I'm almost always at AWB. Generally my environment is changing so much that sticking the camera into a particular value simply makes things worse. The camera will detect when a flash is popped up (or in the hotshoe) and set WB to "Flash" on its own. So AWB still works well enough for me.

If I am in a studio environment, I might set WB to suit my flash head's needs if AWB is a bit off.
It keeps me from adjusting the photo later and applying that change to hundreds of images in the set.
Although not a big deal if I forget since the change can be applied consistently across all photos in almost one click.

Thanks, that appears to have done it.

I really think some of the other brand cameras have it nice where you can save your settings on the card.
Its been a week with the darned thing back and I'm still playing with menu items when I find the camera behaving differently than I remembered.

Thanks a lot.
I've been tearing my hair our, and didn't connect the "Sensitivity" memory setting with turning off Auto ISO.

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to turn off Auto ISO.
Every time I turn my K7 off, then on, it goes into Auto ISO mode, and the ISO changes depending on where I point my camera.

I am in AV mode, and this should not happen.
At least I do not want it to happen.
And before I had my cameras in for repair, I never noticed it happening before.

I cannot find a mane setting for this nor anything in the manual.
Am I blindly missing something?

Any help on how to turn this off would be appreciated.

Auto ISO range set as 100-800.
Auto ISO mode set to Standard.

FYI, I did some quick comparison shots with and without the profile applied.
Had some multiple equipment failures today (lens, camera, flash triggers) so this is the best I can get for today.
Sorry for the wonky white balance and slightly skewed images. But it will give some idea of the automatic correction the profiles can do.

Anyway, example images are here:

DA*16-50:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/compare_16-50.jpg

DA* 50-135:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/compare_50-135.jpg

DA 18-55 WR kit lens:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/compare_18-55.jpg

I believe if the sensor size is different (number of MPixels) there will be some dis-similarities in how well the profiles work.
But I have heard, at least on the Canon and Nikon side, that profiles will work across models with similar sensor size/shape.

Otherwise, I believe you will be allowed to select any profile you want regardless of camera body, and see how well another profile does or does not work.

I created a few lens profiles for my K7 with the DA* 16-50mm, DA* 50-135mm, and the 18-55 kit lenses.

The profiles include focal lengths at both ends and near the middle. Hopefully that would give good estimates for anything in between (not sure how well Adobe does there).

Hopefully these will help. I would be very interested in hearing how well they work for you.
To install, you should be able to drop them into the lens profile folder.


On the Mac, UnZip them to:
~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/CameraRaw/LensProfiles/1.0/

On Windows 7, UnZip to:
C:/ProgramData/Adobe/CameraRaw/LensProfiles/1.0

On Windows XP, Unzip to:
C:/Documents and Settings/All Users/Application Data/Adobe/CameraRaw/LensProfiles/1.0



Find the files here:
DA* 16-50:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/PENTAX_K-7_smc_PENTAX-DA_16-50mm_F2.8_ED_AL_IF_SDM.zip

DA* 50-135:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/PENTAX_K-7_smc_PENTAX-DA_50-135mm_F2.8_ED_IF_SDM.zip

18-55 kit:
http://moringello.com/photo/pentax/lensprofiles/PENTAX_K-7_smc_PENTAX-DA_18-55mm_kit_lens.zip

Just looking at the images a second time... I notice a fine slight line of flash reflecting in the back of the 540's body. It appears your built-in flash is functioning.

In my opinion, PTTL utterly fails completely when there is any specular highlight in the frame.
Neither flash may be requested to give significant power to light the scene because the Pentax camera reduces flash power until specular highlights are properly exposed (which almost by definition should not be). To that end, PTTL will usually set output power to the absolute minimum. Depending on your aperture, this may not be enough to expose any of your scene.

Try moving the flash out of the frame or cover any specular areas with non-reflective material.

I would expect to see something on the carpet form the 540 being fired, but I've had similar results of nearly black frames with the slightest specular highlights. The K7 seems better, but it still suffers from this behavioral limitation.

Still, I would expect *consistent* results, which you are certainly not getting.

Just wonderin'... when you say the built-in flash is set to "master" are you expecting it to be part of the exposure or not? As Master, the built in flash should illuminate the scene regardless of the remote flash firing. You should not get a black frame. It seems to point to a problem with the built in flash.


A couple of odd ball Suggestions:
Set up a mirror in front of the camera to get the built in flash reflecting in frame.
If the built-in flash is firing as master you should get a large bright flash from the built-in flash.
If the built-in flash is firing as controller, you should get a dim flash reflecting back.


Set aperture and shutter speed to get some ambient light regardless of flash. (i.e. Are you sure the shutter is opening?) OK I'm sure this would be obvious without the flash, but hey...


What is the shutter speed set to?
If you try manual or TV mode with shutter speed set to 1" just for grins, does the behavior change? (assuming 1" doesn't completely blow out the image on its own, of course)


About two years ago I had my K10D in for repairs because it was not consistently firing the flash.
Sadly, just had my K7 camera in for repairs. Hotshoe stopped working and exposure for same scene ranged from 1/3200s to 1/25s.
Many years ago, had my istD in for repairs with issues with the flash.

I don't know anyone else with such repeated problems, but just saying it could be a bad camera.

Lovin LR3!!!
Cant describe how much faster it is for viewing my catalogs (45,000+ images in the large one) and for metadata searches.

Noise reduction is amazing, but honestly, most of the time if I needed that much noise reduction, I'd probably mask out some parts... an for that you need to bring into PhotoShop as a Smart Object (or open from CS5 directly). But it is a lot better than the prior version.

I created my first lens profile in about 30 minutes (download, install, read directions, take photos, create profile, and import final profile). It does a decent job and picks up the lens automatically when I tell it to do lens correction. (lighting was awful, but the end result was still better than I had expected).

I have to agree with prior statements... the degree of quality will vary as it includes both barrel/pincushion as well as chromatic aberration. Chart positioning and lighting are going to affect the results a lot.

Although I was under the impression that if your camera/lens combination is in Adobe's catalog, that you could pretty much import it automatically. Its just a matter that each lens/camera combination has to be done separately on an as-needed basis. You cannot simply grab a bunch of files and make it work.
You could, but the UI interface allows for the automated import of profile needed at that time.
Of course, until some Pentax profiles get put up, I guess I cannot say for sure.

It would be great if someone has the ability to do this well, to post files to share.
I'll probably try again this weekend.

I knew I forgot something last night. Yikes! I think they found me... gotta run...