May I ask for some guidance please

[quote:3496ace15f="Yorkie"I'm hoping my new kit will arrive on Tuesday and I will celebrate by becoming a Plus Member to give a little back to the forum - and playing with my new camera of course. [/quote]

Good man. Your celebration is most appropriate. Looking forward to reading your posts and seeing the images from your new kit.

The new kit arrived this morning and joins its ancestors in my stable, the oldest being the Pentax SV (circa 1962) on the left to the new (to me) Pentax K-3 II centre stage.


Ooops! I missed out the Optio W80 so I had to paste it in afterwards.

Initial impressions of the camera are good apart from the lack of tethered shooting functionality (unless someone knows better?) and a bewildering array of menu items (am I the only one who struggles with on-screen user manuals or is it just my old grey matter?).

As mentioned previously, to celebrate I have now joined the elite band of Plus Membership.

Tethered....

Do you mean cable release or controlled from a laptop???

If it is a cable release, there should be a socket on the lower righthand side. Below the SD Card socket.

Also under the drive select menu, you should be able to select IR Remote. Obviously you need to buy one. Third party ones from fleabay start at about a fiver!

By 'tethered' I mean controlled from a PC/laptop Spad. I have/do shoot my other brand of cameras tethered for close up and macro photography so it is a bit of a disappointment that the K-3II can't do it but it's no big deal. I'm going to look for a cable release shortly, thanks for the heads up.

Is this the sort of tethering software you want? link

I've not used it myself so can't comment on what it does and how well it does it, but K3ii is in the list of supported cameras.

My own approach to close-up/macro in the field with a K3 (original) on a tripod is to frame and focus using the viewfinder (with or without right-angle finder as needed) then use a wireless remote to fire the shutter. For desktop macro, the K3 is in live view, tethered to a PC via USB to see the live view image on a big screen (using OBS Studio on the PC), focus adjusted manually (by focus rack), shutter fired by wireless remote. It works for me at least.

Steve

Thanks for the info Lubbyman. My normal workflow for other cameras is by tethering to a computer and using Capture One Pro software, this allows me full control over the camera settings and operation from the computer. Having hooked up the K3ii, all the software seems to do is allow me to import images from the camera. It's more than I expected and I can work with it should the need arise so I don't think I will need any other software.

You may not want to mess with WiFi but this offers quite a lot of what you want ??
https://www.wificommanderpentax.com/

That's interesting @oberri, I'll bear it in mind, thank you.

The K3ii doesn't have built-in wifi so wificommander won't work with it. The only wifi tethering option is a Pentax FluCard which is a wifi-enabled SD card, now discontinued but used ones can sometimes be found for sale in the usual places. I don't use it very often now as it's slow and not exactly the slickest bit of software out there, but you can control the camera with it and it does what it claims to do.

Steve

Thanks for the info Steve, I think I'll be happy with the functionality I have now.

I used to say that, too. But my photographic cupboard tells a different story...

Steve

I know the feeling Steve, this is my new-to-me Pentax digital adventure.
'sotto voce' I wouldn't dare to mention the extensive kit for my other leading camera brands.

I can recommend a Flu Card. It sits in slot 2 of a K3ii and you sit in a deckchair with a mobile phone. It's a lot better than the cut down thing in a K1 (which I never use). I am using this more and more as my eyes deteriorate. I knocked it up with the sewing machine and £5 worth of black cotton stuff from the drapers. What a stunning difference it makes! I got some velcro too to secure it beneath the lens but turned out it wasn't needed.

Thanks for your comments regarding the Flu Card David, should one come my way I would give it a go. The photo has reminded me that it's time to get my 5x4 cameras out and exercise the bellows, I find it helps keep the supple. I'm not sure why you need such a large darkcloth though, it's bigger than the ones I use for my LF shooting.

Some people like using fancy cameras, perhaps other people like dressing up as Darth Vader ... :

Steve