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Simon Yates Photography
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Very entertaining WG-1,
Check out my updating youtube videos. I am user: “PentaxWG1” The good the bad the ugly. The over all feel of this camera is strong and gripable. I love having metal and rubber on my electronics. I have dropped this camera. It was on my lap in the jeep and there was a hornet. I jumped out and it threw to the ground. No problems. The removable circle around the lens (macro stand) has threads. They are 46mm and can screw on filters and caps. I got a cap, uv filter, polorized filter, and flourecent filter on e-bay for $6. So other than the sony TX10, this is the only camera that can protect the lens. Can’t wait to buy a telescopic lens. My camera has been underwater about 15 ft. I’ve seen no problems with leaking. It has two openeings; one for battery and sd card, and one for hd/av hook-up. Both seem strong and sturdy to me. Battery cover does move ever so slightly but seems fine. Ok, thats the construction. As you have already heard, the macro/super macro is awesome. If you can get your specimen to sit still, you can get some pretty great material. The movie macro is even pretty cool, but you have to stay at a consistant focal length or it gets blury. I recorded a wolf spider in pitch black and the l.e.d. lights around the lens made it look like a monster movie! One bad thing about the macro is that when set straight down on the subject it will focus and take the picture on something as flat as a leaf or picture…. if it protrudes as much as a dime width or more it won’t stay focused. But when I pulled back just a hair the dime did look awsome. N-E-Wayz, It seems the closer you are to the subject with this camera the better it looks. A closer shot of two people, shoulders and up, look really good. But further away not so much. pictures of groups of people (full body) or the shot of a pond or a… cow…I say the camera is about par. Not bad but not great. I have tried the cybershot TX10 and if you strictly want waterproof picture quality go that way or panasonic. TX10 was beautiful but not as fun. Back to the WG-1. With par pics I do feel the camera is more consistant than its predesessor w90. Better with stand, free hand not as good..but always the same. Never a crappy picture out of nowhere. I also feel it does much better in lower light than the w90. It gets noisey but I was getting decent lighted shots (no flash) in areas that where very dim to the naked eye. The l.e.d. lights are handy, too. Optical zoom works pretty well for pictures. You’ll want a steady hand or stand if zoomed all the way in. Digital zoom sucks. The panorama is not sweep. You take 3 pics and line them up, then the camera stitches them. Not as convinient as the TX10 but it looks good and you can do tricks…As for underwater. Pictures and video where pretty darn good. Anti shake or wudever made it pretty smooth. With video underwater or above the zoom works but it doesn’t refocus very well. But over all regular video was better than I expected. Once again when things are close it seems very virbrant. I got about a foot from a cow’s face and the fur on his head got very HiDef-ish. Battery life….sucks, but I got and extra generic one when I ordered mine for 6 bucks. Over-all I really love this camera. I’ve been totally entertained for 2 days and havn’t even gotten to time lapse phtography yet. Although I do think of the pic quality of the TX10 now and then. I would have been bored with that camera after one dip in the lake. I can get a 10 mp zoom camera for less than a hundred and fill in anywhere the wg-1 lack.
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|Do not waste your money on this camera,
We owned a Pentax’s first waterproof camera (Optio W10) and loved it. So when it came time to upgrade we bought this one before our trip to Mexico. We choose this one because of its ergonomic design. We figured this would work wonders when splashing around underwater and be easy to hold onto. The ergonomic design is the only redeeming feature of this camera.
At first we were concerned about how loose the battery door was. The battery door stayed shut but it would slide partially open when closed and was very loose (not enough for water to actually get in but enough to make us concerned). Thinking it might just be the camera we picked up, we went back to the store where we bought it from. After looking at other ones it appears to be part of the design. This should have been our first clue that this is a horrible camera.
While on vacation in Mexico the camera froze several times requiring the battery to be removed to get it to unfreeze. Now this can be a true problem when you need to let the camera dry for about an hour before opening the battery door otherwise you risk exposing both the battery and memory card to water.
We also discovered small water spots on the inside of the display screen. Clearly it is not as waterproof as claimed. I am glad we were only using it while wading in the ocean and not actually snorkelling.
The battery life is extremely poor requiring charging every two days when the camera is moderately used.
We also found the image quality not that good. After returning from our vacation, we looked at old images from our previous camera (Optio W10) and they were much better even though it was only 6 megapixels. In fact the same picture taken with our iPhone 3Gs had a better image quality.
Pros
– Great rugged looking design
Cons
– Poor image quality
– Freezes
– Not completely waterproof
– Poorly manufactured
Summary
Clearly Pentax designed a nice looking camera that gives the illusion of ruggedness; however, their production quality of this model is extremely poor. We’ve returned the camera and are looking for a different one (not from Pentax) to replace it with.
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|Great camera,
I was looking at different cameras while I was making the switch from point and shoot to dslr. Pentax had really nice features but was not nikon or canon. I was a little nervous about it since Pentax does not have as big of a market share as some of the other camera companies. Everything I read was very positive about the k-r and so I decided to go for it. At this price, it was a bargain compared to the ones with similar features.
The camera showed up and I took it the next day to photograph my sister’s wedding. All weekend I played with it, taking pictures of family and friends, decorations, kids, etc… I had a great time and came away with some really solid looking pictures. My brother was shooting with a nikon D90 (which is a little older camera) and I thought my pictures looked sharper and more true to color. My wife was worried that she would not be able to use the camera due to the complexity of some dslrs. She loves the camera and uses it constantly. It has actually gotten her very excited about photography. One negative thing is the plastic-y built lenses that it comes with. The lenses work very well, turn out great pictures, but aren’t quite as solid feeling as others I’ve held. I have not had any issue with them and may never have any issues with them. One more issue is the shutter noise which is very robust. I actually enjoy the sound most of the time but have noticed when I’m trying to take candids of our baby, it can call attention to the camera and lose the shot. The camera itself is built very solidly and is very responsive. The grip is large and feels very comfortable (I have large hands and Canon cameras were way too small for me). It will take pictures as fast as you can click and the features are fairly easy to navigate once you get going. I really like the option of using the included rechargeable battery or buying the adapter and sinking in some AA batteries. The focus matrix on the viewfinder was one of the reasons I chose this over the k-x and I’m glad I did because I use it all the time. Another plus is the camera does not weigh too much so it was much easier than I expected to take with us. I’m very happy with my purchase and do not regret anything about it. I think the Pentax k-r is a very solid camera and even after using the cameras of friends and family, I would make the exact same purchase that I did a month ago.
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|Amazing,
Great product.
I love Nikon, and tend to be a Nikon fanboy… but wow! Pentax is superb! Image quality, AF, ISO, and all are amazing out-of-box, and even better on manual mode (if you know what you are doing haha)!
I had such a tough time choosing between this and a Nikon D3100. I kept on looking and looking and looking at reviews, previews, test images…etc. And all ACTUAL proof or side-by-side comparisons showed that this Pentax K-R (and even the K-X) was the winner.
Yeah, it only has 720p, but that is still HD quality. I’m not buying this for filming, I’m buying it for a friggn camera. And I tested out the video on it, and it looks really sharp! Don’t know why so many people with their biased opinion based on the video quality? They must have not ever have actually touched either cameras.
I snagged an amazing deal on this one with the 2 lenses and paid $595 instead of the listing price ($699 for the cheapest at the moment), So it was just a amazing find. Loving it, and will treasure it for many years to come.
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|One of my best online purchases (or ever),
I wanted to make a transition from the point/shoot used camera I own. I felt that I need more liberties, more decisions to make when taking pictures. I am not pretending to become a serious enthusiast or even a professional, but I would like to improve my skills. I have used an old mechanic Pentax K-1000, and I trust this dear brand. I made some research for entry level DSRL. I have read reviews and compare features, and known since then that K-r was for me. K-x is the cheaper sister for this, but it does not have a lithium battery as K-r does. The kit deal for this one is incredible: two zoom lenses! I have used telephoto zoom lens and have no complains about it. I have not used the other one yet.
The camera has behaved nicely. It does offer the quality results it features here and at pentaximaging website. I have only used the MF because I need to practice in doing myself (XD), but the AF has received feedback that it would not work at certain light conditions. It does have expanded ISO sensibility, but it does have a noise drawback after higher ISOs. Its HDR mode is really fantastic because it offers pictures taken in ways you would not dream about with a point/shoot camera, and it does not need to be blown out or over-saturated. And I have only started using few of its many features, and I cannot wait to test the rest of them.
If you are another person really interested in photography as a hobby, and want to expand or improve your skills, this entry level DSRL is for you. You could start little by little changing from auto mode to priority mode, and then moving into fully manual mode. And this kind of camera is made for that, and more! I highly recommend this camera. Of course, there are better DSLR out there, but this one works more than just fine, and at a very good price (I only wish it would be weather resistant as K-7). This has been the best purchase I have ever made on Amazon, or else.
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