Has anyone else had this problem? The camera appeared to crash when the shutter button was pressed, the screen showed vertical lines and the on/off switch refused to work -- ie: I couldn't turn the camera off. Eventually took the batteries out and they were hot. (They were new in, duracell alkalines, with the battery setting at auto.)

Since then the on/off switch also failed to work again - though it was ok when I switched it to on then off again - it turned off the second time.

Love using my new camera, but this is worrying. Back to the shop?

All these comments very interesting indeed, esp on lenses. I only have the kit pentax lens that came with the k-x to compare with the Sigma, and from what I can remember the Sigma seemed a lot cooler and clearer and more attractive.

Tried out JR's settings prescription yesterday and got some nice natural looking results - so thanks very much JR. - interesting that daylight WB should work well in a shady room indoors - neither shade nor cloudy much good at all, to my eye. Also shot RAW+ to see what the jpg conversion does - mostly seems to bring out contrast and create more depth in the image, and in some cases that tones the colour down somewhat. RAW looked strangely shadowless.

Re the monitor- it's a macbook and the colour on pics taken by my compact fuji is lovely - even if it is only a cheap camera, so I don't think the monitor's badly adjusted.

Anyway, feeling a lot happier about the camera since airing my frustration on the forum and very grateful for all your comments

John Riley - thanks v much for that - I'll try it tomorrow. Glad you think Pentax colour is good - reassuring after laying out all my savings on a camera...

Anvh - I've been shooting jpgs - assume you mean the camera having control is better?

Regards
Rob

I've just got a k-x which I'm using with a Sigma 50mm lens. The camera and lens are lovely to use, but I'm tweaking and tweaking the white balance and custom image to try to get the colours looking more natural and true.

When I first turned it on I didn't realise it was in default 'bright' mode - results were horribly faked and 'digital' looking. Discovered 'natural' mode, but it still doesn't look right: as if the camera was fine with muted tones, skin, shadows, but as soon as something pure coloured comes into the frame it boosts it up. So like I said, I'm tweaking.

Any tips? Am I just an obsessive? Any other colour obsessives out there?

One more thing: I hate to start one of those Pentax v canon/nikon/whoever threads, but does anyone think different makers perform very differently in registering colours?

All tips and opinions from you highly experienced photographers very welcome!