Pentax K-3 Hands on Review (+playlist)

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Pentax FLUCARD PRO for Pentax K-3 Setup and How To Guide

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The future is becoming the present. Captured with the Pentax K-5 and K-3.

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 Hi Photographer friends,

It's not that long ago that we started contemplating alternative sources of energy. I remember the first windmill I saw, in Central California. I couldn't believe how big they were.

Now, years later, the are becoming common sites. My spouse think that they are ugly and that they pollute the scenery. I, on the opposite, believe that atop being a great source of energy, they are amazingly pleasing to look at. It's like a forest of smart trees. 

I can only imagine how a person would react seeing them after coming out of a 30 years coma. It would probably look like awaking on another planet.  However, to my knowledge, nobody has ever stayed in a coma for 30 years.

I think they are beautiful symbols of modern life, don't you?

The images below were all taken in the Palm Springs, California, area.

Thanks for reading,

Yvon Bourque

Let me remind you that e-books for the Pentax K-3 available here:  ebooks4cameras
We also carry e-books for all Pentax DSLRs.

One day trip to Mexico with the Ricoh GR

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 Hi Photographer friends,

This week we went to Nuevo Progreso, Mexico. We are currently spending some time in Southern Texas in our RV, and despite all the warnings of crossing the border, our visit was a great one. We parked our vehicle on the U.S. side and walked to Mexico via the International bridge. 

Our Home is where our RV is parked.

The food was excellent and the people very friendly. Being a border town, merchants are everywhere trying to sell hats to sunglasses, candy to full meals and everything in between. It seems that every second business is a Pharmacy, a Dentist or an Optometrist. The facts are that it is indeed very inexpensive when compared to our side of the border. 

However, our visit was for entertainment and as tourists. Mexico is a colorful country. Everywhere you look, there are bold colors. I had the Ricoh GR in my pocket first, as I was told to hide everything of value. I saw no threat at all. We visited Mexico before and it boils down to using common sense. 

The Ricoh GR is the ideal camera for walkabout shooting. It is small enough to carry around and the sensor is an APS-C sized, actually the same as the Pentax K-5. The camera is equipped with an 18.3mm wide-angle lens and is perfect for tight spaces. The quality of the images, is astounding. The following images were captured that day and I wanted to emphasize on the bright colors of Mexico.

Thank you for visiting,

Yvon Bourque

Get our e-books for the Pentax line of DSLRs, including the new K-3.

Revive old images taken with a 3.39 megapixels camera using Lightroom.

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 Hi Photographer friends,

I posted a while back about keeping your pictures that were well composed but with an incorrect exposure. My point was that someday, software would be available to correct the badly exposed images. Every year, new software packages are introduced with more and more capabilities. The pictures below were taken with digital cameras between 1998 and 2000. One camera had 3.39 megapixels. 

Using Lightroom 5.3, I was able to revive some pictures, even more than I did before. I think they were all well composed , but the exposure and other factors keep me from doing anything with these images, except for keeping them in my photo files.

I cannot make them bigger and expect great results, but by using today's tools, I think they are acceptable for computer screen viewing and emails, or even Facebook and other social media places.

Here's what I did.

I tweaked the color and made them more vivid. I used Lightroom's Clarity slider, then the sharpening slider (to the right) and finally the Noise Reduction and Luminance. It makes the images look slightly like a water color print, but hides all of the imperfections.

In the end, photography is an Art and what ever pleases you or the viewers, is okay. 

Thank you for reading,

Yvon Bourque

Visit my e-commerce store for e-books for all Pentax DSLRs from the K10D to the K-3.

Новый флагман среди зеркальных цифровых камер PENTAX с байонетом K, обладающий множеством непревзойденных технических инноваций

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Video Pentax in Deutsch

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Le PENTAX K-3 : à vous de fixer les limites !

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New Firmware Rev. 1.02 for the Pentax K-3.

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 Hi Photographer friends,

K-3 Firmware Update Version 1.02

Thank you for using a PENTAX K-3 digital camera.

RICOH IMAGING COMPANY, LTD. wishes to announce the release of Firmware Update Software Version 1.02 for PENTAX K-3.
Firmware in this document is the software that runs inside digital cameras.

Changes to V1.02
• Added .Bracket shooting in [Anti-Aliasing Filter Simulator].
How to operate Bracket shooting click here  
• Improved stability for general performance.
*Contents of [Version 1.01] will be also updated and following contents will be improved
• Improved stability of battery level indicator when using with battery grip.
• Optimized AF performance when setting AF.C mode.

Changes to V1.01
• Shorten processing time of combining time for HDR Capture.
• Improved performance of continuous shooting when using phase-matching autofocus.
• Extended enlarged display time for live view.
• Improved stability for general performance.

Visit the Pentax Downkoad site

• K-3 Firmware Update V1.02 for MAC Download
• K-3 Firmware Update V1.02 for Windows Download

Great news for Pentaxians.

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 Hi Photographer friends,

We waited for this for a long time. Here it is:

Look how good it looks with the smc PENTAX DA Star 300mm F4 ED(IF) SDM

KEY FEATURES

Weather Resistant

·   The HD PENTAX DA AF 1.4X AW rear converter features weather-resistant construction to prevent the intrusion of water and moisture into the lens barrel when paired with weather sealed PENTAX DSLR bodies and lenses. The user is assured of greater durability and reliability when shooting in rain or mist, as well as at locations subject to a spray or splash.

PENTAX HD Lens Coating

·  Treated with HD coating, a PENTAX-exclusive multi-layer lens coating, enjoy higher light transmittance and lower reflectance than conventional multi-layer coatings. This means it produces sharp, clear images free of flare and ghost images, even under such adverse lighting conditions as backlight.

1.4X Magnification in a Compact Form Factor

·    The HD PENTAX DA AF 1.4X AW rear converter offers a 40% increase in focal length when mounted between the body and lens, yet has an extremely small form factor.  Measuring only 20 millimeters (approximately 0.8 inches) long, its compact, lightweight design allows the user to more easily reach out to distant subjects. The minimum focusing distance of the lens is retained, allowing for the capture of larger, more detailed images in close-up situations.

o    *When this rear converter is mounted, the lens maximum aperture will be smaller by 1 stop.

Auto Focus and Aperture Compatibility

·   Auto Focus and Auto Aperture functionality is retained when using the HD PENTAX DA AF 1.4X AW rear converter.   The rear converter works flawlessly with both the camera-driven AF system and the lens-driven AF system (such as the  SDM- and DC- series lenses).**

o    **The camera’s firmware must be updated to the latest version before using the autofocus function. Compatible camera bodies are: K-3, K-50, K-500, K-30, K-5 II, K-5 II s, K-5, K-01, K-7, and K-r. Autofocus is possible with a PENTAX lens having maximum aperture of f/4 or brighter.

Pricing and Availability

The HD PENTAX DA AF 1.4X AW rear converter will be available at retailers nationwide and online in March 2014 for a price of $599.95.

SPECIFICATIONS

MAGNIFICATION:	1.4 times
LENS CONSTRUCTION:	4 elements in 3 groups
LENS MOUNT:	KAF2
LENS CASE:	Lens soft case DA70mm Limited
MAXIMUM DIAMETER x LENGTH:	Approx. 65mmx20mm (2.6inchx0.8inch)
WEIGHT:	Approx. 126g/4.4oz
BUNDLE:	Case, Body Mount Cap, Lens Mount Cap
OTHERS:	HD Coating Weather resistant, dustproof construction(AW)

************************************************

Three new rugged compacts, the WG-4 GPS, WG-4 and WG-20, as well as a new mounting system for the WG series of cameras. were also introduced.

As you will note, the WG-4 and WG-20 series are the first to bear the Ricoh name.  As such, Ricoh / Pentax wanted to take this opportunity to reiterate their commitment to the historical PENTAX brand. The PENTAX name will continue to appear on all of their interchangeable lens cameras, lenses and sport optics, while the Ricoh name will be reserved for the compact cameras. Check here for more info about the compact cameras.

Thank you for looking,

Yvon Bourque

How much cropping, Photoshop manipulation, tweaking, adjusting and adding new elements is okay, enough or too much?

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 Hi Photographer friends,

How much cropping, Photoshop manipulation, Tweaking, adjusting and adding new elements is okay, enough or too much?

We all ask ourselves these questions at one time or another. Photography is an art, and just like painting, you can make the final results reflect what you want it to represent. You are creating an image, you are not just reporting an image. A lot of people like to produce HDR (High Dynamic Range) images. Trey Ratcliff specializes in HDR images and he's doing pretty well. As an artist, you are in control, although sometimes the HDR is pushed to the limits and it starts to look like a cartoon. However, if that's the way you feel comfortable in expressing yourself, it's all good.

With today's cameras supporting 24 megapixels and more, you can crop your images effectively.  You can crop, rotate and tweak your images and still have a big enough file to produce medium to large prints suitable for framing.

So...although I believe that there are no limits in creativity, there is one exception. I absolutely refrain from modifying any image that are part of a photo-journalistic essay, or for publishing media. If you are reporting an event, no modifications should ever be made, except for some slight rotation to align the horizon, or similar changes. The content of the original image should always remain unchanged otherwise you are lying to the reading and viewing public.

The first image below is the image that I found most pleasing to me and I had it framed. It is now hanging in my RV.

See how I got there. The original photo is displayed below. There was nothing special about the image, but I saw beyond that and my imagination wanted to bring it to what I thought I saw in the viewfinder, real or imagined.

The first thing I did was to straighten the image and then I cropped it to remove uninteresting  elements.

Working with Photoshop Lightroom 5.0, I changed the lighting, the shadows, the clarity and the contrast. I also adjusted the white balance.  It's not for everyone, but for me, the original image was not a keeper but I was able to make it my preferred image of that day.

You can keep on adding to it, but once you start to add other elements, you are painting an image. There is nothing wrong with it, it's just not the picture you took to begin with. However, it's great for a web site page or for enhancing an image within a pre-selected context.

 

Thank you for reading,

Yvon Bourque

You can purchase e-books for all the Pentax DSLRs on my e-commerce site. More tips are included and more will be added in the future. The newest e-book about the great Pentax K-3 is available, with more that 300 pages. 

http://www.ebooks4cameras.com/