new k7 owner

hi pentaxians,

i posted recently asking for some advice on camera, had gone from a 40d to a gf1 and wasn't really enjoying it that much.

after some helpful comments i decided on getting the k7 kit + 21 limited, express delivered the next day! so far it's been great. lightweight, small(ish) and as speedy as the 40d ever was. will spend some time getting to know it and saving for a wider lens and a portrait lens, luckily i have an old 50 1.7 knocking about to experiment with.

looking forward to joining in on this forum (and some lurking) as i had m43 and canon xxd beforehand!

cheers

fred

Welcome to the K7 and Pentaxian club, hope you enjoy your stay and let us know of your good or bad experiences, and show us some pictures especially from that old lens.

Cheers!

Welcome to a great place to ask questions. Can't wait to see some pictures taken with your new K-7
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Cameras & Lenses listed in Plan.

Welcome Fred!

The DA21 is IMO one of the best suited lenses for landscapes (if you like the focal of course) with great flare resistance and beautiful, vibrant color reproduction. You may want to check out the work of one of its master users Thomas (Duplo is the username here): http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/home#section=ARTIST&subSection=143249&subSubSection=6611019&language=EN a lot of the lanscapes there are done with the DA 21.

Radu

fred whitton said:

hi pentaxians,

i posted recently asking for some advice on camera, had gone from a 40d to a gf1 and wasn't really enjoying it that much.

after some helpful comments i decided on getting the k7 kit + 21 limited, express delivered the next day! so far it's been great. lightweight, small(ish) and as speedy as the 40d ever was. will spend some time getting to know it and saving for a wider lens and a portrait lens, luckily i have an old 50 1.7 knocking about to experiment with.

looking forward to joining in on this forum (and some lurking) as i had m43 and canon xxd beforehand!

cheers

fred

Click to expand...

Make sure you upgrade to the latest firmware release. The new reversal film setting is a hoot and should work well with your outdoor shots.
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Ahab

You are very welcome here mate! You picked a great camera and soon you will love it passionately! Well! Ahem! You will really like it a lot! ;-) I am looking forward to seeing your work and reading your commentaries. Post away!

Best regards Fred
Leo

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K-7: Pentax DA* 200mm f2.8, Pentax DA* 55mm f1.4, Pentax DA 35mmm f2.8 Limited, Pentax DA14mm f2.8, Sigma 17-70mm Zoom, Sigma EX DG f2.8 70mm Macro, Sigma 105mm f2.8 EX DG Macro lens, Pentax 1.7 lens adapter, Cokin Pro Z Filter System. Benro B-4 Ball-Head, Benro C297-M8 Carbon Fiber Flexpod, Benro Precision 3-Way Pan-Head
Shooting photographs since 1948
mitch

hi stan, indeed i read about the 1.1 and updated once the battery was charged. now i'm not an expert in these things, could you tell me how the film reversal filter works, and how i would then develop this in lightroom? many thanks, i'm keen to try it out.

hi radu, thanks for the url, i will check it out for inspiration! all the best

fred whitton said:

hi stan, indeed i read about the 1.1 and updated once the battery was charged. now i'm not an expert in these things, could you tell me how the film reversal filter works, and how i would then develop this in lightroom? many thanks, i'm keen to try it out.

Click to expand...

This "film reversal" is simply a JPG image effect, as far as I can tell.

If the camera is set to JPG, and this (or any other) digital effect is enabled, then the JPGs the camera makes will show this effect. The same is true for all image settings such as different output resolutions (MP), more or less saturated, black and white or natural or bright colour, in-camera cropping and so on. When this JPG image opens into Lightroom you can adjust it further, or not, as you wish. So you would straight away see a "colour reversal" picture.

If the camera is set to Raw then the Live View, and the in-camera image review, and the Raw thumbnail (if your operating system browser lets you see this) will all also see these effects because the camera put them there - according to its current settings. However the Raw data itself is not touched include any of these settings. If your Raw converter is the Pentax one then it is likely that it may pay attention to these same (proprietary) settings which the camera has labelled the Raw file with, and respect them in the converted image - although this latest brand new filter may be too new to be understood by the installed software.

However. The Raw data is still Raw, and all Lightroom (and other non-Pentax software) has to work on, is some basic generic information about the exposure and the equipment, as well as the White Balance used. There may be all kinds of Pentax specific camera settings but it will not understand these . So in this case there is little point in setting these in the camera - if you are shooting Raw and converting using Lightroom. However, you could always use some kind of a colour reversal preset in LR (or whatever else you can think of to do with the image) - in fact, that's IMO far more interesting and effective than doing so in the camera.

RP

Thanks rp. I read elsewhere that is filter is used with the purpose to be flipped again so that it produces a particular effect in terms of saturation, sharpness etc. I'll do some research and repost if i figure anything out!

Best,

Fred

fred whitton said:

Thanks rp. I read elsewhere that is filter is used with the purpose to be flipped again so that it produces a particular effect in terms of saturation, sharpness etc.

Click to expand...

That's possible as a "quick trick" to get a particular effect out of JPG-only processing.

But I would be doubtful if this would achieve anything that could not be equally or better done inside Lightroom working from a straight Raw - easily, flexibly and interactively - once one had found a "recipe" for the effect or something like it. But I'd be very interested to be proved wrong.

Sometimes people prefer to make a riigid "processing decision" at the time of shooting that commits them irreversibly; concentrates the mind, for them, maybe. Myself: I regard that just as needless extra pressure! I have an intention in mind at the time of shooting, and try to duly honour that later in processing.

RP

fred whitton said:

hi pentaxians,

i posted recently asking for some advice on camera, had gone from a 40d to a gf1 and wasn't really enjoying it that much.

after some helpful comments i decided on getting the k7 kit + 21 limited, express delivered the next day! so far it's been great. lightweight, small(ish) and as speedy as the 40d ever was.

Click to expand...

I am surprised to hear you say this about the speed. What lenses were you using with the 40D? My partner has a 40D that I have used with the 28-135mm IS zoom and some other ring lenses and they are amazingly fast. When I first started using the camera, I had to check to make sure that the lenses had refocused only to find out they had. And they are so quiet. Let me know what you used. Thanks.

Regards, Jim

fdub1080p said:

will spend some time getting to know it and saving for a wider lens and a portrait lens, luckily i have an old 50 1.7 knocking about to experiment with.

looking forward to joining in on this forum (and some lurking) as i had m43 and canon xxd beforehand!

cheers

fred

Click to expand...

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Equipment list in profile.

jim, my 40d was great (well my second one was but that's a different story). i had the 28-135, 17-55, 135, and 50 1.4. all super great but it was the bulk and weight of the kit that was starting to drag and driving me towards something else. the gf1 size and capability excited me at first, and hey i still have it anyway for now (don't tell the wife), but overall the camera's responsiveness and feel wasn't what i was after. and i missed optical view finder. so far i find my k-7 and 21mm a nice balance.

i won't kid myself that this cycle couldn't start again but for now i just want to focus on getting out there more often with a camera i feel will do what i want of it, and on a weeks worth of ownership i'm happy so far!