. Focusing issues are more often than not user error.

[Gooshin]

what i see

you, not knowing how to use flash

him, knowing how to use flash

an external flash gun and knowing how to use it = pro, kit lens or not.

[Hey Elwood]

I was shoting with a flashgun on SV mode with the ISO set to 200. I was using AF as well with continueous focusing.

Not to mention the fact that when I talked to him about his camera he showed me how his attached Nikon flashgun would extend to 85 mm on TTL mode. I know for a fact Pentax will only extend the flash gun out to 58 mm on TTL...trust me...I tested it on a 540. When I called Pentax for assistance on that issue a few months ago I was told no digital SLR would extend a flashgun out further then 58 mm.

I just proved that was not true.

[séamuis]

I was shooting on sensitivity mode and set the ISO to 200. I can pull the actual settings the k20d selected if you want. As far as the lens goes...that's not my point. The fact that I had to shoot with a DA 50-135 just to get anywhere close to his kit lens is crazy. I can only imagine what his camera would have been like with high quality glass attached to it.

Oh, and by the way...don't be a Jerk. I have a legitament concern and you insult me. I've been shooting long enough to know what I'm talking about. My point is that you have to go though so much trouble just to get the same types of shots from Nikon and I'm worried that I made a bad investment.

umm no. you dont. seriously, nobody is being a jerk. if you think that buy buying a d80 and kit lens that your photos will magically be better... they wont. and again, if you believe that you have to use a DA* to get better photos than his 'kit' lens then you are doing something wrong. I can get better photos, with my K110D and just about any lens you can think of attatched. his photos are slightly under exposed and very flat. reread what you have posted before you start calling people jerks. and if you believe haveing a high quality lens will do the trick magically as well... well maybe you can see whay we are being cynical.

all the info you can give would be appreciated in helping to figure out why your photos didnt come out 'nikon like'.

[deadwolfbones]

User error.

But yeah, the K20D (or K100D, or *istD) is perfectly capable of getting better shots than those Nikon ones, even with its own kit lens. It's just practice, practice, practice. The camera's not a magic box.

Personally I never use Sv mode. I would have chosen Shutter or manual myself. I wouldn't blame the camera in this case either.

[Gooshin]

I was shoting with a flashgun on SV mode with the ISO set to 200. I was using AF as well with continueous focusing.

your sync speed is limited at 180

you should have figured out what aperture you need so that at ISO 200 (why are you shooting 200?) you dont blow out the sky/highlighted background

then you adjust your flash to fill in the dark areas.

whatever you did, you blew everything out, and that is most definetly not the cameras fault.

[séamuis]

I was shoting with a flashgun on SV mode with the ISO set to 200. I was using AF as well with continueous focusing.

why 200 ISO with flash? was this an external flash or camera flash? what was the sensitivity set to? were you using the right AF point?

im no expert on the K20 nor AF lenses, but you need to provide more info.

[Hey Elwood]

your sync speed is limited at 180

you should have figured out what aperture you need so that at ISO 200 (why are you shooting 200?) you dont blow out the sky/highlighted background

then you adjust your flash to fill in the dark areas.

whatever you did, you blew everything out, and that is most definetly not the cameras fault.

oh...lets see...probably because I don't what to have grainy pictures. And what would you have done oh wise one.

I love it...insult me and then not give me any specific suggestions.

[bymy141]

Hi everyone,

Well, once again I'm seriously disappointed with my K20d. This past weekend I was out at a good-bye party for a friend of mine who is moving to Korea. Well, I brought my k20d along for the ride and sure enough there was another gentleman there shooting with a Nikon d80. He was shoting with a flash gun. I was completely amazed by the photos he was getting out of his camera versus my k20d. What was even more shocking was getting his shots with the KIT LENS. That floored me. I had to shoot with my DA 50-135 just to get anywhere close to his shots. I think I may have made a bad investment in the k20d.

Here's some examples.

Here are a few photos I got with my DA 50-135 (these have not been edited)

I’m sorry you feel like you do about your K20D / 50-135mm combo.
It is great stuff, but somewhat difficult to master.

Your photos are overexposed, what may well be intentional since some of them are shot against the light.
However, in a back-light situation proper exposure with a flash most often gives a better all over coverage of the picture.
Also, your photos look somewhat out of focus. They lack sharpness.

A few things to inspect:
- Are you sure your camera is not in spot metering mode?
- Your Ev compensation is set to 0
- Are you sure your camera was using the right autofocus point?
- Your 50-135mm lens is a VERY strong less, meaning all open it will have a very shallow depth of field. Much more shallow than a kit lens in auto flash mode (f 5.6?) Examine the exposure setting of the photos please (they are in the Exif data).
- Your camera can be front of back focusing. It happens sometimes, also with Nikon cameras. Which is problem you can correct manually with a K20D. You may want to test this.

I’d say there is probably nothing wrong with your camera and/or lens, however it would need some more inspection to be sure.
If your gear turns out to be ok, I’d advise you to do more than a little experimenting with the combination with various exposure settings to learn how to improve your pictures.

I hope this helps.

- Bert