Pentax K-3 Review

Image Quality Verdict

The past 4 pages have been flooded with test photos and technical comparisons of the K-3's high-ISO performance and detail.  Let's take a step back and take a look at what that means in practice.

Here we show a night scene shot with the K-3 and K-5IIs in RAW (DNG). Noise was reduced in Adobe Camera Raw while maintaining a reasonable level of detail. Granted, that was purely a subjective judgment.  Next, the images were resized to a width of 1600 pixels using bilinear interpolation, and a +20 contrast adjustment was made in Photoshop. No other adjustments were applied, also no sharpening was performed.

What is immediately visible is the difference in white balance. The K-3 is the more accurate of the two. But what this test really is about is high ISO noise. One might expect that the K-5 IIs would produce the less noisy images due to the larger pixels, but that is not so in the final images. The differences are minor, but at ISO 6400 the K-3 comes out the slightly better. In other words, with the K-3 we get a sensor with 50% more pixels without making any sacrifices of practical significance to everyday users.

Click on any thumbnail to view a larger version or click the JPG links to download the resized image.

Pentax K-3	Pentax K-5 IIs
ISO 100 - download	ISO 100 - download
ISO 1600 - download	ISO 1600 - download
ISO 6400 - download	ISO 6400 - download

The files from the K-3 deliver more clarity and better color, which makes them more pleasing overall.

The next set is shot in daylight with ISO 100, 400, and 1600. Again some noise reduction was applied in Adobe Camera Raw, and contrast boosted by 20 in Photoshop. At this relatively small scaled image size, the K-3's increase in resolution does not have a huge impact on the distant details, though we do observe more detail in the nearby tree.  In this case, more tweaking of the K-3 images would be desired, as the K-5 IIs produced richer colors overall.

Pentax K-3	Pentax K-5 IIs
ISO 100 - download	ISO 100 - download
ISO 400 - download	ISO 400 - download
ISO 1600 - download	ISO 1600 - download

The Bottom Line

The Pentax K-3's new sensor has performed very well throughout our tests.  We find that it delivers the best overall image quality of any Pentax DSLR to date when looking at the final product, both from JPEG files as well as RAW files.  Because the K-3's sensor lacks an antialiasing filter, its files will appear very sharp out-of-camera when paired with quality lenses, but if moire ever becomes an issue, the camera still gives you two separate tools to reduce or eliminate it without having to rely on desktop applications.  No other camera currently offers an on-demand AA filter simulator like the K-3.

At minimum ISO, the K-3 is capable of capturing stunning detail that might well rival cameras of a higher class.  There is no question that the significant increase in resolution is the first thing that users will notice when looking at the files from this camera.  The K-3's white balance is very accurate, and its metering has been tweaked to avoid overexposure: both important improvements over earlier models.  At higher ISOs, noise sets in early, but as you saw above, this doesn't prevent the K-3 from matching and surpassing the high-ISO output of its predecessor after post-processing.

The dynamic range of the K-3 may be just shy of that of the K-5 IIs in theory, but in practice, its shadow and highlight detail is still very impressive.

If you often find yourself making large prints, you will surely enjoy the K-3's increased resolution. If you mostly publish web-sized images, then the added megapixels may still come in handy for when you crop.  And even if you don't need the higher resolution, the K-3's improved metering and white balance is something that you'll be able to take advantage of every day. Even if we ignored the K-3 's improved speed and other innovative features, we would still recommend it for the sake of the image quality alone.

We always try to do our best when it comes to giving you a fair evaluation of each camera that we review, not only within the Pentax realm but also alongside competing brands.  Normally, there would be more cons in this section, but with the K-3, we really have nothing else to complain about, except that its files will take up a lot more of your disk space and demand more of your PC's processor!

So, the K-3 seems to be a winner all-around when it comes to taking still photographs.  For an APS-C camera, its image quality is truly impressive and we are confident that once we perform a comparative review of the K-3 and other 24-megapixel APS-C bodies, the sensor in the K-3 will come out on top.