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Forum: Sold Items 05-26-2016, 09:01 PM  
For Sale - Sold: Early (optical best) Sigma 70-200mm F2.8 APO EX
Posted By frank
Replies: 5
Views: 1,388
I had the lens before, but can't remember how and where I sold it. It's been way too long. I do remember it's a great lens which took very sharp photos w/ smooth bokeh. This was one of the first pro level lens I had.
Forum: Sold Items 05-26-2016, 08:45 PM  
For Sale - Sold: Early (optical best) Sigma 70-200mm F2.8 APO EX
Posted By frank
Replies: 5
Views: 1,388
Really? I didn't know I sold this lens before :lol:

Anyway, what I meant was this in your post:
Forum: Sold Items 05-26-2016, 08:20 PM  
For Sale - Sold: SMC Pentax-FA* 85mm F1.4 [IF] Lens
Posted By frank
Replies: 5
Views: 1,739
PentaxForums.com Marketplace Listing

Item for Sale
SMC Pentax-FA* 85mm F1.4 [IF] Lens

Asking Price
1,000.00 USD

Item Location
Singapore (Singapore)

Item Description
Haven't sold anything here for a very long time. As a matter of fact, haven't posted on PentaxForums for very long. Well, since K1 is here, I guess I'm back too :p

Selling this fantastic lens due to lack of use. Need cash for a longer lens for my newly bought K1. The lens is in excellent condition w/ minor use marks as shown in photos. Other than a 1mm internal dust (as shown in last photo), optical condition is about perfect, and of course we all know such dust won't affect image quality at all. The lens works great in every aspect: focusing is fast and accurate, pictures taken are just as good as you can get from a camera like K1.

It comes w/ hood, front and rear caps, plus a high quality B+W MRC F-Pro filter which is in mint condition:










I purposely under exposed a bit on some of the photos so to show the scratches/marks more clearly. They'd look much nicer if I took photos like those you see on eBay.

Haven't seen this lens sold much here or on eBay, don't know how much I should ask for. But I guess $1000 including all fees (paypal fee and EMS shipping which is EXPENSIVE!) is fare. Please pm if interested.

Thanks and cheers!

Frank

Are you the original owner of the item being sold?
No

Are you selling or trading this item?
Selling

Item Condition (Key)
Used
Excellent

Shipping Destinations
Worldwide

Shipping Charge
Included

Shipping Services
EMS

Accepted Payment Types
PayPal

Return Policy & Additional Details
Return within 7 days if not as described.

Please send me a private message if interested in the item!
Forum: Sold Items 05-26-2016, 08:16 PM  
For Sale - Sold: Early (optical best) Sigma 70-200mm F2.8 APO EX
Posted By frank
Replies: 5
Views: 1,388
Didn't know this lens worth so much now ;)
Forum: Ricoh GR 05-26-2016, 08:08 PM  
Ricoh GR Hands-on and Lots of Photos...
Posted By frank
Replies: 855
Views: 224,278
Thanks :) It's been over three years, I almost forgot this thread. :p My kids have grown up a lot in the past three years.
Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion 05-26-2016, 08:05 PM  
Shoudl I buy a K 1, K 3ii, or invest in a lens
Posted By frank
Replies: 117
Views: 12,302
Just get the K1, it is the end game camera for me. I've used pretty much all Pentax cameras, so far this is the ONE.

The only thing might bother some users is that you might not be able to use some of those Sigma lenses (which are fantastic btw). Luckily I don't have any.
Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion 05-26-2016, 08:05 AM  
Back with K1, and Lots of Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 23
Views: 4,723
Haha, good guess. But he was shooting some street people w that setup, a GND filter might not work the best there :)
Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion 05-26-2016, 03:36 AM  
Back with K1, and Lots of Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 23
Views: 4,723
Thanks.



Thanks. I love to take people in a bit tight frames :D



That's the hood... I need to ask JK (the one who is holding the camera in the photo) if the tilt hood showed up in his photos :p



Hehe, actually some here in our group indeed are waiting for a silver limited edition :D



Actually I missed one or two, a few guys showed up late, missed our chitchat fun moment :lol:

Sorry I don't know about the cosmetic contact lenses thing. Didn't even notice until you said so :D



Yes, our Pentax group have been pretty active over the past 7-8 years, even though Pentax went up and down, sold a couple of times. But now our group became much smaller already. We used to have outings w/ more than 30 people show up, now only in low 10s... :(



Hi Ash, nice to see you here again :) Every time I passed by the bridges near MBS where we shot the night scene, I always thought about you :) Hope you'd be able to visit us again, even don't see us, at least see our beautiful city.




Thanks. Glad you like these. K1 is indeed a great camera, to me it's the end game camera. It's gonna stay with me until ... well, probably a silver version comes out :lol:




Singapore is a small country, I think the K1 you saw here are probably 25% of the total sold here so far ;)



Thanks :)



Thanks :) Glad to be back. Hope I can post more often.



Never thought about this...
Forum: Pentax DSLR Discussion 05-24-2016, 07:55 PM  
Back with K1, and Lots of Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 23
Views: 4,723
It's been a long time since my last post on this forum. I've been quite busy with my work and kids in the past a few years, and there was one time I even sold off all my Pentax gear and only used mirrorless cameras for a while. But I guess the saying is true: once a Pentaxian, always a Pentaxian :) Got back a K3 and a set of silver FA Limited lenses soon after, but seldom used them other than during our monthly outings.

Now I'm back with the long overdue FF camera - K1, which I bought nearly a month ago. But only got chance to use it the first time last Saturday, that's 4 days ago. I didn't even touch it once after I bought it and took the following photos to show off a bit:

















Last Saturday I brought the K1 for a spin during our monthly Pentax outing (which has been going on since 2008!). Glad to meet up with old buddies and new friends as usual. And a lot K1s too (taken by my HTC phone):



And think there were a couple of more K1s on the day, but they missed our chitchat session before we headed out for some street photos.

After setup the camera the way I wanted, well, mostly just the front and rear dials the same I set on all my previous Pentax dSLR cameras, I couldn't help but took a few of our Pentax buddies (thanks guys for posting for me :)) at the coffee shop:













Last Saturday happened to be the Vesak Day, a day the Buddhists celebrate the Buddha’s birthday. There is no better place to take some candid photos other than Buddha Tooth Relic Temple in Chinatown, one of my favorite spots to take candid photos. Thanks to K1, my FA77 really came back to life:







































Sorry about these pretty much same style photos. I just couldn't help but share them to you guys. The light condition inside the Temple is quite complicated, or I can say it's quite difficult. Thanks to K1, these photos came out pretty nice, better than I used to have with my previous cameras.



After snapping around the Temple, we did some street photos as usual. And Chinatown happens to be one of the better places for street photos too. I just love to take photos of street people, and I hope they don't mind me sharing these:


















Chinatown is a tourist spot here in Singapore, there were a lot tourists on the day, and we all know nowadays most people take photos like these nowadays:











I'm sure some of their phone camera results would be better than these:






Of course us "Pros" should take photo like these :D












That's all for my come-back sharing. Hope you enjoy these photos. If not, well, I'll try to post more, and hopefully better ones in the future :)

Cheers and happy shooting!
Forum: Sold Items 03-31-2015, 03:53 PM  
For Sale - Sold: InfraRed (IR) Converted *istDL2 - Great for Taking IR Photos w/o Using a Tripod
Posted By frank
Replies: 6
Views: 1,795
Hi Sean,

Those are beautiful! Wish I could have something scenes like those to shoot at.

Yes, the filter I passed to you were from my buddy friend too. I think quite a few guys here bought converted cameras from here as well.

Hope I'd post here more often in the future.

Cheers!

Frank
Forum: Sold Items 03-31-2015, 03:19 PM  
For Sale - Sold: InfraRed (IR) Converted *istDL2 - Great for Taking IR Photos w/o Using a Tripod
Posted By frank
Replies: 6
Views: 1,795
Thanks for interested in the camera. Currently it's pending for payment. Will update here again when it's done. :)

---
It's been sold now. Thanks again for all the interests.
Forum: Sold Items 03-31-2015, 08:00 AM  
For Sale - Sold: InfraRed (IR) Converted *istDL2 - Great for Taking IR Photos w/o Using a Tripod
Posted By frank
Replies: 6
Views: 1,795
PentaxForums.com Marketplace Listing

Item for Sale
InfraRed (IR) Converted *istDL2 - Great for Taking IR Photos w/o Using a Tripod

Asking Price
125.00 USD with Registered Airmail shipping included to anywhere around the world, that's a lot cheaper than the conversion fee alone...

Item Location
Singapore (Singapore)

Item Description
Haven't taken photos much in the past a couple of years, not to say IR photos. Kinda waste keeping this little fun camera around. I guess it's better to let someone else continue taking some fun photos with this.

The camera was converted a few years ago by my buddy friend, lianglunche, an experienced technician who has done hundreds of IR camera conversion in most camera mounts (Pentax, Canon, Nikon, Mirrorless ...). Basically the camera can only take IR photos now, but since it's converted near the sensor, you don't need to use an IR filter to do so, nor a tripod (which is a must if you use a non-converted camera with an IR filter to take IR photos).

It's still working great in all functions other than the shutter button which is a bit stiff. You need to press it a bit harder to take photos. Just give it a try when you get the camera and get some feeling about the stiffness of the shutter button, then you are ready to go.

Here are a few photos of the actual camera selling, just the camera body w/ a 2GB SD card (the camera supports up to 4GB card I think) and a Nikon viewfinder enlarger (which some considered as better than the Pentax one), no AA batteries or other accessories will be included in the package:










Hadn't been used for a long while until Feb this year when I gave it a last spin before deciding to let it go. Here are a few photos I took with the camera a couple of months ago:

















Are you the original owner of the item being sold?
Yes

Are you selling or trading this item?
Selling

Item Condition (Key)
Used
Good

Shipping Destinations
Worldwide

Shipping Charge
Included

Shipping Services
Registered Airmail

Accepted Payment Types
PayPal

Return Policy & Additional Details
Return if not as described, but return shipping cost is on the buyer.

Please send me a private message if interested in the item!

---------- Post added 03-31-15 at 11:04 PM ----------

The best part about an IR converted camera is to be able to take moving subject in IR which isn't possible at all when using a non-converted camera with an IR filter in front of the lens, like these:









Forum: Sold Items 10-10-2014, 04:06 PM  
Wanted - Acquired: Pentax FA 20-35/4 Lens
Posted By frank
Replies: 4
Views: 844
Thanks. Really nice photos you got there :)

Currently there is one selling at the b&s forum, but the price is abit on the high side, and I don't live in Europe where the seller only sends to.

Anyway, I'm not in a rush, just keep on looking for one.

Thanks again and Cheers!
Forum: Sold Items 10-10-2014, 05:18 AM  
Wanted - Acquired: Pentax FA 20-35/4 Lens
Posted By frank
Replies: 4
Views: 844
Thanks John, But I prefer the smaller Pentax one :)
Forum: Sold Items 10-09-2014, 06:36 PM  
Wanted - Acquired: Pentax FA 20-35/4 Lens
Posted By frank
Replies: 4
Views: 844
Hi All,

I'm looking for an FA 20-35/4 lens. If you got one to let go, please let me know. You know it's not much useful on APSC camera, probably you don't want to keep it anyway :lol:

Hope the lens comes w/ hood and caps.

Cheers and happy hunting.

Frank
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors 04-24-2014, 07:05 PM  
Mourning the Loss of Bruce "Bramela" Stephenson
Posted By frank
Replies: 140
Views: 24,237
Haven't posted anything for quite sometime, sorry to hear this sad news. My condolences to Bruce's family and friends.
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors 11-28-2013, 05:33 AM  
The DA limited is 20-40? and WR?!
Posted By frank
Replies: 1,331
Views: 194,398
Sorry for late reply. A bit too busy and lazy lately.

Here are the aperture values at different focal length:
20-23mm: F2.8
24-33mm: F3.5
34-40mm: F4.0
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors 11-26-2013, 03:47 PM  
The DA limited is 20-40? and WR?!
Posted By frank
Replies: 1,331
Views: 194,398
Got one w me right now, the initial feeling is that it's a very well made lens with great feeling in hands or mounted on camera. IQ is pretty good with great sharpness and bokeh, CA (or is it called purple fringe) is very well controlled, one of the best in this regard among all Pentax lenses I've ever used, far better than the FA31 at least (I'm talking about CA here). The AF can be faster though, maybe it's due to the WR sealing or indoor light condition last night when I tried.

Will take some actual photos over the weekend, if I'm not too tired after the full Marathon run.
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 11-21-2013, 06:30 PM  
Experiences with the new K-3 Camera (Lots of Photos)
Posted By frank
Replies: 13
Views: 4,092
Thanks for the link. I didn't shoot much video w/ dSLR cameras, got dedicated videocam for that. It's good to know anyway.
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 11-19-2013, 06:25 PM  
Experiences with the new K-3 Camera (Lots of Photos)
Posted By frank
Replies: 13
Views: 4,092
That's true. My wife loves her Note II far better than my X100 or dSLR cameras :p




Thanks. Can't imagine I'd ever use a camera like K20D after I've had a camera like K3. They are just not in the same league, and like generation apart to me. You'd be amazed how much better the new camera is over the earlier ones, K5II and K30 included.




I know exactly what you meant. I did the same previously, but felt a bit overdone. So I'm w/ my current method, faster on/off and secure enough :)




Thanks. Guess I'm luckier that I don't have any mortgage or loan to pay off, and my car still runs fine (it's too expensive to change cars here in Singapore right now :(). But compare to those, a camera cost far less, and would give me a lot more fun (especially than a new car, which does nothing better than an old one but cost a lot more).



I've had the K30 too, and the K5IIs as well. Both are excellent cameras. But K3 gives a lot more than the price difference imo. I understand we don't need a camera like K3 to make good photos, K30 is more than capable. But if it can make me sleep better and get the job done easier, I'd go for the better tool.



What jello effect? And sorry I don't have a K01 anymore...
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 11-19-2013, 07:04 AM  
Experiences with the new K-3 Camera (Lots of Photos)
Posted By frank
Replies: 13
Views: 4,092
Thanks. Better just get the K3 so you won't be on the fence for so long ;) As to the K5, you can keep as second camera or sell it to recover some cost, or just pass to your relative to make another Pentaxian :p
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 11-19-2013, 06:54 AM  
Experiences with the new K-3 Camera (Lots of Photos)
Posted By frank
Replies: 13
Views: 4,092
It's been a couple of weeks since the K3 officially became available. There are a lot reviews already, and some of them are very detailed, all of them praised K3 and considered it as the best APSC camera available right now:

Pentax K-3 Review - Introduction - PentaxForums.com
Pentax K-3 Digital SLR Review
Essentials: The Street Fashion Blogger - The Phoblographer

I'm sorry my promised review has been delayed until now. No excuse, just too lazy I guess...

Anyway, I've had the new K3 for about a week and two weekends. Before that I played the pre-production set for a few days. I won't repeat what the above reviewers already said (and please do take a look at those reviews if you want to know more about this excellent camera). I just wanna emphasise on a few improvements K3 has over the previous cameras, especially the K5II/s and K30.

SOLID Build
My initial feeling is that the camera is SOLID! Yes, it feels even more solid than the K5/II/s. The grip is slightly deeper, which improves the holding and feeling in hands. I guess we all know that WR is a big selling point for Pentax dSLR cameras, especially here in South East Asia countries.

FAST in operation and focusing
I've mentioned it before (during my hands-on review), and I'd confirm again that this is the fastest Pentax camera I've ever played, and I've had pretty much all Pentax SLR/DSLR cameras (minus medium or large fram cameras). Everything seems to be faster: changing settings, auto focusing and taking photos, card access... It's just a turbo boosted K5IIs. The live-view focusing is the fastest I've ever tried on any dSLR camera, it's probaby faster than many mirrorless cameras too in this regard.

K3 also features a super fast continuous shooting speed at 8.3FPS. I'd never use my camera like a machine gun, but I'm sure many out there love doing so. It's good to see that we finally have a camera which is faster than most other dSLR cameras from Canon/Nikon when we want to take multi-frame action photos.

Accurate Metering, AWB and auto focusing
This might have been mentioned elsewhere, but probably not emphasised. Thanks to its 86K pixel RGB light-metering sensor and improved algorithms in exposure, multi-pattern white balance and SAFOX11 autofocus module, K3 is the most accurate camera in exposure, WB and AF that I've ever used. I mentioned that the camera is really fast, now best of all, it's not just fast, the focusing is very accurate too. So far all my lenses are all spot on, be it indoor under dim light or under bright sun. Plus spot on metering and white balance, I'm sure everyone would benefit from all these enhancement.

Anti-Aliasing filter simulator
K3 features a newly developed anti-aliasing simulator which helps eliminating the need to commit to either supreme resolution or superior moiré control. This is probably the 1st camera which features a selectable anti-aliasing filter, giving the user the ability to easily toggle anti-aliasing functionality on or off. If you read in the above reviews, you'd see that K3's anti-aliasing simulator applies microscopic vibrations to the image sensor unit at the subpixel level during image exposure, generating the same level of moiré-reduction effect as an optical anti-aliasing filter. Note: This function is most effective with a shutter speed of 1/1000 second or slower. This function is not available during HDR shooting.

I've yet got chance to try this feature myself, here are some samples I copied from Pentax brochure:
The actual scene:

And different AA filter simulation effect:


I'm sure this would come in handy when needed.

Dual SD card slots with optional FLU, Eye-fi wireless and SDX Memory card compatibility
I've wanted this feature for years. Thank you Pentax for giving us this. Now we can put two SD cards in at the same time, and they can be customized to different purpose:
one card for still image and the other for video
one card for main storage and the other as backup
one FLU/Eye-fi wireless card in one slot while a normal SD card in the other
...
I haven't got a wifi capable SD card yet (which I'm sure I will in the near future), right now I put in two cards, one for video and one for still photos, works perfectly.

USB3.0 connection
I guess most of us are still using USB2.0 or even USB1.0 card readers when dumping photos from the camera to computers, which is still much faster than copying photos directly from the previous cameras to computers through USB connection. With K3, I bet you'd love to copy photos to computers through the built-in USB3.0 port, which is really fast.

Now Pentax please give us the tethering, so we can use this USB3.0 capability in full.

professional H.264 video
Since K-01 Pentax cameras have improved a lot in video recording, but only until K3 that Pentax really take video recording very seriously: dedicated video record button, full HD movie capture in the H.264 format (60i/50i/30p/24p), the ability to switch from still image to video recording with the flip of a dedicated switch. The user can also adjust the audio recording level manually and monitor sound levels during recording. Other than the microphone terminal for external microphone connection, there is even a headphone jack on the front shoulder of the camera.

I was pretty surprised when I saw the headphone jack, couldn't help but plug in my favorite IEMs (an AKG K3003i), here we have a best DAP combo:





Don't know if Pentax would make MP3 player feature available on this cool camera :D

Common Pentax senses
Other than those I mentioned above, we Pentaxians have been really enjoying these common features in most Pentax dSLR cameras: in-body shake reduction, WR sealed body, Pentaprism optical viewfinder with 100% coverage (and K3 even features 95% magnification), Magnesium alloy body w/ stainless steel chassis, excellent ergonomics, built-in electronic level,


There are way too many new features in this new camera, I can't describe them all here. Better read the more detailed info from the review links I post in the beginning, so you'd know more about the camera.

Here come to the best part of my review, actual photos. But as usual, before I post the sample photos, I'd love to show off the new camera first:









What a beauty! Pity this isn't mine. It's from a good friend (another long time diehard Pentax fan).

I've bought limited edition silver K5 before, loved it. But this round I decided to go w/ the black one:





The lens mounted on the second photo is the newly release DA 55-300 HD WR lens. We all know what WR stands for, HD is a new improved coating over previous SMC coatings. This is another beautiful lens which everyone should consider to get one:



As mentioned earlier, I only had the new camera for a week plus, and before that I tried a preproduction set for a couple of days. So far I've really enjoyed using the camera, and it's definitely the best camera I've ever had.

I don't want to show you photos of boring charts this time, or comparison photos between the new K3 and earlier K5IIs or K30. I'll just post some actual photos I've taken during a couple of school events my kids participated, and some street photos as usual. Hope you enjoy viewing them. Oh btw, all photos were taken in JPG with minimum post processing (some photos I've posted already during my hands-on review, but the links were gone. Here I'm posting them again together with some new photos I took).

The following photos were taken with the preproduction K3:







































The follwoing were taken with the new K3:





































I have some other photos which I haven't got chance to look at them yet. Will do so when time comes.


From what I've experienced so far, I'd say for most users this can be the ultimate camera, and the final camera you ever need. There are so many other improvement or features I can't cover, the best way to find out is to get the camera yourself :)
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 10-09-2013, 07:58 PM  
Pentax K-3 Hands-on and Sample Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 116
Views: 58,399
Hi All,

I'm really sorry that I couldn't answer all your questions. Since I only had the camera for a few days, and it's now w/ someone else, I can't do any further test.

As to the photos, I bet I'm over the limit from my photobucket account. Will see what I can do w/ them. Really sorry about this.
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors 10-07-2013, 07:32 PM  
Pentax K-3 Hands-on and Sample Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 1
Views: 2,910
Forum: Pentax K-3 & K-3 II 10-07-2013, 07:26 PM  
Pentax K-3 Hands-on and Sample Photos
Posted By frank
Replies: 116
Views: 58,399
As some of you already knew that I got a preproduction K-3 a few days ago. It's been a great pleasure to hold and play a new Pentax dSLR camera as always, and I'm so happy to see that Pentax has made another fantastic camera after the already excellent K5/K5II/s.

Look and Feel

My initial feeling is that the camera is SOLID! Yes, it feels even more solid than the K-5/II/s. From the product brochure, it's said that this new camera has an even more solid magnesium body with better weather & dust proof capability. The camera has much more durable shutter which can click 200K times before it dies. That's better than many pro level cameras.

The grip is slightly deeper with a bit different but more ergonomic contour, which makes the feeling even better when holding the camera in hand. That's really something considering that K5 already has the best feeling in hands (to me at least).

The back LCD is slightly bigger than the one on K-5, but the actual view area is quite a bit bigger especially when reviewing photos or doing live view. On K-5 there is a black out bar at the bottom which shows some status/info, because the LCD screen on K5 isn't 3:2 ratio I guess. But the K-3 utilizes the whole screen area due to its full 3:2 ratio screen. This made the screen look much bigger when in use.

The viewfinder is slightly bigger too, now at 0.95x magnification (vs 0.92x on K5). And Pentax used some new Pentaprism in this camera which improve the brightness by 15%. I compared the camera w/ a K5IIs side by side, the viewfinder feels indeed a bit brighter on the new camera.

As usual, I love to take photos of new cameras:





















Operation and Performance

Since it's a preproduction unit with a firmware of v0.31, I won't be able to share too much of its performance at this stage. But even as it is right now, this has been the best and fastest Pentax camera I've ever used, and I've used pretty much everyone of them. It's almost like I'm using a Nikon camera.

This camera is FAST! Yes, everything seems to be faster: changing settings, focusing and taking photos, card access... it's just a turbo boosted K5IIs.

Now you can shoot at as fast as 8.3fps in continuous shooting! That's faster even than most Canon or Nikon cameras.

The camera has dual SD card slots, which can be configured to pretty much whatever you like:
- card 1 for RAW and the other for JPG
- card 1 for JPG and the other for video
- both cards record the same photo (yes,duplicated, it's like a backup)
- wireless connection via FLU CARD in one slot for wifi transfering photos or even tethering. That's something everyone should try

Pentax have been using 11 focusing points in pretty much all their dSLR cameras (other than a few entry level ones), it's so good to see that we have 27 focusing points. The focusing module has been updated to the latest SAFOX 11 too, with a very high sensitivity of AF minimum luminance -3EV, better or equal to the best camera out there.

:

As you can see, there are 3 points at the center covers F2.8 luminance flux. I wish the 3 points would be from left to right instead of up to down, so it'd be more useful when holding the camera in portrait direction. Well, I guess we can't ask for too much.

Pentax put USB3.0 in this new camera, which might come in handy. I myself never used USB port on any dSLR camera due to its slow file transfering speed. But now I'm gonna use this port to dump the pictures to my PC through USB3.0 connection that's for sure.


Image Quality

Even though it's only a preproduction set w/ v0.31 firmware, the image and video quality are already EXCELLENT. Best so far from all Pentax cameras.

The new camera has an AA filter-less 24M CMOS image sensor and newly developed image processing engine - "PRIMEIII”, assures the high quality image output up to ISO51200. The 86K RGB light-metering sensor is new to Pentax, I have yet to see how effective it is. But I'm sure we'd see improved color accuracy and white balance that's for sure.

We all know Pentax like to put something unique in their cameras. This round they put in something really unique, an AA simulator. I still can't figure out how this thing works. But from the description:

- a tiny “sub-pixel level” move of the image sensor unit during image exposure generates the same level of moiré-reduction effect as optical AA filters.
- Unlike fixed optical AA filters always creates the identical result, this innovative selector allows the user to adjust the level of the moiré-reduction effect from OFF, Type1 and Type2



Note: This is really a very unique feature which other cameras like Nikon D7100 won’t be able to achieve.

Here are some examples to illustrate the AA filter simulator feature:

Original scene:


Difference between no-AA simulator and Type 1/2 moiré-reduction effect:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v636/fengwei2005/K3Testing/AAfilter_sample2.jpg[/IMG]

Looks pretty effective. But when I tried myself, I failed to create any photo with any obvious moiré effect even with the AA simulator turned OFF.

The other unique but very effective feature Pentax put in this new camera is the Multi-pattern Auto White Balance. It is to measure WB for each area in a picture, and achieve natural color for the whole picture. Here are two examples- AWB vs Multi-pattern AWB:

AWB


MAWB:


I haven't done serious image quality comparison due to the beta version firmware and it's just a preproduction set. But from what I can see so far, the camera produces super clean photos up to ISO3200, and it's very useable even at ISO6400 or 12800. You don't need ISO extension to use ISO100 or ISO51200, which I'm sure many would love to try.


Video Quality

Video quality has improved a lot in this new camera. Actually Pentax made a lot effort in improving video recording capability in this new camera, with dedicated buttons added, and now it can record full HD MPEG4/H264 60i /30P videos. There is even a stereo headphone jack on the left shoulder which you can use for playback videos on the camera, or monitoring the recording w/ a headphone on, so you'd be ble to shoot videos like a pro :D

I was surprised to see the steoro headphone jack, couldn't resist to plug in my favorite IEMs (an AKG K3003i), here you have a best DAP combo:



Don't know if Pentax would make MP3 player feature available on this cool camera. It'd be fun to listen to some music though a dSLR camera :D

Overall Pentax has turned the camera into a very high quality pro level video recording device with the following features:
– Full HD recording ( MPEG4/H.264)
– set up 60i/30p frame rate with Full HD
– In addition to HDMI terminal and stereo-microphone terminal, stereo head phone terminal is equipped
– Choose from Auto/Manual for sound recording level
– Sound level indicator
– Easy access to movie recording mode
– Dedicated movie REC button
– 4K (3840×2160) interval movie
– Various effect functions
– Frame editing function




Compare with K5/II/IIs

As you can see from the camera photos, there are some changes in button layout. I have to look around the camera to find some of those settings/buttons. But it didn't take me long to figure out how to use the camera, and I think it won't take more than 5min to get used to the new layout if you are an experienced Pentax user. Most buttons are where they should be, you'd feel at home even you are a new to Pentax.








Sample Photos

I only used it for a weekend, took over 500 photos. Although the firmware is far from final, the photos I got from the camera look fantastic. They are very clean even at ISO3200 (think about it, this has a lot more pixels than the K5IIs on the same sized sensor) with very pleasing colors even in JPG. Auto white balance is very accurate, the multi-pattern AWB works very well. Focusing has been spot on w/ the three lenses I tested: DA70, DA35/2.8 macro and HD DA55-300WR (another new lens you should try!)

Here are some photos I took during my kids' Children's Day event, all taken by K-3 w/ DA70 in JPG:


































I have some other sample photos which I haven't got chance to look at them yet. Will do so when time comes.



There are way too many new features in this new camera, I can't describe them all here. I guess the best way to find out is to get the camera yourself :)


Here at Pentaxforums and DPReview there are some very detailed info about this new camera, just in case you wanna know more about it before you jump in:
Pentax K-3 Announced - Pentax News - PentaxForums.com
Pentax K-3 First Impressions Review: Digital Photography Review
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