K-3 exposure

Thanks Philip, I was not aware of this. It seems to be something for nothing, or least it did till I noticed the small print that it is not usable below 200 ASA - I use 100 as often as I can.

I wonder how it works ? Changing the sensitivity amplies the photons captured - guessing this setting is using a simiar idea.

Well worth experimenting with. Many thanks.

I definitely have not seen a tendency to blow highlights with my K-3, quite the contrary in fact. The dynamic range is very good indeed, not noticeably different from my K-5's. I find the K-3 meters very accurately, in most situations. It appears to be more reliable on metering than the K-5 variants.

Here's an example of a (processed) K-3 image that had a pretty wide dynamic range:




It had the assistance of a 0.6 ND Grad filter for the sky.

Regards
David

Exposure is a really subjective area (unlike 'sharp' focus for example). Multi-segment metering is a world to itself and you've no idea what the camera is compensating for (or not). From the spec, the K-3 metering sounds much more advanced than the K-5 and it wouldn't be a surprise to find that they did things differently - even before you consider the various optional highlight/shadow/dynamic range settings.

With multi-segment metering, the camera has no idea what effect you're after, or where you want to put the mid-tones/highlights/shadows. Exposure compensation with multi-segment metering is unlikely to get reliable, consistent results because for each scene the relative 'segments' are assessed by the algorithm in an attempt to find a suitable match programmed into the system.

I usually use spot or centre-weighted because of the above reason (I can usually predict how they will react and can apply exposure compensation as required).

Multi-segment metering should provide the optimum exposure range, albeit not necessarily at the best level for the subject. It should preserve shadow details and prevent highlights getting blown so you end up with an image that can be easily worked on in post processing. However almost always the photograph will need working on to obtain the optimum levels for the subject matter.

I use multi-segment on the K-3 for most situations. As mentioned above it works very well.

Regards
David

After a little more time and I'm reasonably sure that the dynamic range of the K-3 is worse than the K-5. It is subjective, but a little more care is needed to stop highlights blowing, there just seems slightly less latitude.

DXOMark backs this up: http://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Compare/Side-by-side/Pentax-K-3-versus-Pentax-K-5...

In reality this is offset by the new features, but to me it is a slight degradation in performance, for the type of photos I have been taking ie landscape. Perhaps it shows how good the K-5 sensors are. Getting the K-5 DR and the cropability and larger print sizes in the K-3 was always going to be a trade off.

The K-3 with primes do give stunning clarity/resolution, so a good upgrade, but with a little more care required.

One question. I don't really want to use grads and I tend to use the 2 second timer to flip the mirror up for longer exposures. What I want to be able to do is bracket, so I can blend in high dynamic conditions. But I can't seem to get the mirror flipped up and bracket automatically. Bracketing manually, doesn't work unless it is a still day (=boring, usually). Can you get the mirror flipped up and bracket automatically ? - thanks.