Robert Soames Wetmore writes: > I've always admired the K2 as the "ultimate" of the Pentax K's. It has a > feeling of solidity and a weight that bothers some but pleases me.
I like the K2 as well. I have two of them which I use alongside my Z-1p. Solid, well-built and reliable, provided they're not stored on a shelf for 20 years... :) > Like the > KX, it has DOF preview and MLU, but in some other respects is specified even > better. For its time it is a fine manual camera - and quite useful today. I would be inclined to believe it was Pentax's flagship of the day. It was the first bayonet-mount camera they commercially released (the KM, KX and K1000 followed soon after). I just love the viewfinder and the meter. And the 8-second shutter speed :) > However, I keep hearing that its (Seiko-sha?) metal focal plane shutter > induces a fair amount of vibration [see typical excerpt below]; this would > sort of defeat the whole idea of MLU (which is the main reason I am thinking > of investing in some K2's, to be used with larger glass, as upgrades of my > K1000's, which I will keep for more portable photography). Can anyone > confirm that this is true? Is there noticeable degradation of image clarity > - and under what conditions? The shutter sounds pretty "heavy" but I haven't noticed any problems in my images because of it. I don't do a lot of work with long lenses and slow shutter speeds, but I do use the body for macro work quite often. I do use a sturdy tripod and use the mirror lockup whenever I can. > >In addition to its weight, it has two significant drawbacks: its ASA > > >setting must be the most difficult of any camera ever made, Its not difficult, just different :) Once you know how it works its pretty easy to set. Until the dial stiffens up, then you get chewed-up fingernails. One of the little "gotchas" with this body is that you can't adjust the film speed unless the exposure compensation is set to zero. > > and its > > >first-generation electronic shutter is noisy and vibration prone. >The > >camera gives a kick that is not solved by locking up its mirror (a >feature > >it has), which no doubt degrades image quality at slow shutter >speeds. The wording implies to me that whoever wrote it has never actually tested it. He could be right, but as I indicated earlier I haven't noticed any problems, even at the horrible shutter speeds of 1/4 to 1/15 at 1:1 macro extension. I get more problems with subject movement due to wind. Cheers, - Dave David A. Mann, B.E. (Elec) http://www.digistar.com/~dmann/ "Why is it that if an adult behaves like a child they lock him up, while children are allowed to run free on the streets?" -- Garfield - This message is from the Pentax-Discuss Mail List. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.pdml.net and follow the directions. Don't forget to visit the Pentax Users' Gallery at http://pug.komkon.org .
