Digital pros and Cons

Pentax have given me the option of replaccing my non functioing MZs body with a new DS instead of perservering with attempts to fix it.


I am seriously considering this, I will retian my MX and Ricoh GR1v 35mm cameras and my film scanner.

Please can you help me with some questions.

I am very concerend over dust in sensor problems, does the DS have a shutter to protect the sensor whn changing lenses et, or does the mirror down provide suitable sealing?

One reason for choosing the MZs in the first place was its percieved toughness. How tough is the DS for harsh hot/cold environments?

I like geting occasional enlargements bigger than A3 off scanned (at 5400dpi) negs and transparancies. I have read a lot of discussions on this on the web, but what are peoples opinion of printing large enlargments off a DSLR, ie at 150dpi, interpolated up to say 254dpi before sending to Peak Imaging or similar pro labs?

I would need a new A3 printer,any sensibly priced recommendations?

I would need to get a new wide zoom to overcome the 1.6 crop factor; the 16-45 is a lot more expensive than the 18-55, how do these rank in performance with my 24-90?

Thanks

Kevin

Hi Kevin,
Just reading your cross-post on ePhotozine as well
I'll try and answer:

1) Dust. The *ist-D/DS have a shutter and mirror the same as all film cameras. You will get dust in there eventually. However a big puffer usually gets the crud off, and if you need to clean it it's not really that difficult to do. (I've cleaned mine three times).

2) I have the *ist-D and it's very well made. It depends how extreme you mean about hot/cold environments... you shouldn't have too many probs down to -18C as far as I know (especially if you use the Lithium cells). Memory card writes tend to slow down as it gets colder, and battery life for NiMH cells goes well down.

3) I have printed at A2 from the *ist-D without any interpolation, via Photobox. Result was stunning. Personally I find digital cleaner, but different to film.

4) Not sure about printers... I tend to go straight to online print service

5) The 16-45 is a stonkingly good lens. Noticeable sharper than the 24-90. Distortion is almost non-existent. It's wonderful The 24-90 performs very well on the *ist-D too Park Cameras have it for £270, which is pretty excellent IMHO (and depressing as I paid £350!).

I'd also suggest purchasing a large SD card (for the *ist-DS) - if you shoot RAW (which is by far the best), then a couple of 1Gb are useful (about 70 shots on each).

Hope that helps

Matt

We use the Epson 1290s A3+ printer, which is relatively inespensive and prduces stunning results. Thoroughly recommended.

Matt has covered everything else!

I would be the first to admit that anno domini aided and abetted by an amount of carelessness have contrived to bring my photographic skills to their lowest point of the 50+ years since I first took up the hobby but despite that the technical quality of the output from my *ist D and Epson R1800 outclass my best work from the past. No problems with C41 chemical stains and dermatitus either.

That's a brave admission, so I'll too confess to making better black and white prints on my inkjet printer than many of my darkroom efforts!

Seems similar to me
Since going digital I've realised how aweful even my best images were!! (That's why I've just had to upgrade all my glass )
Matt

Thanks, Matt, what a terrific excuse for more lenses....why didn't I think of that?

Ha ha You soon run out of excuses!
Seriously, I didn't realise what I was missing until I started getting hold of decent glass (like the SMC-F 50/f1.7). The good glass really shines on the digital sensors, and as you know, I've made a conscious decision to stick with the Pentax glass.

Now have 16-45, 24-90, 80-320, 50/1.7, and 100/2.8 - have finally settled on this set (The 80-320 is proving amazing. Such superb contrast and detail in so small a package. A joy to use.) I also use the 1.7xAF convertor and some TriPlus extension tubes (which have the electrical contacts). Flash is down to the AF360 and a Metz 50MZ-5.

The 12-24 will make a nice addition That's one lens just aching for another excuse
Matt

Oh, yes.....12-24mm....Mmmmm....

I recently ran a lens test for a talk I was doing at ADAPS, and the results were astonishing. I compared the *ist DS with 18-55mm and 24-90mm, a Fuji S2 Pro with Nikkor 28-105mm, a Fuji S7000 and a Pentax 750Z.

I mention this again because you mentioned the 24-90mm, and it really performed very poorly on my close up target. The SMC Pentax-A 35-70mm f4, excellent on film, was even worse on the CCD and I can only describe it as abysmal.

The real star was the 750Z, which out-resolved everything else, and I know elsewhere some found that hard to believe, but that's the way it was...

Hmmm.
I wouldn't call the 24-90 the sharpest of the bunch, but it just has "something" about the image quality that I can't get from other lenses. I have had some beautiful images from it, and generally it's the lens that's on the *ist-D. The 100mm/f2.8 is awesomely sharp, but there's still a quality that I very much like about the 24-90 that I can't find anywhere else (my first shots were some wedding "snaps" that I was over the moon with. Shot in RAW, a little PS processing, and they rivalled the pro results )

However, because it has very good contrast I find the images sharpen up very well indeed in PS (with the right technique). True, the 16-45 is much sharper. And it is also true that all the compacts sharpen much more aggressively than the DSLRs. The reason is this - since you post process 99% of the time, adding the sharpening to the image within the PC gives you more control and flexibility. Once an image has been sharpened in camera (especially if it's over sharpened), there's not much you can do to undo that "damage". It's always best to keep it softer and leave the sharpening until later. But that's a completely different, and rather huge, subject

Maybe I should rustle up a little tutorial...


There are other real killer effects, which are more important than just sharpness IMHO, are ghosting, flare control, and chromatic aberration. I'd rather have a slightly softer lens which handles these three things well. The Pentax glass is generally just amazing (which is why that's all I have now). Yes, a little CA, even on the 100/2.8, but not excessive, certainly not like some third party lenses I've tried! Testing for these requires differing conditions, and I don't see that a single test shot can measure all these things. Just something else to throw into the melting pot

Matt

Matt

I think a lot of us would like to see your tutorial on post-processing, even if a small and quick one.

People like me, who love photography and are fed up with compacts, would benefit. I have shot with my old Zenit EM while I was a kid, but the understanding one gets of photography as an art and a science at my age is much bigger.

So, if you can gather the time, drop us a few lines on your experience, maybe with some links to other sites or books where we can learn some more.

Always nice to learn from the pro's!

Flink,
Not a pro, just a Photoshop nutcase
Well, here are a few sharpening links that are well worth the read (some are long though!):
http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/12189-2.html
http://www.creativepro.com/story/feature/20357-2.html

http://www.retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=169
http://www.retouchpro.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10602
http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=158
http://retouchpro.com/tutorials/?m=show&id=149

There are some interesting, useful, and novel ways of sharpening in those links. High-pass sharpening is very useful and quick (and works wih Elements too). The CreativePro links give a technique that uses some advanced layer modes available only in Photoshop - they have the most recent sharpening techniques (there is a simpler version that I've used too, which I don't have a link for). The results are very natural and controllable (which I like!).

What I want to do, given the time, is put together a Photoshop action set that is specifically for the *ist-D/DS with values set best for general use...
Matt

I have to agree with Matt about the 24-90. Of course it's not as sharp as the best primes, but I get lovely pictures with it on my D.

This sharpness issue is a big problem. In the days of film, it was about the only quality of a lens that could be measured precisely and objectively. As a result, there was, and is, a temptation for manufacturers to concentrate on this aspect of lens design at the expense of more subtle but equally or more important qualities.

Now with digital, there is the ability to sharpen digitally, and as a result there is no practicable way to compare the performance of, say, the lens on the 750Z and a lens on a DSLR.

I personally believe it is most unlikely that the 750Z can produce all-round results anywhere near as good as what is possible on a DSLR. Just measuring digitally-enhanced sharpness is no way to evaluate lens performance.

George

I must just mention that when I did the lens tests I did, the target was a mixture of fine detail and larger areas to enable some sort of impression of lens performance to be obtained.

When I took the files I examined the unsharpened pictures and then again with sharpening at 50% USM.

What I was referring to, though, was not sharpness per se, but resolution, which is a different matter. The 750Z resolved finer writing than any of the other lenses tested, DSLR included, simply on the basis that you could clearly read the finest print in the test target on the 750Z and you could only just make it out on the best DSLR lenses. It was unreadable on the 24-90mm.

All I can suggest is that you try it for yourselves with an open mind!

It's still a complex field, but the tests at www.imaging-resource.com showed the 750Z at "1450-1500 lines of strong detail" and extinct at 1800 ("much on a par with the rest of the 7-megapixel field")

(That site has resolution test targets of both cameras.)

The *istD test had "1350 lines of strong detail" and extinct at 1600. However, they did comment that the RAW converted files are a fair bit sharper than the in camera JPG. I'd agree with that completely, especially when processed with Capture One - in fact the difference is mind-blowing, IMHO.

I'd love to be able to test the 750Z, but, although I own a Canon S30 and an Optio S40, we both prefer the SLR format.

I wasn't arguing with you John, just pointing out that there's more to a lens than just resolution etc, and the 24-90 can seem disappointing "spec-wise", but performs like no other lens I have had (and I like it!!).

For sheer sharpness, the 50mm/f1.7 and 100mm/f2.8 are just awesome! (Might have to do my own resolution test sometime on those lenses... in fact I thought I saw a review with the 100mm/f2.8... I'll see if I can dig out the link)

Matt