But +/- 5 stops is plenty for me

George, I class myself as somewhat of a newcomer (been shooting almost a year now - not including p&s of course) & am someone who has learned from scratch on a dslr.
Now I can only speak from my experience, I bought a dslr as I wanted to take control of the photographs I produced & 20 minutes of reading up on technique ensured I wasn't interested in "program" mode from the get go. I don't think it's difficult to grasp the relationship between aperture, shutter speed & iso. Of course putting it into practice is a learning curve & using it to creative advantage a steeper one.

Why buy a camera that affords you total control over your photography & then relinquish that control by seeking out that evil letter "P" ?
At least we've stopped short of the plethora of program modes available on some p&s cameras, hunting around the menu for a picture of a dog & crescent moon to ensure a "good" photo of your pet at dusk is quite frankly ludicrous (as my post seems to be heading)


With reference to the original question, the only in-camera technology I totally rely on is ttl metering (but that's hardly a new addition) plus tyou need to know how to exploit it to your advantage, knowing whether to expose for shadows, highlights, or midtones for the result you're after- as for post processing, I don't think I would enjoy photography as much without it, my results would certainly be somewhat more lacklustre. But I'm not a prolific shooter. If I spend a few hours shooting, I'm happy to return with 2 dozen shots & would be delighted to have half a dozen keepers after an hour or so in photoshop. But then, that's my hobby, I enjoy the processing as much as the capturing.

Most sensible post I have read all day.

I shoot AV almost exclusively, I could shoot manual yes, but it just means turning another dial, why not let the camera take the strain ? Using ttl metering, you're only going to dial it in until you reach EV0 anyway & then compensate from there. Where's the huge difference between using AV mode & some EV compensation when required & using full manual ?

I generally want to control depth of field, obviously I am aware what kind of shutter speed will be required & I can affect this through altering the aperture or iso. Basically I am manipulating 2 of the 3 exposure paramaters & allowing the camera to take care of the 3rd, just for convenience sake. If I was primarily interested in shutter speed I could shoot SV & alter the iso to ensure I get enough depth of field.

The only time I shoot manual is when using manual flash off camera, as I need to manipulate the exposure more.

I wonder if we're seeing a small jpeg shot in camera here ?

No offence meant here James, but if you don't know how to sharpen I'm guessing you have little experience, so you may be unaware that a "RAW" file refers to a file of pure data from the camera sensor & has not been processed by the camera in any way. I'm presuming here that you've set the camera to record "small" jpegs which would explain the size. Also, depending on how you have the camera set up, a jpeg will have been "processed" by the camera in some way (sharpened, saturated, contrast boosted etc)

James, you've posted a crop of the resized image. Not a crop of the original image.

I think you're getting confused as to what a 100% crop is. It is simply a part of the original image shown in its original resolution (ie. not resized at all)
100% = original size
crop = portion of image

So this is a full image resized for display on the web: (roughly 15% of its original size)

[IMG]http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q105/RR76/DUCKYFULL.jpg[/IMG]

-----------

And this is a 100% crop from the original image:

[IMG]http://i134.photobucket.com/albums/q105/RR76/DUCKYCROP.jpg[/IMG]

You can download the Pentax & Adobe codecs for free direct from their websites, but they only work on 32 bit systems.
This set of codecs appear to be 3rd party ones, I've just installed them & they work on 64 bit too !

Thanks for posting the link lidy, as I've had to remember to manually start a 32bit explorer window up until now !

Prices may well have risen since they originally stocked this lens, but not by that much ! I sold my copy months ago for more than Wolfson picked this one up.

Amazon use partners, Wolfson has picked up the only one the partner had in stock. Now it's only available from Amazon themselves at twice the price.
I'd say, if it turns up & it is brand new then it's a bargain !

If it was their last one & not a particularly good seller for them then the price may well be genuine & perhaps they will now no longer stock it in Pentax fit.

Be sure to post up some shots when it arrives.

I had the sigma, it is a little soft at f2.8 but otherwise is a very good performer. Here's my fave shot taken with it (f4 1/30 iso800) in difficult light !





That price is amazing, so I'd thoroughly check out the seller first !

Now, I'm not one for military parades, but looking at #25 & #26 I'd watch those legs march past me all day !