That's great to hear - if more editors had stuck to their guns like that both the photographers and the bands would have been better served.

For a photographer, copyright is all. I hate it when anyone takes a lax attitude to breach of copyright. It's all the artist (I use the term loosely about myself :wink has.

To answer the question directly, RAW gives you unprocessed information from the sensor. You can decide white balance, sharpness and everything else for yourself.

With jpeg, a Pentax engineer has decided for you what the white balance, sharpening et al will be according to his taste.
They are skilled people and make good choices.

I prefer to decide these things for myself because, for example, I do not want to apply the same sharpening to a portrait of a woman as I do to a landscape.

For inexperienced or rushed people, it's likely that the Pentax engineer will decide better than they can what they want or need.
For experienced or fussy photographers, RAW is the way to go.

Only you can decide what is best for your purposes. Most people will be happy with the jpeg option, I think. While it'll always be a compromise, it'll rarely be wrong. With RAW, you can turn out awful results if you wish.

Personally, to paraphrase Ghandi. I prefer my awful to your best.

I read some tests on that lens at the time (the early 60s as I recall) in the BJ. It had, they said, wide open, a soft, plastic quality. Maybe that was why it was called 'dream'. I think they probably meant fuzzy.

But hey, for a press man, you had an image, never mind the quality, feel the image!

I'm a hectoring bore on this

Back up every time you use your computer. Automate it. Do it.

There are two kinds of computer people. Those who have just lost all their stuff and those who are just about to.

There isn't, as you say, but nothing to do with price (in my opinion). More to do with this: link and this: link

Pentax make nice enthusiast cameras but if the K7 had been the only model available when I was looking I'd have bought a different marque. The K10/20D (Samsung in my case) with their weatherproofing and lack of consumer gimmickry came in at a good price compared to the opposition.
With the K7, I think they've placed their product at a price point where there is just too much accomplished competition.

If you were covering the Olympics or major sporting event, for example, Nikon and Canon would have service teams there to lend lenses out and to repair cameras on the spot and so on.
You buy into that when you buy their their professional equipment.

Pentax can't and I'd imagine don't want to compete with that. Without a professional service they can do what they like with but they will never compete. (So what, I can hear Hoya saying ).

I find a tripod useful for formal(ish) portraiture. Set up the camera and then stand with your face just behind and over the it and use a cable release or remote.
It enables you to put aside technical considerations and concentrate on motivating your sitter.
But in general, I ony don't use a tripod when it would inhibit rather than enhance.

I'm struggling to understand what's going on with this thread. Is someone unhappy? What happened?

I agree with Mike, it seems an attractive idea but would need to be formalised to be of any use, along the lines of the online conferences of an OU course. But once things become formalised there's an obligation to be available. It's a big commitment and a lot to ask.

I don't think there's any need to save 90% of the queries answered on the forum. It's free and doesn't annoy anyone - some people enjoy giving the advice on an ad hoc basis but might be less than willing to taken on any liability.

Carry on as usual, John?

I think it is - plainly Rankin is doing well, but for fewer people than previously.
I was able to retire out of it partly because of my library. It would be very hard for someone now to get copyright on their material because the sort of bands and show biz folk that I worked with all retain copyright nowadays.

For example, I did Paul McCartney's photography for a couple of years but he had me on a very tight contract where he owned all copyright. So I just earned my day rate. Like wedding photography, that's just a kind of casual, jobbing work, really.

The money is in shooting your own ideas and selling them, thus you have all copyright and the immmediate income is only the bunce. You need a good active agent to get you work and a constant stream of ideas for when he doesn't.

I never got rich (by a long chalk!) but I quickly learnt that relying on people to book you for jobs was a route to lots of work for little reward. That's even more so nowadays.

In fact, there are so many people who can operate a camera well these auto days that you'd probably make more money if you didn't shoot the pictures yourself but paid someone to do them. That's how people like Darren Lyons at Big Pictures have done so well.

I bought my Pentax because it was the cheapest weather sealed camera body I could find.

I feel no emotional commitment to it, it's a confection of glass, plastic, metal and silicon made in a far away country.

As someone who has earned their living at photography all their life and earned enough from it to retire at 55, I know a bit about photography as a job. It has *** all to with cameras.

It's worrying that someone planning to turn pro should think it does and I see nothing in feeb's pictures that could not be done with any dslr whatever make or even a good few prosumer cameras.

But if feeb believes that another camera will improve her work, it's her money and I wish her good luck.