K10d first impressions

[mdausin]

Hello! I've been using a K10D for a little over a month now, and I thought it

was a good time to share some opinions about the camera. This isn't really a

review, but more of a collection of not so obvious things that I like and

dislike about the camera.<BR><BR>

 

First of all I should say that I /love/ this camera. It is well built, well

designed, and takes fantastic pictures. It is better than my older Canon 300d in

nearly every respect, and I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone.

<BR><BR><BR>

 

That said, here are some of the less obvious features that I like.<BR>

 

<ul>

<li>The auto ISO feature in Aperture Priority mode is one of the best features I

have seen in a long time. While in Aperture priority mode, this lets you

specify and an ISO range (ISO 160-640 for instance) that the camera must stay

within. The camera will try to set the shutter speed to (1/focal length*1.5)

AND will then use the lowest ISO speed in the range you specified. I wish every

camera this feature. I rarely ever worry about what ISO speed I am using any

more (except in very low light where I want full control of all parameters.) </li>

<li>The viewfinder/focus screen is fantastic. On my old 300d I eventually had

to buy a split prism focus screen to help me manual focus, but I honestly

haven't needed to do this with the Pentax. Everything looks clear, bright, and

sharp as a knife.</li>

<li>I love the RAW button. I almost always shoot RAW. But there have been

times when I was caught without enough space on my SD cards on a shooting trip.

But, with the RAW button, I can set the camera to JPG mode, and only switch to

RAW when I know that I've got my exposure and composition correct. This may not

be so handy if you have a box full of 4 gig cards, but I've definitely found it

useful on a couple of occasions.</li>

</ul><BR>

 

 

However, there are some annoyances that I would like to point out. I don't feel

like any of these are severe enough to forgo considering this buying the camera,

especially since they are ALL are potentially fixable with a firmware update.

But I hope that maybe someone at Pentax will read this and try to fix them, and

make the K10 that much better.<BR><BR>

 

<ul>

<li>The rear speed dial has two purposes. One purpose is to change

aperture/shutter speed, and the other is to change the zoom level of the rear

LCD. This isn't an issue when you are looking at pictures in 'play' mode. But

the dial choses to work as the zoom dial on the preview image after taking a

picture, even though the camera is still in 'record' mode. This is very

frustrating because I commonly want to change exposure settings after looking at

this preview screen and only end up changing the zoom level on the image. It

would be VERY nice if I could disable the zoom feature while the camera is not

in 'play' mode.</li>

 

<li>The 'auto ISO' feature mentioned above is wonderful. However, it is

rendered far less useful because the currently metered ISO speed is not

displayed in either the viewfinder or on the top LCD screen. This makes it very

difficult to tell what exposure you are currently at.</li>

 

<li>While in single auto focus mode, the camera /will not/ take a picture unless

it has achieved focus lock. I can think of many times when the camera couldn't

quite lock focus, but I could see with my eye that it had gotten close enough to

take a picture. Your only choice in this scenario is to disable auto focus

(there is a button for this) or switch to manual focus mode. This isn't too big

a big deal, but it would be nice to just be able to hit the shutter.</li>

 

<li>The Lens Make/manufacturer does not appear to be saved in the EXIF data.

This may not be something Pentax can fix, but it would be nice to have.</li>

</ul>

<BR><BR>

 

Again this is a fantastic, reasonably priced camera that is capable of taking

great pictures. <BR><BR>

 

Also, in case you are interested, I have a collection of all the pictures I have

taken at <a

href=http://www.one-blind-eye.com/index.php?x=browse&category=16>www.one-blind-eye.com</a>

<BR><BR>

 

[renatoa]

Related to:

 

> The auto ISO feature in Aperture Priority mode ...

 

I can't speak for k10, but I tested throughly my k100, trying to understand how the Auto ISO works, and my findings are the following:

For the FA 50/1.4 lens, the trigering exposure time is 1/60, not 1/50, not 1/75, i.e. 50 * 1.5x crop factor.

For a Sigma long tele 170-500 the trigering is fixed at 1/250 sec, not related to focal length, the same at 170mm as for 500mm.

Not tested for the kit lens, but if any interes, can be done.

[mountainvisions]

I got my K10D wednesday. I love the features. Although the buttons are smaller then on my ist D.

 

I have no complaints with the lack of external WB, ISO, DRIVE mode functions. The Fn button and 4 way control work well for this and I think it's actually quite useful. I just don't understand the layout of the buttons. AE-L is actually very oddly placed.

 

Overall, I really like the camera though and think as i shoot with it the button layout will become less and less an issue.

 

It's big and heavy for a Pentax SLR but slightly smaller then my PZ-1P (which I found an ideal size). Weight wise it is by feel almost as heavy without the BG2 grip as my ist D is with the BG1 and lithium AA batteries.

 

I'm confused as to why Pentax removed the flash control from the K10D for wireless. this was a great feature on the ist D and something that extended my meager 2 strobe system. Now I'm forced to by and carry a 3rd strobe for 2 strobe setups just to control the wireless flashes. Not happy about that but it's a minor inconvenience.

 

Not really any other issues. I like the features on the menus. I wish it had the 3 user menu settings like the ist D. I found that useful. I set one for sports/action, one for landscape, and one for wireless flash shooting. However, the return of the user function from the PZ-1P is a nice feature.

 

ISO range adjustment is nice, so are the WB fine tune controls. I also like the 1/3 EV range of ISO settings over the older models 1EV steps.

 

The buffer is great. I shot a full 512MB Ultra II card as a test with no hiccups. Amazing.

 

AF is faster and with SSM should be very very good. Without SSM it was almost on par with the Nikon D80 at all EV down to I believe EV4 and below (which is very low light anyway). I imagine it will actually exceed the D80 with an SSM lens mounted.

 

Still upset at the meager X sync. But that isn't a problem with this camera so much as Pentax refusing to put 1/250th on any model since the PZ-1P.

 

Antishake as reported is inconsistent but I get at least 2 stops almost every time with good results. Sometimes I get 4 stops. probably 2.5 is pretty accurate. I'm shooting at 1/25th with a 50 1.4 on the camera and damn happy with the results. To be able to shoot at even 1 stop under the general 1/focal lenght rule is pretty nice 2-3 stops is great.

 

I didn't care for the SD cards because they are too small to work with for rapid changes. I prefer full size CF. But thinking about it the possibility (never happened to me) of bent pins SD is fine. I just feel like there is little advatage to SD in a full size SLR over CF. And CF allows adapters to SD so you get the best of all worlds.

 

Overall, this is a solid camera which I'm happy with at first glance.

[jim_a]

Mike,

 

First off I enjoyed looking at your pics. Nice work.

 

I've had my K10D with the DA 21 and 40 primes for about the same length of time as you. Coming from shooting Leica M with a 35 and 50, where I mostly used the 35, I'm surprised at how much I like the FOV with the 40, which is the equivalent of a 60mm lens. Those lenses make for a nice compact kit.

 

The Hyper Manual program is really interesting, in conjunction with the green button. You can decide if aperture or shutter speed is the priority. For me when I press the green button while in manual it chooses the correct shutter speed for the aperture and ISO currently set. After that *you* tweak the shutter speed or aperture as needed. In this mode I point the camera at a part of the scene that will give the best exposure and hit the green button.

 

Today I played around with the TAv mode for the first time while street shooting. This is a another interesting mode as you set the desired shutter speed and aperture and the camera picks the ISO to get the correct exposure. I see a lot of potential with this mode in the right situations.

 

My one nitpick is with the e-dial in Av mode:

 

There are three options in this mode:

 

1. Front dial no input, real dial controls aperture.

 

2. Front dial EV comp, rear dial controls aperture.

 

3. Front dial controls aperture, rear dials controls EV comp.

 

There is not an option to set up the camera to control the aperture by the front dial and have no input from the rear dial for EV compensation.

 

I am starting to use the back AF button instead of the shutter release button for AF (Mike, this will get around the need for the camera to AF lock before you can take a picture) and think it may be easier to control the aperture from the front button in this situation. I like the idea of being able to tweak the exposure with EV comp but there are times I want to lock that feature out. It's easy to spin the dial by accident if you are not paying attention. It would be a nice little tweak in a firmware upgrade.

 

I'm shoot in RAW DNG mode and using CS3 Beta. I am losslessly compressing the DNG to get them down to around 9-10MB depending on the image.

 

Overall I'm pretty please with this camera. My only other DSLR experience is with the Olympus E-1.

 

Jim

[brett_st_pierre]

Quoting Renato:

 

>I can't speak for k10, but I tested throughly my k100, trying to understand how the Auto ISO works, and my findings are the following: For the FA 50/1.4 lens, the triggering exposure time is 1/60, not 1/50, not 1/75, i.e. 50 * 1.5x crop factor. For a Sigma long tele 170-500 the triggering is fixed at 1/250 sec, not related to focal length, the same at 170mm as for 500mm.>

 

I wonder if it is to do with the ROM chip in the Sigma lens? With me Pentax zooms there is a minimum shutter speed step-up as you zoom from shorter to longer. Same with a Tamron zoom I have. It has often been said that Sigma simply reverse engineer the ROM (and get some things wrong) rather than pay a licensing fee to Pentax -- just rumour but who knows...