Decision, decisions

I have been looking around the digital slr market for the last few weeks, and the more I look the more confused i get!

The istd looked a little pricey on my limited budget, so when the DS was announced i got very excited until i read rumblings on this site that 1) my PKA lenses may not work, and 2) the DS will be more of a point and shoot camera, as it's metered manual is difficult to use.

Pentax slr's appealed to me because I have built up a good range of pka lenses which i use with my me super and p30t, and as i only shoot on manual, the new digital slr has to be capable of fully manual operation.

Can anybody give a definitive answer on whether the above two "problems" really exist. I have read the dpreview review, but that came out before the previously mentioned rumblings, so i wonder whether somebody here knows better.
thanks in advance for your help.
john

1) From the Pentax UK site:
Lens Mount
PENTAX KAF bayonet mount (by using AF adapter)
Usable Lens
PENTAX KAF2-, KAF-, and KA-mount lenses
* Power zoom function not available
K-mount lenses usable with restrictions
S-mount lenses usable with adapter
67/645 lenses usable with adapter and with restrictions

2) The Pentax uk site also states that there is a metered manual setting for exposure.

You may want to also consider that even now, and especially once the *ist DS comes out, the price that dealers are willing to part with the *ist D stock for is dropping dramatically.

I am very happy to see the *ist DS but have not decided yet if that is because I can get an *ist DS or because I can get an *ist D much, much cheaper than before.

I have seen a couple of *ist D's on the second hand market for about GBP500, so half the new price, but like everything else Pentax they are hard to come by and are snapped up pretty quickly.
I am still ruminating in wheter to go for a second hand *ist D and get everything I want, go for the *ist DS, or wait until Pentax brings out something else.
Does anyone have any views on the quality of the images taken by the 2 cameras?

I'm just experimenting with my new *istDS and 18-55mm Pentax zoom. It can produce A3 prints that are absolutely fine - do you need more than this?

As far as I can tell the *istD and *istDS use the same or a very similar chip and the quality should be pretty much identical. The *istDS does not need a firmware upgrade to use older lenses and also has a larger screen on the back.

John,

You say *istDs can print to A3 - what do you use to scale up the file size and/ or what settings do you use for output file to printer.

Andy

Hi Andy

I resize in Photoshop 7 to A3 at 300ppi, bicubic resampling. Only moderate levels of Unsharp mask are used to avoid unpleasant edge effects - no more than 50%.

The printer is an Epson 1290s and I use a custom setting for colour and another one for monochrome.

Colour is printed at 2880dpi, magenta reduced by 7.

Monochrome is also 2880dpi and the gamma reset to 2.2. I print using the black cartridge only, and I think the results are very good indeed. To my shame, some of the prints are better than darkroom versions....

All I can add to that is that I try to use relatively straightforward and painkless techniques - as little messing about as possible!

John,

Thanks for your reply

Andy

Have read all the above ...and still don't know what to do...

I am also in the middle of deciding whether to get the *istD or the DS.....i have three Pentax lenses at the moment and don't want to buy a camera that may not accept them....especially my fish eye

is it better to go for the *ist D in this case ? any opinioins would be greatly appreciated

If you already have Pentax lenses, you will be able to use them on both digital bodies.

I have bought a *istDS because of the lower cost, although the quality does not seem to have suffered, and there seemed no reason to pay more for the *istD.

I suggest you look carefully at the specs and prices, make a choice based on your requirements and then buy it! After that, I always stop looking at alternative prices and offers and just get down to enjoying the new toy!

so far I have found the Ds to be excellent in almost every way, with all my old pentax lenses fitting and working well.
The only slight problem I have had is some horizontal banding on some shots taken at high iso 1600 + in machine gun mode. This disappears when pictues are resized.

Thankyou for the advice everyone......I am going to look into it again at the weekend.