Jeanette, PP is far from my strongest suit so I won't even try and suggest what you should do, but from a purely objective standpoint, as an observer my initial reaction was that your pic was slightly over exposed or washed out in some way - but nothing that couldn't be fixed in PP from what i understand.

How does it look on your monitor next to your friend's? How does it look to your eyes? Maybe I am seeing it through different eyes from you. We all have our own way of seeing things and our own tastes in what is pleasing to our eye.

Forgetting composition, sharpness etc. to me the colours lack some of the depth or warmth of the other picture - but again I am sure this is a simple tweak.

Bottom line is you love you photography and are openly asking for feedback in order to improve which can only be a good position for any of us to adopt

It's amazing that people spend so much energy on this.

Pentax, Canon and Nikon are ALL VERY GOOD QUALITY brands and all make excellent lenses and cameras. Period. Anyone who argues against this is just being churlish, hypersensitive and paranoid.

Pentax is a brilliant camera and lens brand. But is it the best? No.
Is Nikon? No
Is Canon? No.

They all have their role and their target audiences for whom they are 'the best'. And all of them do some things better than the competition. That's the nature of the beast

Are Pentax lenses better than Canon glass or Nikon's or the other way round? This is just nonsense and you shouldn't even go there. Yes Pentax has its own coatings, but if Canon or Nikkor lenses didn't cut the mustard the pros certainly wouldn't use them. There might be a lens here or there in each range which is better or faster than the equivalent lens in the other brands, but on the whole they are ALL EXCELLENT. Again to say otherwise is just being petty and smallminded.

Canon and Nikon are bigger companies and therefore can and do segment their market more than Pentax and can offer different things to different sectors of the market, from entry level amateurs to serious pros who demand the top spec in all areas (from Af to FPS to IQ to customer service and yes even branding and brand awareness so on) and can afford to pay for it

Pentax is a smaller 'niche' player in a position where it is trying to please several sectors of the market at one time with a more limited range of offerings. In my opinion Pentax products are brilliant at that middle segment which covers most people in this forum I expect. I don't think Pentax is trying to be anything that it is not. It is just Pentax and will always have a slightly niche identity I expect.

It really is a waste of time and energy to compare and play the 'my dad's stronger than your dad' game. Just accept what you have and enjoy it for what it is and if it no longer suits for whatever reason is personal to you try and find something else that does meet your current needs. Who cares what the brand name is if it is the right fit FOR YOU?

Once more I am opting out and removing the notification so I don't get reminder emails bringing me back to yet another thread that has degenerated into a farce. It's been useful being here the last month or so, but right now I have no appetite to stick around, addictive though it is

I start threads or contribute to them because I hope to learn from others' contributions or trigger a debate (not deliberately contentious) where there is a subject in which I would like to weigh up dichotomous opinions.

There are some threads on here that were started in that spirit by others but degenerate into nonsense that doesn't advance anyone's photographic knowledge. I have just removed the notifications from one or two such threads so I don't keep getting reminder emails to go and check out the latest drivel. In other words, the quality and content of some of the contributions deteriorates to such an extent that it makes me want to opt out.

There is a place for light banter and I am guilty of it too, but on the whole I would like to dip into this forum to advance my knowledge and understanding of all things photographic and Pentaxian.

Where would we be without George?

I am sure that the quality lenses from the quality manufacturers are much of a muchness. They will all be good. How can they not be?

Where there might be differences IMO would be in speed for example whereby Canon will offer an 85mm f1.2 but Pentax might not because the target market for Canon is more likely to have a need for this speed yet Pentax's target market would be satisfied with 85mm f1.8 or f2.

I suspect the starting point of this thread was about creating products suitable for a pro market even though that (meaningless) word wasn't used.

I was on a film set today and the stills photographer was using a Canon eos 1 mark 111 body (huge) but I must say I saw two lenses he used : 85mm f1.2 and 50mm f1.2 . Both very nice but not small and he said the 85mm was heavy...add that to the heavy bulky Canon body and he can save his gym membership

But would I like an 85mm f1.2 and 50mm f1.2? Probably

To be honest Tony I thought I wanted Live View since it is very useful in a P&S, but I find it an irritation in a DSLR and prefer to use the VF for everything, so I wouldn't use the flip out screen most likely in a DSLR. The very first time I saw a flip out screen I thought wow I want one of those, but now it leaves me cold. but we're all different in what turns us on. The novelty wore off quickly for me

I was told by one well known camera dealer that the Nikon D5000 with the flippable screen is barely selling compared to their other models, despite all their advertising. He said he can not even give it away (exaggeration to make a point before anyone jumps on this).

I think the flip out screen is a gimmick that people will get sick of. I would rather have a camera built like a tank I can take to the beach or up a mountain without worrying about it being too delicate or susceptible to the elements

I don't know about the focussing but there is no reason why the lens information can't be communicated to the body as it is now. But off the film metering AFAIK is the most accurate since it measured exactly the amount of light 'energy' landing on the film and then closed the shutter so it didn't matter what lens was being used, as long as it knew the ISO/ASA of the film and whether it was being pushed

I remember years ago being told that's how IBM used to operate. I don't know if it is true but apparently they would sell a company a mainframe with all the bells and whistles built in but not enabled, so they could sell them the 'upgrade' and apparently all they then did was go into their mainframe and enable a few hidden featurs and voila suddenly you now had the better, faster, smarter computer now you've paid the extra money for their top of the line model instead of their entry level model. I suppose that's how a lot of software is sold - it's already got everything there but you just don't know how to access it without the access code

By the way, we never sleep