personalphotos

<p>Steve, if you hire a lawyer to defend you, you pay those costs. Been there, done that and trust me, it can cost a bundle. No way this is worth holding back £100 of a £200 fee. </p>

<p>Steve, you are so wrong. If they find a lawyer who is willing to sue for emotional or other damages, then this could easily cost 10x or 20x in just legal fees, even if it was thrown out of court. There's absolutely no guarantee that they couldn't take this beyond small claims court.</p>

<p>Give them a full refund, get a signed release and move on. </p>

<p>I am in complete agreement with Marcus and Nadine. If there are any unfinished details, deliver those with delivery confirmation (emails or courier) and then follow Marcus's advice to end all ties with them. Once you have completed all the things you were <strong>originally contracted</strong> for, cut them loose and move on.</p>

<p>This bad review threat is used sometimes and to little effect. It really sounds like to me, he was setting you up from the beginning. <br />If during the pre-wedding consultation, he was opposing her wishes, then you might have made a bigger effort to get things clarified before the wedding. This is a lesson learned for next time. If on the other hand, all was smooth during the consult and this came out of the blue on wedding day, then he was setting you up I'll bet.</p>

<p>You don't say what type of student you are or what you are studying. Is it photography? Is it public school or post secondary education?</p>

<p>First, did you have anything in writing with them? Emails that outline your skills and experience or a contract that outlined what was expected of you as their photographer.</p>

<p>Second, for a fee of £200, I would expect that there is not much here for them to sue over, certainly it would be small claims court and nothing more. It's not worth their time to go much beyond that to get 'damages'. Who knows though if they get the right lawyer and judge. You could be in for a much larger cost and it's almost a 100% guarantee that you would loose a case like this. If they did take this to small claims court, you would most certainly have to refund them the fee and also have to pay any court related fees or costs. Give them the refund now and get this behind you.</p>

<p>If I were you, I would refund the full amount and in writing, have them sign off that there are no further business deals between you and the couple regarding this wedding. You were very unprepared for the job at hand and never should have been charging if you didn't have the experience or the equipment to do the job at hand.</p>

<p>Let me put this another way. If I hired a car mechanic student to fix my car and he advertised he could do the work but in reality didn't have the experience or the tools to get the job done right. Then I would have a claim against him. If I told him to fix the brakes and he forgot and then if I got in a car accident because the work he did was poor and my brakes failed as a result of that work, he did not deserve to get paid for substandard work. I would get my refund without question.</p>

<p>This will also come across as unfair but each and every experienced photographer or car mechanic or what ever other occupation, had to apprentice in their profession before they were ready to do the work for a fee. They took the time to learn and gain experience before they were ready to charge for paid work. There are too many people that think this is fairly easy and expect to get money for work they are in no way prepared for.</p>

<p>Last and this will sound harsh, I certainly hope you don't write emails or any correspondence with the couple like the post above. The English, spelling and grammar is very poor and reads like "text speak". From reading this, you come across as very young and unprepared. Please do yourself a favour and learn to write English much better.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>You could always try Ebay for a "parts lens" to get a replacement mount. I saw 2 that sold for under $50 just recently. Or look at the Tamron as a modern replacement.</p>

<p>As many have suggested above, it's time to stop using the camera to find the images. I suspect from your answers, that you connect the camera to your computer to get the images off the card. In this case, you need a good quality card reader and connect that to the computer to see what's on the card.</p>

<p>If the images are readable, then great, problem solved to this point. If they are not, then since you may not be able to use the RescuePro software you have, maybe buy a new Lexar Pro CF card such as <a href="http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/815978-REG/Lexar_LCF8GBCTBNA400_8GB_Professional_400x_Compact.html">this</a>.</p>

<p>The reason I suggest the card purchase is, the card is $29.00 and they include a downloadable version of Image Rescue 4 using a coupon inside the box. You can purchase a version for $34.00 off the Lexar web site but may as well get a new card and the software for less. Plus now you have another good quality card to use for testing purposes and future shooting. I've used Image Rescue 4 a couple of times and very impressed with the software. It's recovered old images after formatting and subsequent image recording.</p>

<p>If you can get the images off the cards with either the reader or with the Image Rescue 4, it's now time to test the camera/cards. First, format the cards in the camera, not the computer. Second, check the camera for how the playback is set. Go to the play menu and the second item is Playback. It should be set to "All".</p>

<p>3rd would be to take some test shots with the newly formatted cards and see what happens. It may be that you haven't formatted the cards since new and this caused an indexing error on the cards. Again, do not format them on the computer but in the camera.</p>

<p>If you are still having issues after these steps, then inspect the card reader in the camera with a flashlight and magnifying glass. See that all the pins are perfectly straight. I find this unlikely to have caused this issue but you could have a bent pin.</p>

<p>If the pins are straight and you are still having issues, then it could be the card reader in the camera and it needs repair. If it can record and playback after formatting, then it was simply that the cards needed to be formatted.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>There in is the mystery. Like I mentioned above, if you stop the lens down and use the preview button, the lens is at the aperture chosen, the VF is dimmed and the metering sensor is getting the amount of light at those settings and yet it's still wrong. Almost as if it was programmed to be wrong so you'll buy a DA lens and put your good Taks on Ebay.......</p>

<p>Better than the style of pee green/yellow from last year. I don't edit this way because I want the images to stand the test of time and explain this to possible clients. Might look OK on your computer/iPad today but how will you like these on the wall at at your 20th anniversary?</p>

<p>Michael, I was of course being facetious abut "the camera has no idea a lens is attached". It of course does know but just can not communicate with a pre A series lens and thus you have to set the focal length. That setting of course does nothing to aid in exposure readings.</p>

<p>I've owned at least 20 different Takumars and K or M series lenses from 28mm all the way to the monster 500mm. These almost all render wonderful images if you have the time to nail the exposure.</p>

<p>One day in a fit of boredom, I took 3 mid length primes and a hand held spot meter. Put the camera on a tripod and had things set up in controlled light. The exercise was to see if the exposure readings would be at least linear with each lens while using the Green button.</p>

<p>I can definitively say no. A lens might underexpose by up to 2 stops when wide open and over expose by 2+ stops when completely closed down. A one stop aperture setting change does not guarantee a linear exposure, one stop shutter speed adjustment change in the resulting setting/image. In fact, it's completely unpredictable. I tried even using the preview button and manually stopping the lens down, assuming that if the lens was set to it's stopped down value of say f8, the meter, using the green button, could get a more accurate reading of available light. Nope, it doesn't. It's closer to the right reading but often underexposed by 1/2 to one full stop. The camera just can't meter these old lenses accurately because it does not know what lens is attached and what settings you are using. <br>

The mount has been crippled and that's the end of the story unfortunately. If Pentax were to take Nikon's lead and allow these K and M mount lenses communicate with the body, Pentaxians would be a much happier bunch. I can't see this impacting lens sales for modern AF gear one bit but would certainly make the brand and bodies be much more attractive. What would really happen is, Pentax shooters would still buy the modern lenses they normally would but also add a few (or a lot) of older lenses for fun shooting and use them more. Our photography would be richer for it as well. </p>

 

<p>Let me put this in perspective for you.</p>

<p>You book a wedding for a very nice fee. You have your shiny new 5DMKII all ready to go and it's worked great for the last 3 weddings since you got it. You are at the ceremony and have your spare body nearby just in case something happens. While walking backwards up the aisle a few steps, you trip and fall, damaging the 5D2. You reach for the 140K click 40D that hasn't been used much for 3 months and discover that the shutter is worn out and doesn't work after taking 6 shots.</p>

<p><br /> Do you have a lawyer on retainer? Is having an old camera at the end of it's life worth the refund and grief you could face if your backup fails when you need it most? Is that worth "saving" $500-600 in selling the wrong camera?</p>

<p>This is a business and you are entrusted to capture moments that are never to be repeated. To be blunt it would be irresponsible to have your spare as a camera you know is worn out or near the end of it's usable life. Every business and this is a business like every other (even if too many shooters don't treat it as such) has equipment costs and overhead. This is just such a case and without any question, you should retire the 40D and keep the 7D. Take the $300 and be thankful the camera has worked so well all this time and served you so well. It owes you nothing but you owe your clients the best preparation you can afford.</p>

<p>I know moderators (I am one elsewhere) hate people being confrontational but BeBu, you don't know what you are talking about and don't understand even when it's explained. Clearly you've never used an older (pre-A series lens) on a Pentax DSLR. </p>

<p>Without the contacts on the lens (or a camera that can read the aperture lever setting) to transfer lens and exposure information, the metering DOES NOT WORK and this is by design. The advertising claim that any Pentax mount lens will work on a Pentax DSLR is a partial myth. It will connect/mount and take a photo but not "work" correctly. Most certainly not like a modern lens can. In fact you would be faster to use a hand held spot meter and manually stop the lens down to get correctly exposed images.</p>

<p>It's too bad because there are some stunning M42, K and M mount lenses around and they work better on a 40 year old Spotmatic than they do on a K-5. It's understandable that an M42 lens can't communicate with a modern camera but am M or K lens could transfer basic aperture info to work if Pentax wanted it to. </p>

<p>OK then if you are right, you explain the problem.</p>

<p>On a fixed aperture lens, it's not as bad but the camera does not know a lens is even attached so has no idea of the aperture the lens is at.</p>

<p>With a normal lens (M42, K, M series) that has an aperture, the lens might be set to f5.6 for example but be a 50mm f1.4 max aperture lens. In order for the camera to meter correctly, it has to know what aperture you have chosen. The lens is always wide open until the shutter button is pressed and then stops down for a split second (shutter speed time) to (as in this example) f5.6 to take the shot as you wanted. The issue is, if the camera doesn't know there is a lens attached, then it only sees the wide open setting (or amount of light coming in) and doesn't even know what that aperture is actually set at. Even if you manually stop down the lens to the setting you want to shoot at, the meter reading is off because the camera still has no idea what that aperture is and can not make the needed exposure calculation correctly.</p>

<p>When a camera takes a meter reading, it sees the wide open setting and then has the selected f5.6 setting information. It calculates that if the wide open setting is a shutter speed of say 1/500th @f1.4 and the lens is set at f5.6, then it knows to cut the shutter speed by 4 stops to 1/30th to get the same exposure at the same ISO setting. To even make that calculation correctly, it has to know that the lens attached is an f1.4 lens. In the Pentax crippled mount, it doesn't know and might think it's an f2.8 lens and base the calculation from that.</p>

<p>So if the camera has no idea that there is a lens attached and no idea what the stopped down setting is on that lens, the meter just guesses an exposure based on the available light and a guess on what the max aperture of the lens might be (the starting point to calculate the stopped down exposure). Normally the image will be 2,3 or more stops off. So even with a fixed aperture lens, the camera doesn't know it is f8 or whatever. It could think, this lens is an f4 lens and I'll choose a shutter speed to match that aperture for the amount of light I see in this scene. Now your shot is 2 stops over exposed.</p>

<p>The actual answer is Manual mode for most or all older "M" mounted lenses. Shutter priority is useless because in that mode, you change the aperture and in this case, the lens has a fixed (unchangeable) aperture setting. You can use Aperture Priority mode to adjust the shutter speed to match the correct exposure and this method will work.<br>

<br /> The issue is that Pentax cameras have a crippled mount and no exposure information is translated to the meter. In fact the camera doesn't even know a lens is attached. The camera will give you a rough idea of the correct exposure but can easily be +/- 2 stops. With any all manual lens on a Pentax, you will have to use your experience to get the right setting.</p>

<p>Andy, I know this tangent has derailed your thread a little and this will be my last post responding to Ian. But I can't help but reply at least once more. I will freely admit I make mistakes and assumptions from time to time and others have corrected me. When one is not open minded enough to realize one's mistakes, forums get filled with theory's posted as absolute facts and someone coming by a year from now might read this an assume it's correct.</p>

<p><strong>The rest of you can ignore this:</strong><br /> That being said, Ian, I know you will post again and assert you are right. I won't reply because this thread is about enjoying and lusting over a new camera. It's been hijacked too much already. I'm as much to blame and now but in for a penny, in for a pound....</p>

<p>Re your last 2 photos. You try to prove a point by using different brands of equipment, different flash systems possibly (we don't know) and meter value settings and you set the cameras up differently. You should be using a constant light source, not flash or strobe.</p>

<p>1) Pentax and Nikon metering calibration are going to be slightly different (look at Canon where it can be +/- 1/2 stop at times!) Thus your example is flawed.</p>

<p>2) You posted the wrong EXIF data on the exposures....</p>

<p>3) The Nikon was set to -0.33 EV and the Pentax was set to 0.0 EV. That's a 1/3 stop variance! Example is now worthless.</p>

<p>4) The Jpeg controls for brightness and contrast settings for each camera were set differently. Plus who knows how each manufacturer determines those settings and their relative values to the exposure. Thus your example is further flawed.</p>

<p>5) You are using different lenses on each camera. To prove your exposure assumption, you should use the same lens on each and be set to the same equivalent value. IE 50mm (FOV 75mm) on the APSc and 75mm on the FF. Using the same zoom lens on each would allow this. On top of that, using a different FOV allows different reflected light into the image captured, changing the exposure. Further flawed.</p>

<p>Respond if you must but I'm unsubscribing to this thread and will not reply. Let Andy enjoy his craving for a new camera.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Mis, yes it's still quite big and if you compare it to the D700, there's very little difference. Most of that is a few mm in width and the larger 'flash hump' on the D700.</p>

<p>Just for fun, compare the D600 to the D3s. Users who own that beast can see a huge difference (of course to be fair, you would need to add a grip to the D600).</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I'd guess everyone has different criteria and that would be very dependant on what you shoot most of the time. For me it's weddings/events/baby 90% of the time and 10% for family and fun.</p>

<p>For the family and fun, no backup required.</p>

<p>For the rest,the first thing I look at is what focal range do I shoot most? It's 24-85mm. So I have a zoom that covers most of that and it's the most used lens (28-75mm f2.8). I then have 4 primes that cover some of the most important focal ranges withing that range. A 24mm, 35mm, 50mm and 85mm. Then I have a second zoom (28-70mm f2.8) that backs up this range as well and is also an f2.8. </p>

<p>Next is an ultrawide 12-24mm with no backup since it's more of a 'fun shot' lens at a wedding and I could live without it if it failed.</p>

<p>Next is the venerable 70-200mm f2.8 with an 80-200mm f2.8 as it's backup. </p>

<p>So that's it. In the mid length region (speaking FF), I have 3 choices and 2 at the longer end.</p>

<p>No you are wrong Ian. I read enough to know <em>I don't care</em>, to be polite. It has nothing to do with good photography.</p>

<p>Josh, couldn't have said it better myself. A lot of that interview was just blah, blah,blah. Not really saying much of anything. He sidestepped the real demand from the Pentax SLR community and avoided the camera so many users have been waiting years for. A 35mm format sensor.</p>

 

<blockquote>

<h4>Is there room for a higher-end Pentax K-mount DSLR?</h4>

<p>We have the 645D, and Pentax is dedicated to that system, but whether there's room between the K-5 cameras and the 645, I can't say.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The 645D is a very nice camera but a niche unit for most and always will be. </p>

<p>Get that post removed as well. It should be easy if they took his earlier ones down. Actually, if you wanna have some fun with this tool and have a lawyer. Get the lawyer to send him a cease and desist order with the threat of a $250,000 civil suit. It is defamation after all.<br>

SAVE absolutely everything he posts including the old email where they were happy before all this started. </p>

<p>Andy, it's a nice looking camera and I can certainly see the attraction. Honestly, I'll probably buy one myself because the D800 isn't a wedding shooters camera and I can't afford a pair of D4's. So before April next year, I'll be getting a good used D700, a good used D3s and most likely a D600. Btw, to add a bit to your gear lust, Nikon now rules in IQ on <a href="http://fstoppers.com/nikon-compared-to-canon-dxo-mark-best-digital-camera">DoX rankings</a>. They hold the top 3 spots and the 5th spot. The D600 being 3rd behind the D800 and D800E.</p>

<p>Ian, I'm aware of Equivalence and in fact anyone who has heard or understood the term "crop factor" is discussing equivalence even if they have never heard the term. You are missing the point though. Just as 200mm is always 200mm (in terms of magnification), Aperture is still aperture. F2.8 is always f2.8 regardless of the sensor size. What he's saying is, with sensor "A" you get a DOF of "X" at f4 and on sensor "B" you get a different value (range of distance near and far in focus) for the DOF using the same lens on the smaller or larger sensor.</p>

<p>So the aperture remains constant, regardless of the sensor size, the exposure is identical and the only difference is the DOF. The aperture can not and does not allow in more light (IE: "make the lens faster") because it's used on a larger or smaller sensor.</p>

<p>I will prove this point in one simple way. Take two cameras from the same company that share the same mount. Now use 1 lens and take a photo with the APSc camera at say f4, ISO 800 and 1/250th shutter speed. Lets assume that's a correct exposure for the test photo. Now take the Full Frame camera, turn it to manual and use the same settings. Assuming the sensors in each camera are calibrated to <strong>exactly</strong> the same sensitivity values, then the FF camera will expose the scene exactly the same at the same settings. The lens didn't get any "faster". Only the DOF changed and that has nothing to do with the physical characteristics of the lens design and it's size on sensor X vs sensor Y.</p>

<p>I will also state for the record that the article has a number of mistakes and I won't get into it here or on another thread. He also contradicts himself in at least 2 places I noticed and if I wasted the rest of the day reading this, I'm sure I could find more. One example, he makes no mention of the relationship between noise and pixel size, density or design. He claims that the only factors are:</p>

<blockquote>

<ul>

<li>The total amount of light falling on the sensor</li>

</ul>

<ul>

<li>The proportion of the light falling on the sensor that is recorded (QE -- Quantum Efficiency)</li>

</ul>

<ul>

<li>The additional noise added by the sensor and supporting hardware (read noise)</li>

</ul>

</blockquote>

<p>The guy is just another photographer, with a very good theoretical and mathematical understanding, who in his own words, wrote an "Essay", not a factual theorem with footnotes and references. I repeat my point, your picture and example is flawed.</p>

<p>I'll also comment on the wider lenses being larger on APSc vs FF. Not always true and very dependant on the lens design. The Nikon 20mm f2.8 is about half the weight and smaller than the Pentax 14mm f2.8 So in some cases it's very true under about 28mm and in other cases it's not like at the really wide end:<br>

The Sigma APSc 10-20mm f4-5.6 (86.4 x 88.9 mm, 520 g) is a smaller lens than the<br>

Sigma FF 12-24mm f4.5-56 (83.82 x 119.38 mm, 670 g) . I'll grant that the 2 are not identical in speed and FOV but they are very close.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Michael, since he's repeating the behaviour and twice has had the posts removed (you are correct that they rarely do this easily), then maybe it's time you wrote The Knot directly and ask them to have his IP address blocked. It won't completely stop him of course but maybe the message will get through if his computer can not log on to the site.</p>

<p>Other than that, check the comments once in awhile, have any of his posts deleted and go forward with your life. </p>

<p>I completely agree Andrew. Give me a true D700 replacement camera at 16MP and some upgrades (1-2 stops higher ISO would be #1), Dual CF, higher frame rate etc etc and price it around the D800. The 2 cameras are for very different shooters.</p>

<p>I figure that Nikon is concerned the D800 sales will slip because a number of shooters have gone to that camera from D700's because there was nothing else. With the introduction of the D600, there still is noting for many D700 owners looking for an upgrade.</p>

<p>Consider me one of them and if this is the lineup for the coming 2-3 years (average product cycle). Then I am resigned to looking for 2 cameras over the next 4-5 months and will be used (a D700 and a D3s). I'll just hope they last till the next bodies come out.</p>

<p>Sorry Ian, it's a nice couple of photos but in terms of lenses, you are comparing apples and oranges. The 24-85mm is a slower, variable aperture lens vs an f2.8 which by physics alone is going to be physically wider and often longer. Plus this doesn't take into account lens design differences.</p>

<p>For example, compare the Tamron 28-75mm vs the older Nikon 28-70mm, both f2.8 lenses. Similar focal length lenses (especially at the wide end) and given the Tamron being 5mm longer, you would expect it to be a physically longer lens. The Nikon is a much bigger lens.<br /> The Nikon: 89mm W x 124mm and weight of 935g<br /> The Tamron: 73mm W x 92mm and a weight of 508g</p>

<p>So the Nikon is approx 84% heavier and 35% longer. but on paper, these are nearly identical lenses (and they are optically as well). Now to use your example, lets consider the crop factor. 16mm on APSc = 24mm FF and 50mm APSc = 75mm FF (FOV and lets not debate this once again).</p>

<p>So the Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 FF lens is the equivalent to the Pentax 16-50mm f2.8 you show above.<br /> Nikon: 83 x 133mm and weight of 902g<br /> Pentax: 84mm x 98.5mm and a weight of 565g (35% shorter or in US terms, over an inch shorter)</p>

<p>The actual fact is, an APSc lens can and often will be smaller (many times very significantly) than a FF lens because the crop circle (sensor size) is smaller. The lens glass doesn't need to be as big to fully illuminate the sensor.</p>

<p>Oh and you are freaking me out putting lenses on their front end down like this. I treat my gear like cr@p compared to most of is but would never do this without a cap and/or hood in place (second photo has no lens caps on).</p>

<p>Pour a Scotch on the rocks, reread Nadine's post and relax. Let him enjoy his psychosis and don't let it infect you.</p>