I like 1 and 3 very much, maybe wouldn't have cropped the bottom of 3 quite so severely.

2 you have focused on the snout and I think that point of focus should always be on the eyes. The eyes of any portrait are by far the most important thing to have sharp.

It's a bit difficult to view these without clicking on them as they are a bit large for displaying in the forum. They will fit better if you limit them to no more than 800 pixels.

I prefer the composition of the first one, which is a really good image. It is a bit oversaturated though, so I would take the colour back to be more like the original shot.

The original shot with the new composition would be excellent IMHO.

The auto in most cases refers to the teleconverter having linkages that will enable the lens to focus at open aperture and then stop down normally when the image is taken. This is a mechanical link and nothing to do with autofocus.

There are autofocus teleconverters with electronic contacts but I don't see many of them around.

Press the Fn button and then press the OK button and you will have a choice of several modes that adjust the settings for particular purposes. Matt mentioned that the portrait setting worked well and I have been using the bright setting to perk up those winter landscapes.

The light looks natural, which is good, and the movement in the subject is consistent with what we might expect, also good. I don't think you should clone out the Fire Exit sign, just crop the right hand side of the image. This will fully concentrate our attention on the subject.

Very nice sparks flying, which is the major strength of this IMHO.

By this time next year the K20D may no longer be around. It's as cheap as it's going to get right now if the price rises we've seen hinted at come into force.

I think so. For what I want from it it is significantly better, just as the K10D was a definite step up from the *istDS.

This shot is inevitable going to be almost a silhouette, which is fine, so I don't think we need any of the bright water in the foreground. Without that bright distraction we end up with a potentially moody evening shot that's very nice indeed.

We haven't had much of a chance to use the K20D cameras we bought recently, but a few thoughts so far.

The quality is superb and the exposure is quite a bit more accurate. I have opted for the Bright setting at the moment, which adds a little more "zing" to the shots. We are both using Premium JPEG quality.

There are a number od minor improvements to handling, but the easier-to-use catch on the SD card compartment is actually quite a bit easier to get hold of.

The camera is very, very quiet in operation and I get the feeling that the vibration levels are significantly lower than with the K10D.

So far so good and we're both very pleased.