Preview
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One thing PentaxDSLRS have always donewell is exposure and it was no different here. Consistency is the keyword. Point theK-3 II at a subject, dark, light, back or front lit, and it gave a spot-on exposure
we had the HD Pentax-DA 18-50mm f/4-5.6 DC WR RE. This sells on its own for £30 more than the 18- 55mm at £230 so if you go for this kit option, expect to pay slightly more. The option is worth considering because the lens can be retracted for greater compactness; it makes a really neat combination with the K-3 II. Turn on the camera with the lens in its retracted position and you get a warning to rotate the lens to its operating position. Having only spent a day or so shooting with the Pentax K-3 II, it certainly appears to be a very fine camera with much going for it, including a competitive price tag. We’ll be testing it fully in Photography News as soon as a full production sample arrives, but so far, so good.
We couldn’t test the Pixel Shift Resolution mode properly on a pre-production model, but the theory sounds good – the only downsides right now are that you need to keep the camera stable and it only works with static subjects. One multi-frame feature you can use handheld is the HDR feature. Three bracketed images are taken consecutively and if there is a slight shift in camera position, the K-3 II resolves any misalignments automatically. Three HDR strengths are available and if you are shooting JPEG and Raw simultaneously, you get a single merged HDR JPEG and the three bracketed Raws so you can play later at home too. In Raw shooting you have the option of whether you want Pentax PEF or Adobe DNG files. Given the convenience of DNG that’s the option I went for, later processing the images in Lightroom CC. The typical Raw file size was around 30-36MB with JPEGs around 9-15MB. I shot everything in either program or aperture- priority AE mode using the K-3 II’s multi-segment metering pattern. Having used Pentax SLRs over many years, I know that one thing they have always done well is exposure and it was no different here. Consistency is the keyword. Point the K-3 II at a subject, dark, light, back or front lit, and it seemed to give a spot- on exposure. Extreme lighting is a perennial issue and here the K-3 II seemed to favour shadow detail so complete silhouettes were avoided, even when shooting with the full sun in the frame. The K-3 II sells for £849.99 with the DA 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6WR standard zoom. With our preview sample
ABOVE Side-lighting on a predominately dark background can be tricky for camera meters, often resulting in overexposure. No problem for our pre-production K-3 II here though and the orange buoy was nicely recorded. Again shot on the DA 18-50mm f/4- 5.6 at 50mm. The exposure was 1/80sec at f/10, ISO 100.
πTo find out more, go to www.ricoh-imaging.co.uk.
As in most modern digital cameras, the Pentax K-3 II has picture modes that work in JPEG only and gives plenty of in-camera creative effects. There are 11 effects available on this DSLR from colour rendition styles such Picturemodes
BLEACH BYPASS
as Bright and Vibrant and subject-oriented settings, including Landscape and Portrait, to more extreme effects like Cross Process and Bleach Bypass, as shown here (right).
RADIANT
MUTED
CROSS PROCESS
REVERSAL
MONO
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Issue 21 | Photography News
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