K10D Jpeg settings

Before you all start shouting at me about using RAW hear me out

A friend of mine bought a K10D a while ago. She bought it at a big elctrical retailers, and either the salesman saw her coming, or more likely was as ignorant about it as she is.
Anyway she bought the camera with the zoom kit lenses and a 6Gb card , plus loads of other extras.

I finally got to see some of her photos after we'd been for a walk together. Since she posted them online I assumed she had reduced them for the net.
No, they were shot at the lowest Jpeg possible and looked horrible. Apparantly the salesman set it at that and said it was fine and she could get loads of photos on her card.
She also still has 1.0 firmware.
Anyway, I am going to see her tomorrow to help her update the firmware and set up the camera for jpegs. She has never had an SLR before, so I am going to try to teach her a few basics of photography while I'm there. She doesn't even understand the concept of RAW at the moment so Im not going to go there
Not having a K10D I do not know the best menu settings for Jpegs with regard to saturation etc etc. Obviously I will set it to the best quality jpegs, but what else should I change and to what level?

What a shame. You generally don't get PHDs working at the big electronics stores... but I'd appreciate it if they simply admitted they didn't know what they were saying. Argh!

Anyway,
Hit menu and the first menu screen has those settings. Easy to get someone to that.
Anyway, I like the sharpness up one notch. I also set the Image Tone from 'natural' to 'bright' (No text for the option, so that is the icon that is in color, as opposed to pale white).

I have read that some also kick the contrast up a notch. Looks more like Canikon, I guess??

Don't know if there is a "best" setting for all cases, but we know that Pentax does do little sharpening of its jpegs and since your friend isn't into post processing yet, you'll want to kick the sharpening up a notch or two. I probably wouldn't go to three unless she only prints directly from the card. (might still be too much?)

I generally shoot in RAW+JPG, and the jpegs looks pretty decent out of the camera for viewing on machines that don't understand PEF files.

I have saturation set at +1, Sharpening +1 (don't over do in camera sharpening) and Contrast at +2. Often it is a matter of preference, also depending on the main subject.

Other settings I would check is the range on the ISO (fn button to access ISO menu) ensure that the range is suitable for the type of pictures, i.e. try and avoid ISO above 400; and the noise reduction setting on the set up menu, should be set to on.

Thanks guys. I also have to reset her WB - that is set to manual
I'll let you know how we get on and if she is happy with the results. I know she was beginning to think she had been sold a lemon.

That one caught me out too when I first got my K10D! Took me about 50 'yellow' shots to realise what was going on!

Might I ask those who suggest sharpening +1 what they do with the pictures later?

I take JPEGs (yes, I know they should be RAW), convert to TIFF, adjust levels as needed, crop etc.

Then two things tend to happen: 1) reduce image to websize with sharpening as needed, 2) reduce image size/sharpen as needed sending to online printing at 6x4.

It seems best (gut-feeling, not tested) to leave sharpening alone in the camera and do it at the final image size. How much difference does changing sharpening level in the camera create at the later stages I have described?

Michael

If you are into post processing then yes leave sharpening until last, when you have the photo as you want.
My friend is a total beginner and has not yet got any PP software (apart from that which came with the camera - which she hasn't loaded). So to encourage her and to get good looking photos straight out of the camera it may be a good idea to set sharpening in camera.
As she gains confidence and understands more she will no doubt change it.

Because I mainly shoot in JPG, I want to get the look I want right in camera - post processing on JPGs reduce the quality. Currently I wouldn't have the time to process all the images I take if I took them in RAW. When I need to, I use RAW (Hay, that dedicated RAW button works for me!). I very rearly have to do any sharpening post processing - partly as I am mostly printing at 6x4 with the occational print at A4.

My friend says thankyou for your help - her photos look a lot better now. She is also going to look for a course to follow to learn more.
She didn't even know how to get the SD card out of the camera. Since I don't have a K10D it took me a while to work it out too - she didn't have the handbook anywhere handy for me to read

I found the Magic Lantern Guides book on the K10D an excellent resource. it works well with the manual and explains why you do things rather then how.

I got it through the Pentax User Club but the ISBN no is 978-1-60059-185-3 and was around £ 15.00 plus postage.

I am sure your friend would find it useful. Maybe buy one for the Store Guy as well

This story seems all too common, I was at a christmas party and the host had just got a new 6mp compact from santa (kodak as I recall) anyway he asked my advice but totally ignored it by letting another guest change the jpeg setting to the lowest possible resolution, I gave up and went back to enjoying myself.
I can just imaging the "Oooos" and "Awwws" when they get their 6x4 prints from the instant print lab......."these are much better than when we used those disposable things aren't they"

sounds very familiar, I think we all have experienced these situations. I try to stay out of them and only when people start complaining about the image quality I make the suggestion to use the highest setting available

Me too, I now stay well out of such discussions unless as you say Golfdiesel people moan about quality levels. After all, what is the point of buying the latest camera SLR or compact with oodles of MP, just to set it on the lowest jpeg settings????? Doesn't make sense, apart from the "clever" guys who say you can store 1001 images on a single card ..... wow!!!!!!

Snappyhoffy, thanks for the tip on the Magic Lantern guide. i had heard of the before and suggested it to my friend, but her English is not that good so she said no to buying one.

I agree and very good value when bought from Amazon.