The SensorSwab/ Eclipse fluid approach works really well - just takes a couple of goes to get the knack of not leaving streaks behind!

Just a word of advice about using compressed air - if you are tempted. The thing you are cleaning is actually a chromatic filter mounted above the sensor, so high pressure air could possibly force a dust particle between the sensr and the filter - then it's there forever!!

Whatever.

The fact is the *istD does not put them to shame - I know - I've stupidly I've stuck with using one for 18 months, for semi-pro use, with hind sight probably out of brand loyalty. I eventually got tired of soft jpegs, innacurate white balance, sluggish AF and slow write speed. I was using it for sports events and it was always just a little bit dissapointing, even with the Sigma EX 100-400 f4 on it.

Fact is, if you get a 10D or 20D in your hands you'll soon find it puts the istD to shame.

Pentax glass is the best thing, no mistake. Pentax film cameras are superb. But now that Pentax has to deal with 'electronically' processing the image rather than leaving it to the film manufacturer, they have lost any advantage they had.

It's a great camera of amateur use, but make no mistake Canon out classes it when it comes to pro use event photography.
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Colin,

I use halogen studio lighting with my istD - and the best results are obtained, as already suggested, by manually setting the white balance.

A nifty aid to doing this is Lastolite's ezbalance card - its really an elasticated reflector type thing that folds up into a 4" circle - very handy for keeping in the camera bag and with a white on one side and 18% grey on the other you can get WB setting as well as exposure!

The other thing I do is shoot RAW, so that the WB can be adjusted (rescued?) later, in the 'computer dark-room' (!)

Arthur,

Doh! I should have realised.... I do use Adobe CS and have the Pentax RAW converter installed - just didn't connect the three letters together.

I became a RAW convert about 6 months ago - even bought some big gig CF cards to prove there was no going back! After cutting my teeth on a K1000 and a darkroom in the spare bedroom years ago, RAW is now where it's at for me!

Thanks again...

Guys, thanks for the info!

I've been playing with different photoshop (CS) options quite a bit since reading the postings! I did also try the 10% at a time method, but saw some weird effects, a bit like 'tiling' when zooming right in to see the individual pixels (why would I do such a thing? must be developing an obsession - yikes!)

Arthur, I've never heard of ACR. If you could give me a clue where to look on the web it would be appreciated (most search results took me to radiology related sites, hmmmm...)

Thanks again!

Greetings!

As a istD user I've recently been looking into getting some of my better images printed for framing - ideally 16" x 12" or thereabouts. The trouble is when you consider the pixel resoution of the image and factor in the desired 300dpi printing resolution, it means that 3008 x 2008 out of the camera image will give approx 10" x 6.7" of print.

So I guess some serious up sampling is required!

I've dabbled with resizing (resampling) the image in Photoshop, but was wondering if there is a better way?

Does anyone out there have any pointers on the best way to tackle getting larger prints and minimising the resulting degradation in quality?

Thanks in advance!

John