|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
01-05-2020, 02:43 PM
|
| |
I went to the futsal game today. I hadn't been to this arena before, and the conditions were challenging. The entire court was surrounded by a low plexiglass barrier, and above that a net that extended to the ceiling. So I had a choice of going to the balcony and shooting down on the field through the net, or staying at court-level and shooting through the scuffed-up plexiglass. I mostly chose to go high and deal with the net.
The first half I shot with the Auto Chinon 50mm f/1.9, mostly wide open, occasionally a stop down. This kept ISO around 400 with the shutter speed(s) I chose. The second half I used the 55-300PLM, and that resulted in ISOs in the 1600-3200 range.
I don't know that this really proved anything. It was nice having the leeway afforded by the 400 ISO shots to pull up shadows. But for reasonable sized viewing the 1600 or 3200 aren't bad at all. With the vantage points and obstructions I wouldn't say any of my pictures today were particularly good, but they'll be good enough to post on the team's Shutterfly site. Obviously the 50mm wasn't going to isolate any one player, it captured more group action.
I was surprised at how decent the focus results were with the Chinon. I basically zoomed in with Live View and focused around the middle of the court and left it alone. That ended up being okay. The 55-300PLM struggled with autofocusing through the netting, and I often had to manually adjust.
I can see the advantages of a faster aperture lens for this type of shooting, maybe even if it wasn't the world's fastest focusing. So maybe I should rent the 50-135 and/or 70-200. Although we often play at other arenas where the parents are standing almost on the sideline, so 70 is long and 50 is still not really wide. Like I said before, I need a mythical 18-135 f/2.8.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
01-05-2020, 06:43 AM
|
| |
One of my sons has a futsal match today. I should try an experiment. I have a very limited selection of fast(ish) glass, but maybe I bring out the Auto Chinon 50mm f/1.9 and see what I can do with that. It's manual focus, so I don't expect much, but it's also ~3 stops faster than the PLM. I've previously used the 40mm f/2.8 limited and got reasonable results when the players are close. In theory the 50mm should be able to get me 800 ISO in situations where the PLM is 6400.
But I really should rent the 50-135 just to see for myself how it works out. And maybe in four or five years Pentax will update it with faster focusing motors, or at least put that on the roadmap for the 2030s.
Also... what about the 24-70mm f/2.8? That's a newer, full-frame lens. I wonder how fast focusing that is? Looking at past indoor soccer shoots most of my shots are in the 55-100mm range. With lower ISO and a higher quality lens perhaps cropping for zoom would be okay.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
01-05-2020, 04:51 AM
|
| |
I've been trying to shoot indoor soccer and futsal for a number of years, recently with the 55-300PLM. I often end up with ISOs of 6400-12800, and on a K-3ii that's usually okay if I got the exposure right and don't have to pull shadows, but it's still not great. I've thought about the 50-135mm f/2.8, but reviews indicate the focusing is not even remotely close to the PLM and might not be up to shooting sports. I suppose I should rent one to find out. I've also considered the 70-200mm, but 70 on the short end probably isn't wide enough as I'm often quite near the court.
What would be great would be a fast-focusing 18-135mm f/2.8. Pentax, get on designing and building one of those, please. If you could make it modern image quality, small, light, and $400, I'd appreciate that, too. ;)
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-29-2019, 12:46 PM
|
| |
You really think they're going to release a 70-200 f/4 at almost the same price as a 70-200 f/2.8? And try to makes sales solely on reduced weight? That seems unlikely to me. It would almost have to be $500 cheaper.
Oh, wait, you're saying they couldn't do that and make it a * lens, or nobody would buy it. Poor reading comprehension first go around on my part...
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-28-2019, 08:50 AM
|
| |
I think companies are in a panic over phones taking their market share, and have decided that only the most obvious improvements over phones will really sell. I think that's going too far, in many or most cases a decent modern ILC with a 2005-2010 era lens will have all kinds of advantages over a phone.
But I guess a big part of this is making a profit on lower numbers of sales. And it's harder to turn a profit on a $350 lens that isn't sharp in the corners wide open when a lot of the people who would have bought that now use an iPhone.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-26-2019, 02:41 PM
|
| |
The K-30 was her idea. She said "we should get a 'good' camera for Christmas so we can take pictures of the kids." I found the K-30 kit, and then I pretty quickly got really into photography. I think she was a little annoyed by that for a while, maybe she wanted to be into it more than me. But it set the precedent for how much a good camera should cost.
Maybe I should have gone Hasselblad...
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-26-2019, 10:28 AM
|
| |
I need something else. My other half isn't into high fashion, name brand stuff.
---------- Post added 10-26-19 at 01:30 PM ----------
I guess I could sell the K-30, but it's been good to me and will probably only bring back a small fraction of the K-??'s pricetag. My least-used lens is probably the 35mm f/2.4. That'll fetch at least $75 on the marketplace!
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-26-2019, 08:59 AM
|
| |
A lot of us are going to be up long nights formulating strategies for convincing the wife that almost $2000 is a fine price for a camera, despite the fact the last two were about $800.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-20-2019, 11:47 AM
|
| |
I have to assume that at some point they'd say, sorry, we can't make everything backwards compatible. The K-5 came out almost a decade ago. Even at Pentax pace they've released eight or 10 new cameras since then.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-20-2019, 06:16 AM
|
| |
It makes it easier to collaborate with other manufacturers to build lenses than can be more readily repurposed for other mounts. Good for economies of scale and reducing Pentax' R&D costs.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
10-06-2019, 04:55 AM
|
| |
Isn't this really just a slap-fight with phones? See, your phone can't do pixel-peeping scalpel-level sharpness in the corners so you should buy a $1700 camera and a $1500 lens to take photos! They think that's easier to explain than the long, sometimes nuanced list of things dedicated cameras do better.
---------- Post added 10-06-19 at 07:57 AM ----------
I don't see what's wrong with in-camera or post-processing profiles if it gets me to the right end result at a lower cost and with a lighter kit.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
08-23-2019, 06:09 AM
|
| |
If you could help with two senior positions in the defense industry or equivalent in my new location that would be helpful, too. :)
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
08-22-2019, 04:09 AM
|
| |
I don't know of anywhere I could rent a camera or a variety of cameras (and lenses) for an hour. Where I am there is no local place to rent camera gear. And when I send off to a place like Lensrentals.com or Borrowlenses.com the shipping costs are equal to several days rental so you even renting a system for a few days can be pretty expensive.
It's a practically impossible proposition for me to try out a number of other systems on a reasonable budget. My only realistic options are to briefly play around with whatever is tethered to the shelf at the local big box store, or rely on reviews and online commentary. If I only went with what I could try out myself I wouldn't be a Pentax shooter.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
08-21-2019, 11:56 AM
|
| |
It's goes both ways. I've never had the opportunity to handle a Pentax camera in a store. If I relied on doing that I'd be shooting Sony or Canon or something else. If you draw a 250 mile circle around my house there's one store that carries Pentax, that being roughly a two-hour drive in DC beltway traffic from my house.
I'd love to go down to my corner camera shop and compare and contrast five different brands. But that's never been the case in the last 20+ years. Best Buy is my local camera store, and it has a small selection of Canon and Sony, maybe Nikon, with kit lenses, tied to the counter with a steel cable. A few of those display models even turn on and off.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
08-21-2019, 11:48 AM
|
| |
I don't know what kind of resources you have. Renting a K-1 with a 70-200 f/2.8 and a 50mm f/1.4 would be something like $400 for a week. Multiply that by four or five bodies and you're spending a new camera's worth of cash on trying out different systems. I'm sure that's very useful, but not realistic for many or most people.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
08-21-2019, 08:39 AM
|
| |
Unless you rent 4-5 bodies each with 3-4 lenses and do comprehensive comparison tests once you've thoroughly familiarized yourself with the various user interfaces I don't think your method is going to result in any better, more objective results than that of the masses you say are fooled into believing marketing hype.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
02-05-2019, 05:49 AM
|
| |
I'm quite happy with my K-3ii, have no real need to replace it anytime soon. But... I might have to figure a way to get the K-3ii replacement if it has all the K-3ii features along with KP-like high ISO performance and better autofocus.
|
|
Forum: Pentax News and Rumors
02-04-2019, 11:00 AM
|
| |
I think they have to be focusing on FF customers because it's going to have to be a really over-achieving lens to top a $360 PLM. The PLM is super fast silent focus, it's reasonably sharp, WR, it's relatively small and light. It's everything I look for in a lens. Its only downside the the limited max aperture, which forces ISO high for things like indoor sports. But I can't come up with a case where I'm justified in paying an extra $1000 for an f/4 aperture. I'll live with ISO 6400 and save the cash for something else.
|
