Thanks for the comments!

Fortunately Grey Squirrels are not too difficult to get close to compare to the native Reds, either a camouflage suit and mesh face veil or covering yourself in netting does the job to get you really close up (...and my irresistible homemade crunchy nut paste helps as well to urge them to pose just a bit longer).

These shots are taken with the K5IIs and the DA300 which are both quiet enough to keep firing as wildlife is approaching. The flip side is the lack of zoom when they are coming in closer than anticipated....
I used to take the K30 with Sigma 70-300 with me as back up to cover this problem but both are to noisy for close up wildlife shooting in my experience.

I already have increased the brightness as all images where quite underexposed, having shot at ISO 800 and f4. Just find it difficult to find the right balance with this in pp. Regarding NO 1&2, they where taken when the daylight was fading quickly and actually I like the fact there are no blown highlights in the whites so prefer to leave it like this. With sunlight I often struggle to get this right! (I will attach two images to show what I mean).

I have spend the last afternoon of 2015 hiding in my local woods... (and testing my new Squirrel attractant recipe). Non cropped images

Hope I'm not going to far of topic but thought it might be helpful..

I can highly recommend this ballhead for anyone using long lenses ..it's absolute rock solid when locked. I use the DA300 + DA (SR switched off) on this without any issues (even in Scottish weather) When using this the weak part will be the tripod.

Before sending it away for costly servicing... perhaps you could do another test? Create "perfect" light conditions on a subject inside the house for example and optimize the stability and see how it performs.

What is the shutter speed you used with the bird shot?

I think the problem lies with the fact Ricoh can't offer a package like the competitors do to get the Pentax brand stocked with the large retailers. For example my brother (who lives in Europe) sells 8 brands compact cameras and 3 brands dslr's Canon/Nikon/Sony ..to offer more choice for high end dslr customers he has recently tried to get the Pentax brand on the shelf but with little room for negotiations unfortunately he failed to do so.

I bought this a few weeks ago, fits and works fine with Pentax.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LCD-TIMER-REMOTE-CONTROL-SHUTTER-FOR-CANON-EOS-550D-60...

Nice set!

If you find the the paint job of the ship strange.... it's getting better!

It's originally called "the Boei" and the ship is build in 2004 for the City of Arnhem (The Netherlands) at the cost of 7 million Euro .....to host drug addicts!
With the annual maintenance cost of 130.000 Euro (not included the cost for it's purpose) I believe It is used until 2010 in Arnhem and has waited for 2 years in Dordrecht harbor to be sold to Chevalier Floatels which is using it as a accommodation barge for off shore personnel. It's renamed as ‘Sans Vitesse’.

Regards,
Peter

I wonder why manufactures (not only Ricoh/Pentax ) not just always sealing their packaging for such expensive products as camera bodies and lenses?

I have bought my K5 IIs in Germany which came with a seal on it's box, the Pentax products I have bought here in the UK weren't sealed.


Regards Peter

Fully agree, a great set of photos of this little master of camouflage!

Wow! Absolutely stunning, please keep sharing them!