I would suggest the following tests: take shots of distant object/landscape with both lenses so that the focus is set to infinity. If the pictures turn out out-of-focus, then your cam body is likely to be screwed (unlikely for both lenses to be bad). If both are in-focus, cam body is good. Also if you set lens to infinity focus, looking thru viewfinder the distant landscape should appear sharp (this would mean your prism system isnt screwed).
To see if the AF of the cam is not working well: focus on somebody standing nearby, switch to MF mode and see if you can get sharper focus than that selected by camera. Does the lack of quality seem like due to light leakage ? You can test that by say loading film, wrapping a black cloth all around the body so only the lens is sticking out, shoot some pics, develop the photos and see what happens. basically eliminate possibilities one by one... or you could just find a good repair place nearby and have a lookover done :) and yeah, indian weather is excellent for fungus growth. So check that out in your lens first. On Fri, Feb 08, 2002 at 06:10:01AM +0000, Gaurav Aggarwal wrote: > Hi all, > > I bought a used PZ-1 in the US a few years ago but hardly used it. > Subsequently, I moved to India and have been using it off and on, > more as a "tourist" photographer only. > > I have 2 lenses: FA 28-200mm Pentax and A 50mm/f1.7 Pentax (manual > focus) that I bought used. I usually used the 28-200 lens even though > I know that such large-range zooms will never give very good > performance. However, I liked the ability to capture landscapes at > 28-35mm as well as subjects of interest at 120-150mm when travelling > as a tourist. > > Lately, I observed that my pictures aren't any good compared to what > fellow tourists take primarily with their P&S or sometimes with > Canon EOS Rebel (2 of my friends have this one). Neither the focus > is as great (clarity misses out), nor is the color, brightness and > contrast. Somehow, something is always missing in my pictures. > > I had read quite a few books on photography while in the US 3 > years ago and had felt that I knew what I was doing when I put the > camera in Aperture priority mode, and click at f8 or f16. Obviously, > I am wrong somewhere. > > Then lately, I started using the 50mm/f1.7 manual focus thinking that > the prime might be much better. The results are hardly any good > compared to 28-200. I mostly shoot Kodak or Fuji films of speed 100 > or 200. I have changed my developer couple of times and did see some > difference but nothing major :-( > > What could I be doing wrong? Is the metering mode on my PZ-1 set > incorrectly?? I do not have its manual with me. I usually leave > the camera in HyP mode, and select either Aperture (when taking > lanscapes or portraits) or Shutter (when photographing traffic or > waterfalls, river). I typically never use the spot-metering. > > Also, I have been able to make use of DoF and regret this. Try as > hard as I might, I can hardly figure that something is indeed going > out of focus at small apertures (i.e., wider openings). > > Any tips, criticism, suggestions would be more than welcome. Thanks!! > I am relatively new to PUG and so pardom me if I have violated > the charter/norms of the mailing list. > > Gaurav > > Bangalore, INDIA. > > ________________________________________________________________________ > Looking for a job? Visit Yahoo! India Careers > Visit http://in.careers.yahoo.com > - > 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 . - 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 .
