Hands-on with Pentax K-r :)

[fengwei]

Well, finally a new camera came in town:

The camera looks a lot better than these, but I've no other camera w/ me, had to use my daughter's F31FD to take these photos

 

[fengwei]

There are enough reviews and previews about this camera on usual review sites, here I'd just point out some obvious differences (or improvement) from the K-x:

1. AF seems to be quite a bit faster. I've no K-x w/ me to compare, but I did feel it's faster. Even a slow AF lens like DA35 macro is very responsive under low light condition.
2. AF point confirmation in viewfinder is a big plus over K-x.
3. AF assistant light is pretty effective under low light.
4. Bigger 3" LCD screen w/ 921k pixels resolution really makes big difference when viewing photos or doing live view
5. 6fps high speed continuous shooting is FAST!
6. AF adjustment (pity only one adjustment value for all lenses instead of one for each lens, but still it's better than w/o)
7. Auto alignment for handheld HDR (3x) photos might be useful to some users.
8. It looks a lot prettier (at least to me).

That's all I can think of for now.

 

[fengwei]

Had the camera for a few hours only, haven't got chance to use it under normal daylight yet, only have some random photos under room light or in coffee shop. The camera takes very clean and usable photos at ISO1600, it's pretty nice at ISO3200 too. With some post processing, even at ISO6400 isn't too bad.

Here I'd post a series of photos, all straight out of camera in RAW, converted by Pentax Digital Camera Utility 4 which comes with the camera, no other process done other than resize and sharpening as usual. The results would be much better if I'd do a bit post process. But since this is just for testing, I'd leave them as is.

Thanks to Denis for buying me dinner, I'd post some of his photos first (lens used: DA35 macro):

ISO 1600:

ISO 3200:

ISO 6400:

ISO 12800:

The high ISO can be expended to 25,600, but I didn't try that 'cause I'm sure I won't like the results at such high ISO anyway. Overall I'm very very pleased w/ the camera's high ISO performance.

 

[fengwei]

To show some more details, here are the 100% crops of the above photos:

ISO 1600:

ISO 3200:

ISO 6400:

ISO 12800:

 

[fengwei]

Enough pixel peeping, I'd only post some random photos taken tonight.

Our delicious dinner (well, just some left overs I guess):

And of course the best part of all meals:

 

[fengwei]

DA35 is really a great lens for food photography:

Denis wanted to see the beer cap:

That's all from the dinner.

It's nearly 10pm after I got home and took shower. Nothing much to shoot, so I decided to take a couple of photos of my new flat. Believe it or not, this is the very first time I actually took some photos of our new flat (all taken at ISO3200 w/ FA31):

 

[fengwei]

I'd end with my kid photos, all taken w/ K-r and FA31 at ISO3200.

My naughty son:

Can't leave out my lovely daughter:

Well, I decided to do some process on this last photo. I'm not very good at post processing, but you can see the difference:

 

[Royaux]

Pink one to be made available locally?

 

[magicianhisoka]

this will be interesting looking forward to seeing what it can do!

 

[dreamwatch]

-Likes-

 

[nik34]

WAKE UP....PENTAXIANS....:lovegrin:...;p

 

[evolutioner]

pink?!
omfg.. i'm starting to like the lines on the top

haha.. luckily we're still up...

we want more~

 

[darrrrrrrrrr]

Oh nice....

Waiting for FW's thread on "Hands-on with K-5 "

 

[nik34]

Oh nice....

Waiting for FW's thread on "Hands-on with K-5 "

Bro,going for K5??;p

 

[liveevil]

The box is nice...

 

[CorneliusK]

Linking Creampuff's post of PF.com

http://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-dslr-discussion/118131-pentax-k-r-has-arrived.html

The pink color is going to sell like hot cakes man.

Also eagerly awaiting FW's K-5 hands on...

 

[jjynwa]

wow! Just when I am about to sleep. :bsmilie:

 

[darrrrrrrrrr]

Bro,going for K5??;p

I think so.. Will wait for the poison by FW and Denis first

 

[snapnut]

Wow... this is a nice surprise for owls like me :bsmilie:
High ISO is impressive... as are the improvements over K-x ;p

 

[reyreina]

ISO performance is darn good! fortunately shooting some film has taken the iso addiction off from me or my wallet will be broken again. Heh