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02-25-2014, 04:06 PM   #16
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QuoteOriginally posted by pinholecam Quote
Yes, the EVF is the best one yet, or at least crosses that threshold as to be good enough in resolution and response to give a rather seamless experience.

Some caution over the euphoria though.

1. Menu and options are there, but when you start to use it, you (rather I) noticed that it does not 'flow' as well for photo taking as does a Pentax (or many of the cameras I've had in fact).
Silly things like double press for magnification; Limited EV+bracketing options; menu diving just to turn on remote control; button placements, etc
Nothing that deals a 'killing blow' but minor irritations that makes me think how a camera maker in the business for a good 10yrs (excluding Minolta years) can still not have a check list for these.

Now, here's a great one.
You can assign a button to 'Turn off LCD"
What it does, it turns it 'black' but its still 'ON'
2. Really poor JPGS (RAW is fine/great)
3. In very bright conditions, the LCD/EVF will still be a bit dim (but still ok imo)
4. In dark conditions like just before or at blue hour, if your lens is not a fast one (eg. f4; f5.6) it can be too dark to see/compose properly with it.
5. Sensor reflection issue - the main PITA as fas as I'm concerned.

6. Lenses are not worth it - Perhaps other than the FE55 (which to me is still overly big and expensive for a 55mm f1.8) ; the other 3 lenses rely on varying degrees of in-camera corrections. Not acceptable to me for the type of money they are sold for.
I can accept that a lens is cheaper and does this, or that its expensive and has most optical corrections in place relying on software to make it even better, but the FE35 and FE24-70 fall into the 'poorly corrected , relying on firmware correction and costly" category.
very good insights... thanks!
I will have to try the camera outdoor to see how it perform. But if on look directly into light source, OVF is difficult too. same with dark condition... I basically have to compose my night shots by trials.

I am just very surprise with the EVF on A7 as many have said EVF is useless, I am sure another generation the EVF will be great. Fuji X-T1 EVF received praises from many. It is the EVF that make me think A7/R is usable for DSLR shooter.

Lenses is definitely an issue with the SONY system... I certainly like Fujifilm offering in this area, they have fast, and reasonably priced primes, and I think, they are taking away what used to be Pentax's strength. too bad they are APSC, and I rather stay with PENTAX in the APSC format.

Another thing I don't like SONY is that.... they basically likes to screw their user... how committed they are to the mirrorless FF?

02-25-2014, 04:57 PM   #17
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QuoteOriginally posted by LFLee Quote
I will go back to the store to try A7R to get a feel of shutter, fps, and AF on that one, when they have one in stock. I left the store feeling the A7 completely change my view towards mirrorless camera and EVF. They are, in fact, very usable.
did you test the magnify function of the evf, for manual focusing? if you like to use manual focus, you'll never want to go back to an optical viewfinder again... it's just that good.

the other big thing is the ability to use just about any camera lens that's ever been made... there are some lens adapters for the pentax system, but it doesn't even come close to what you can do with the nex e-mount system.

using other lenses can be more difficult, but if you really want the shot, a good photographer can get it done... look at this a7r + tamron 150-600mm pic, the eyeball is sharp... 600mm at 1/250th, canon lens with vr turned on:

a7r + tamron 150-600mm: Sony Alpha/NEX E-mount Talk Forum: Digital Photography Review
02-25-2014, 10:20 PM   #18
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QuoteOriginally posted by LFLee Quote

I am just very surprise with the EVF on A7 as many have said EVF is useless, I am sure another generation the EVF will be great. Fuji X-T1 EVF received praises from many. It is the EVF that make me think A7/R is usable for DSLR shooter.

Lenses is definitely an issue with the SONY system... I certainly like Fujifilm offering in this area, they have fast, and reasonably priced primes, and I think, they are taking away what used to be Pentax's strength. too bad they are APSC, and I rather stay with PENTAX in the APSC format.

Another thing I don't like SONY is that.... they basically likes to screw their user... how committed they are to the mirrorless FF?
EVF have come a long way.
Before end of 2012-2013, they were laggy between what was shown on evf and the actual scene (taking moving stuff was such a pain then), lacked resolution to do MF w/o magnification.
The good EVF's coming out since 2013 are all pretty good for most things.

Yeah, Sony's has showed that its strength is not in lenses.
I do have a disdain for all these 'electronic' lenses though (most from MILC makers).
They run on electronics and software fixes.
So one fine day, say 10yrs down the road, if Sony or Fuji decides to move on to the next better mount or exits making cameras, it will be harder to get these lenses to work.
Not that the Fuji ones are no good.

I agree with the unpredictability of Sony's commitment.
They have moved from DSLRs to SLTs, then NEX, now As, trying to find whatever makes the money.
We know that the DSLRs are gone; SLT's are a dead end and dropped in favor of MILC.
We have A mount and E mounts.
Something will go, and it seems for Sony, going is the natural procession of things.
02-26-2014, 03:59 AM   #19
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I would just say that there is a learning curve involved going from a K5 to a K3. But it is a quick learn. Pentax just threw a lot more features into it and so there are more settings, but most are accessible with a button push and dial turn. I use a K5 II and K3 for my shooting now and they are close enough that I don't struggle going back and forth (not like when I had a K20 and K7).

02-26-2014, 04:05 AM   #20
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Well, that they drop SLT makes sense. They invented SLT to have live view with EVF all the time with proper AF. But since they now can put the AF sensors onto the sensor itself there is no need for a mirror anymore.
02-26-2014, 10:17 AM - 1 Like   #21
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QuoteOriginally posted by pinholecam Quote
Yeah, Sony's has showed that its strength is not in lenses.
I do have a disdain for all these 'electronic' lenses though (most from MILC makers).
They run on electronics and software fixes.
This is a hot topic for some. I prefer lenses that are optically corrected and yes, I know Hblad does electronic correction. If you go to photozone and look at the wide angle primes, the FF are about the best for distortion with no correction and as you get to smaller sensors, it gets worse, in general. One standout exception to this is the original 4/3 lenses from Olympus, they were optically good.

I've gotta believe at some level optical is better and electronic correction leads to other issues.

I also want manual focus that's direct drive and not focus by wire.

C'mon Pentax make a mirrorless with nice evf that uses K mount.
02-26-2014, 10:29 AM - 1 Like   #22
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@RyanW: I wouldn't want the K mount on a mirrorless. I want to be able to use _any_ lens I want to with an adapter. Pentax can offer a K mount adapter that supports all features, like AF etc., but the thing needs something that makes it compatible with all lenses, maybe even mFT (crop mode), C mount (crop mode), ...

Also I actually like lenses that are not optically correct. Give me a profile for Lightroom that corrects them perfectly. This allows smaller, lighter, cheaper lenses, that are every bit as good (in the end) as the corrected lens. I've seen what Canon superzoom cameras actually capture, and how the corrected version looks like. Corrected it looks good, uncorrected it's god awful. If they can correct with that much CA, distortion, vignetting etc., then anything goes.

02-26-2014, 12:10 PM   #23
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QuoteOriginally posted by kadajawi Quote
Corrected it looks good, uncorrected it's god awful. If they can correct with that much CA, distortion, vignetting etc., then anything goes.
Anything doesn't go. Can't dig up the thread with the Adobe engineers talking about it, but here is the issue. Noise tends to show in patterns when the corrections are applied.

Adobe Community: I am getting banding/moiring patterns when using the ACR profile for my Canon 18-135MM STM and 70D

Another link
http://starcircleacademy.com/2013/12/the-revenge-of-lens-correction/

A very good article in general on the topic
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/5653763779/a-distorted-view-in-camera-distortion-correction

as far as K mount for a Pentax mirrorless, personally that would be enough for me. I've never wanted to own a bunch of lenses from other makers and mount them all on the same imager. I understand those who might.

Last edited by RyanW; 02-26-2014 at 12:27 PM. Reason: added links
02-26-2014, 09:47 PM   #24
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True that... If it's gonna go mirrorless, it better go free mount, not K mount! Why? Because everything in K mount seems to make the price jack s**t...
I'm one of those who do use 3rd party glasses and i don't understand why in the world would a similar lens in Nikon mount costs 1/2 the price in K mount.. Whut? Magically better? Heh..

But nevertheless, Sony's good.. They're just an experimental company dealing with all new techs.

Sequence goes like this i see: Sony innovates or creates something -> Build a product around it -> Sell product to cover cost -> Sells or license said technology to other company -> Profits from patent or something along those line -> Rinse and repeat the cycle..

Ta-da!
02-26-2014, 10:09 PM   #25
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Sony also wants to have sales. They want to be big in the camera business, they are a rather consumer focused company.

As for the "uncorrected" lenses... The first thread was a Lightroom bug it seems, as the photos were fine with the same processing under Photoshop. Maybe they are slightly less sharp, but if that means weight and space savings I can gladly live with that.
02-26-2014, 11:18 PM   #26
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QuoteOriginally posted by kadajawi Quote
@RyanW: I wouldn't want the K mount on a mirrorless. I want to be able to use _any_ lens I want to with an adapter. Pentax can offer a K mount adapter that supports all features, like AF etc., but the thing needs something that makes it compatible with all lenses, maybe even mFT (crop mode), C mount (crop mode), ...

Also I actually like lenses that are not optically correct. Give me a profile for Lightroom that corrects them perfectly. This allows smaller, lighter, cheaper lenses, that are every bit as good (in the end) as the corrected lens. I've seen what Canon superzoom cameras actually capture, and how the corrected version looks like. Corrected it looks good, uncorrected it's god awful. If they can correct with that much CA, distortion, vignetting etc., then anything goes.
Lenses that are optically bad need too much software intervention.
The result are the corrected areas break up earlier than the other parts of the photo.

Take the FE35 for example.
-0.9ev vignettee at f8.
That's an almost 1 stop correction needed.
if shot was exposed to the left to save the highlights., in post the shadows will have to be pushed back up say 1 stop.
So corners are pushed 2ev and center 1ev.
Add in color adjustments, etc and the noise starts showing earlier on the corners.


So lens should be generally good to begin with and let software tweak it a little to be better.
Not totally bad and do everything in software.
Worse, charge a premium for it like what Sony has.
02-26-2014, 11:31 PM   #27
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QuoteOriginally posted by pinholecam Quote
Lenses that are optically bad need too much software intervention.
The result are the corrected areas break up earlier than the other parts of the photo.

Take the FE35 for example.
-0.9ev vignettee at f8.
That's an almost 1 stop correction needed.
if shot was exposed to the left to save the highlights., in post the shadows will have to be pushed back up say 1 stop.
So corners are pushed 2ev and center 1ev.
Add in color adjustments, etc and the noise starts showing earlier on the corners.


So lens should be generally good to begin with and let software tweak it a little to be better.
Not totally bad and do everything in software.
Worse, charge a premium for it like what Sony has.
If only the centre of some of my Pentax lenses would be as good as the corners of the FE 35!

It's so funny. In the DA-lenses-on-FF-threads even the heaviest vignetting gets talked down untill it's almost considered a blessing. Needless to say, that blessing only applies to Pentax lenses of course.

Personally, I don't care. Vignetting is fixed in less then 3 clicks of the mouse. Corner/border softness, that would have been a problem.

Last edited by Clavius; 02-27-2014 at 01:22 AM.
02-27-2014, 12:11 AM   #28
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QuoteOriginally posted by Clavius Quote
If only the centre of some of my Pentax primes would be as good as the corners of the FE 35!
So do you have examples to post taken with said lenses from your camera?

Last edited by pinholecam; 02-27-2014 at 01:51 AM.
02-27-2014, 04:15 AM   #29
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QuoteOriginally posted by kadajawi Quote
@RyanW: I wouldn't want the K mount on a mirrorless. I want to be able to use _any_ lens I want to with an adapter. Pentax can offer a K mount adapter that supports all features, like AF etc., but the thing needs something that makes it compatible with all lenses, maybe even mFT (crop mode), C mount (crop mode), ...

Also I actually like lenses that are not optically correct. Give me a profile for Lightroom that corrects them perfectly. This allows smaller, lighter, cheaper lenses, that are every bit as good (in the end) as the corrected lens. I've seen what Canon superzoom cameras actually capture, and how the corrected version looks like. Corrected it looks good, uncorrected it's god awful. If they can correct with that much CA, distortion, vignetting etc., then anything goes.
It doesn't really. When you correct wide angles, you lose some of your width and some of your resolution. Vignetting is fixable at lower isos, but as your iso goes up, it introduces noise. Whatever Clavius says, most DA limited lenses (on APS-C) do not require significant correction. On the other hand, a lens like the DA *16-50 does require a lot of correction at the wide end and while it is fixable, there is no free lunch there either. What's wrong with having lenses that are decent without computer intervention?
02-27-2014, 04:57 AM   #30
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QuoteOriginally posted by Rondec Quote
It doesn't really. When you correct wide angles, you lose some of your width and some of your resolution. Vignetting is fixable at lower isos, but as your iso goes up, it introduces noise. Whatever Clavius says, most DA limited lenses (on APS-C) do not require significant correction. On the other hand, a lens like the DA *16-50 does require a lot of correction at the wide end and while it is fixable, there is no free lunch there either. What's wrong with having lenses that are decent without computer intervention?
Typically I add vignetting anyway...

What's wrong with an optically perfect lens? Size, weight and price. If I can have 90% the quality at 1/2 the size and price, I'm happy. Especially when you'll only see the problems when pixel peeping.

The Friedman Archives Blog: The Most Distortion-Ridden Zeiss Lens Ever (and Why You Won’t Notice It)
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