Severely underwhelming K-3ii

barbakane wrote:

Sorry if this post is long winded, but I've taken well over 1000 pictures with my new K-3II, manufactured in August of last year, have the HD DA PLM WR 55-300 and the HD DA 16-85...both very well reviewed lenses. I researched for over a year to finally decide on this set-up before spending almost $2000 on the kit, including battery grip and flash. I don't have a single image that I could call sharp.

My $200 FujiFilm s4200 takes better pictures!

I'm really disappointed, because I see examples of my exact setup posted here, and my results are not even on the same continent, let alone in the same ballpark!

See examples here:

http://s1303.photobucket.com/user/ratikon/library/pentax?sort=3&page=1

I'll explain later why I had to add the link....

The pics of the Caribe Royale are on a tripod with autofocus...9 point IIRC. Timer @ secs.

The woman and her child were handheld, about ten feet away, AF, not reason why they shouldn't be sharp.

Staircase was AF set on tripod, SR off, timer set to two seconds.

The leaves were taken at the same focal length, one with my new $2000 camera, and the other with my $200 camera. Which is which?

The bull was taken from about a hundred feet away, AF, blazing sun...handheld propped against a fencepost for stability.

Building facade was taken with my Fuji, as was the vulture and the flower.

I've tried using both lenses at f-8, usually the sweet spot of the lens, and still no good.

I realize there is a learning curve to using the camera, but really? Not a single sharp image in over 1000 taken?

Secondly, I've spent WELL over an hour trying to figure out why I can't upload photos to my gallery. I have photos in there now, uploaded quite a while ago, but now can't seem to get it to work. I have Edit mode enabled, just in case. But I doubt that's the reason. I've tried changing the size of the files to not exceed 1600 on the long side, but all my photos i want to upload are WELL within the limitations set. All I get is an error msg. I also just let the file try to upload for ten minutes or more, thinking it may take a while to upload a small 14MB file. Still no luck. I've read and followed the instructions in the FAQ's, nada, nuthin, zilch, zero results. All the photos are on my harddrive.

What the blazes?

I can't see your photos because they are marked private, but I have the K3ii, 16-85, and 55-300 WR and for me they perform perfectly. I had been using the K3 but recently decided to buy the K3ii as backup so most of my recent photos were with the K3 but I don't notice any difference.

You can see my photos on https://lawrencehelm.smugmug.com/RiverPhotography/Mar-2017/  I believe that you will see that most shots are sharp.  I was shooting into the sun on some of them -- that is, the sun shining on the river water which resulted in highlighting i couldn't get rid of, but most are okay.  I haven't any photos which precisely match your complaint.  The March 2017 are with the K3ii and an old lens I am growing fond of, a 16-45mm.

I must confess that I did have a problem with the 55-300 PLM and sent it back.  The autofocus system didn't operate as advertised.  And as a consequence I decided to stick with the older 55-300 WR which I already had, a lens I have gotten good shots from in the past.   My experience with the 55-300 PLM I should hasten to say is not typical and most users are happy with it.  I expect that had I asked for another copy rather than my money back that the second copy would have been as good as everyone else finds that it is, but by that time I was tired of messing with it.

I have used the 16-85mm lens quite a lot and think it one of the best lenses I've every owned.  However, there have been times I have wanted something longer, and if I take the 16-85 and the 55-300, there is some overlap in the middle.  If on the other hand I happen to find (have?) a good copy of the 16-45, then there is no overlap with the 55-300.  Also, the 16-45 is lighter than the 16-85.

This doesn't address the problems you are having with your gear, but it does illustrate that the deficiencies you have with your camera and/or lenses do not apply to all those copies owned by the rest of us.  I have owned a lot of cameras and consider the K3 the best I've ever owned and only bought the K3ii as backup (because I hike and there is always the danger of a fall damaging a camera or lens), but that isn't to say that the K3ii isn't as good.  In fact my outings with the K3ii indicate that it is.

As to uploading photos to your gallery, my particular system, Smugmug, claims to be able to handle photos of any size, but I've discovered that if they are too large then the uploading takes too long.  I use Lightroom and process my photos in Raw.  I have designated that the final results are JPEGs of a size that will provide good quality but not be so large as to take too long uploading.

I've seen discussions of defective equipment here on this forum in the past.  When I've discovered such defects myself I've sent the gear back immediately.  I ran into something similar not so long ago with a K-S2.  I used it with the 55-300PLM (which turned out to be defective) but at first I didn't know whether it was the lens or the camera, especially because the 16-45mm lens I had just purchased used also had a defect.  It seemed too much of a coincidence that there could be too lenses defective at the same time and so I sent the K-S2 back within the time limit given me by the seller.  But when I played with the 55-300PLM and the 16-45 on the K3, it turned out  that indeed they were both defective.  I sent the 55-300PLM back and did not get another copy.  I sent the 16-45 back to KEH and then shopped around and got another copy, this one from Adorama and thus far it has performed very well as perhaps you can tell from the March 2017 shots.

Lawrence