Visit My eBay Store: jerryw1351/SPARKLE CITY CAMERASGOOGLE THIS CAMERA MODEL AND RESEARCH PRICE ON AMAZON, $988. with 1 LENS 18-55MM, DO NOT BE TRICK WITH THESE SO CALLED CHEAP NEW PRICES, THAT IS WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO GET A CHEAP CAMERA WITH CHEAP PARTS.I SHIP SOON AS PAYMENT IS MADE. YES AND A WIDE NECK STRAP COME, AND A CAMERA BODY CAP.AND TIFFEN AV FILTER SINCE IT WAS NEW.http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/pentax-ist-ds/4505-6501_7-31109375.html PASTE THIS LINK TO WWW.CNET.COM REVEIW AND THIS SITE HAS A VIDEO OF THE PENTAX IST DS. YOU WILL NOT BE DISSAPOINTED IN THE WAY THIS CAMERA LOOK OR PERFORM. PLEASE CHECK MY FEEDBACKS AND KNOW WHEN THIS CAMERA ARRIVE YOU WILL BER PROUD TO PULL IT OUT.THIS CAMERA LOOKS NEWER THAN THE PICTURES.THIS IS A LIKE NEW PENTAX IST DS 6.1 MP CAMERA, ITS NOT REFURBISHED OR RECONDITION, THE PRIOR OWNER JUST UPGRADED,DO NOT CONFUSE THIS CAMERA WITH THE IST D OR THE IST DL, THIS CAMERA MODEL CAME AFTER THOSE MODELS,THIS CAMERA COME WITH ALL ORIGINAL ACCESSORIES EXCEPT THE A V CABLE, BUT I ADDED A NEW HIGH SPEED SANDISK SD MEMORY CARD, NEW RECHARGEBLE BATTERIES, AND A NEW CHARGER, IT COME IN THE ORIGINAL BOX, THIS CAMERA PERFORM AND LOOK NEW, AND IT TAKE AMAZING PICTURES,THIS CAMERA COME WITH THE SIGMA 18-50, ON AMAZON.COM  FOR LENS,AND ITS A OUTSTANDING LENS THAT AUTO AND MANUAL FUNCTIONS ARE PERFECT, FOR THE BEGGINER JUST PUT ON AUTO AND IT WOULD BE HARD TO TAKE A BAD SHOT, AND IF YOU ARE A ADVANCE BEGINNER OR PRO THE MANUAL SETTINGS ARE ALL IN PERFECT WORKING ORDER, THE PICTURES OF THE LENS OF THIS CAMERA HAS A LOT OF SPONGE BALLS PARTICLES CLINGING TO IT FROM WHEN I TOOK IT OUT OF THE  BOX, THE SMALL DUST IS ON THE OUTSIDE AND ON THE BODY TOO, I SHOULD HAVE CLEANED IT UP BEFORE TAKING PICTUES, THESE PICS, ARE REALLY CLOSE UP THIS CAMERA. I GARANTEE THIS CAMERA AS I DO ALL MY CAMERAS, FOR THE FEATURES AND SHOOTING SPECIFICATIONS CLINK THIS LINK TO STEVES-DIGICAMS I RECOMMEND INSURANCE, EVEN THOUGH ITS OPTIONAL  INSURANCE.AMAZON HAS THIS CAMERA FOR $988 PLUS TAX AND SHIPPING, WITH NO BATTERIES,CHARGER,OR MEMORY CARD. AND THE DIFFERENCE IN APPERANCE AND PERFOMANCE, IS MINUTE TO NONE.A SAVINGS OVER $500..SIGMA 18-50MM LENS ,YOU CAN GET SPECS OR REVEIWS ON THIS LENS AT STEVES-DIGICAMS REVEIWS. PASTE OR CLICK THIS LINK TO CHECK REVIEWS AND PRICE http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/istds.html  THIS CAMERA IS AS CLOSE TO NEW AS A CAMERA CAN GET, I HAVE A EXCELLENT RECORD IN DESCRIBING CAMERAS. INSURANCE INCLUDED IN SHIPPING CHARGES. 

Introduction to the Pentax *istDS: The prince of affordable DSLRs

Just when you thought only a famous, demented rock star could get away with an unpronounceable name, a camera company known as Pentax comes along with the *istD and then follows up with the *istDS.
Editorial note for the less pop culturaly aware - Prince (a well known rock star) once changed his name to

One month before I sat down to compose this review, the tedium of scanning colour slides made me head out yet again to a couple of our big camera shops in Toronto to see if I could finally persuade myself the Nikon D70 viewfinder really wasn't that awful after all. I couldn't. Another big company's offering at the price point did little more for me (though I was actually somewhat relieved: didn't relish learning to cope with the ergonomic regression of lenses with no aperture ring). In an age when marketing departments have so much say, the calculated absence of critical 50-year-old technology shouldn't come as much of a surprise. It's pretty much common knowledge these days that a serious problem with entry-level digital SLRs is how very little of the budget finds its way to the viewfinder, which I maintain is one of the handful of body features to approach anything resembling a sine qua non of successful camera design: if you can't see clearly what you're shooting, how can you shoot clearly?

Before Spilling the Ink
(50mm, f/1.4)

In response to my disappointment, the salesman suggested I look through an *istDS and I confess I did so only because it was there. Although I own more camera brands than I really need and have fairly reasonable impressions of a few others, until recently, I was perfectly clueless about Pentax and generally dismissed the brand as something reserved for starving art students. So, when I brought this improbable contender up to my eye and saw how much better the view was, it was obviously with mixed feelings. While still below a film-based SLR, the finder was certainly/miraculously quite acceptable, but all enthusiasm was quickly nipped in the bud by scepticism concerning the sort of lenses I'd be bound to. As I said, I really had no clue.

Fortunately, I decided to share my experiences in one of the photo.net forums and things spiralled quickly to a brisk education that included a pair of very informative articles on Pentax lenses by Mike Johnston. The universal lauding of the 50mm f/1.4, and similarly high praise for the recent Limited Edition lenses, was more than enough to put me at ease. I soon found myself back at the shop negotiating a trial purchase of the *istDS with 30-day return option.

Technical Specifications

A short list of the basics...

• Lens Mount: Pentax KAF mount (compatible with KAF2, KAF and KA)
• Shooting Modes: Manual, Aperture Priority, Shutter Priority, Program (and a few strange ones)
• Focal Length Multiplier: 1.5
• Viewfinder: Pentaprism with Natural-Bright-Matte focusing screen (split-screen available as custom option)
• ISO Options: 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200
• Effective Pixels: 6.1 million (6.3 million sensor photo detectors)
• Sensor size: 23.7 x 15.5mm
• Sensor type: CCD
• Power Source: 4 AA-sized batteries or two CR-V3 Lithium batteries
• Shutter Speeds: 1/4000 to 30 seconds and Bulb
• Storage Medium: SD memory card

Yamon Drion: Urban Digital Colour Test Chart
(43mm, f/1.9)

The *istDS will store images as either RAW or JPEG files. Theoretically, the RAW format offers higher resolution, but you may not find this to be the case if using the software Pentax supplies for conversion, which introduces a heavy-handed etching to dark edges and an excessive amount of noise that manifests itself in the form of red pixels. A week or so into my review, an updated version was released (along with a firmware upgrade for the camera) and, while matters did improve, I still found results fell somewhat short of the mark. If you can afford the luxury, the best strategy is importing through Photoshop CS. Otherwise, best to stick to direct JPEG, which is what the Pentax RAW converter turns the file into anyhow?though I'm still puzzled as to why, with benefit of full computer, it can't perform as good a job as whatever operates inside the camera.

Ergonomics

My initial impressions of the camera were so positive and my enthusiasm so obvious that a friend of mine far away in New Zealand just couldn't wait for the final verdict and purchased the Pentax on impulse. His review goes straight to the point: "I love my *istDS, it handles just like an SLR should with the convenience of digital image storage."

As you may be starting to suspect, in spite of the fact that I'm a decade younger than one of my favourite (and sharpest) lenses, I do tend to favour a more traditional approach to photography. Given my shooting style, anything beyond the 3 simple things a camera actually does (focus, aperture, shutter speed) is unnecessary and divorces me from a process I enjoy, a process I like to maintain full control over. Against such a backdrop, it's quite remarkable how my first stroll about town with a modern technological marvel went off as smoothly as if I'd been using the digital Pentax for years.

Sid Reichmann Polishes New Stone for the Young Ms. Hilton
(43mm, f/1.9)

Not only does the *istDS fit very nicely in one's hands (not too small, not too big), all the controls seem to be exactly where you'd want them. Ironically, what gave the game away was my instinctive flipping of thumb toward a non-existent advance lever. I even forgot the memory card one day, having proceeded out of the house under the routine, absent-minded confidence of knowing there was always film in the camera bag. Such an oversight never materialized with my first digital and the slip-up is an enormous compliment to Pentax. I wonder what the marketing department would make of this.

One minor technical complaint would be that use of the aperture ring is disabled by default and requires some hunting in the back pages of the manual to figure out where enabling is buried in the menus. Not sure why really, given that the function doesn't interfere with use of dial-controlled aperture on lenses without a ring.

Street Shooting

The intuitive, rapid handling of the *istDS, combined with its fairly compact size has made more than one of us wonder about the possibility of street/candid photography. Although a bit noisier (audible noise, not pixel noise) than a rangefinder, this DSRL isn't really much more intrusive. Theory aside, the camera was both capable and enjoyable to use in this context; if you can believe it, I even felt at ease leaving my Leica M6 at home during most of the trial. Given the high rate of misses when you're chasing (and, in my case, routinely missing) decisive moments, the zero cost of digital capture is also a huge bonus.

Winter Beach
(43mm, f/1.9)

On the downside, street photography typically works a lot better in black and white (it's difficult enough to compose under the best of circumstances without having to worry about harmonious colour interactions) and I'm still not entirely convinced of the digital aesthetic here. There is something I see in my film shots that doesn't quite transpire in a desaturated digital capture and you can see it in this comparison (click here). Cultural bias? Perhaps. For now, let's just say the jury's still out on this artistic point.

Posed Shooting in Ambient Light

One of the things I do fairly often in winter is indoor portraits and other posed shots of people illuminated by window light (there's not much choice in Canada, unless you can make a case for frozen red noses). Even with some very big windows, it means I'm often working at f/2.8 or f/2 or worse and, with such wide apertures, precise focusing becomes critical. Given the additional pressure of not making the ?model? hold poses for an unnatural amount of time, I did find things tricky with the *istDS. Feel free to jump all over me for dismissing auto-focus, but I strongly suspect the available split-prism screen (my first choice with film SLRs) would have been far preferable.

Lenses

For me, any camera system truly begins with the glass. In fact, over the past few years, I've twice purchased a lens well ahead of acquiring a body to mount it on. That said, I'm not one of those who needs the arsenal of a dozen primes just to get going. My film shooting is mainly through the incredibly cost-effective, manual-focus 50mm lens (with a trusty 90mm tele-photo for balance), so I brought no unwieldy legacy to the table here: if a new DSLR wouldn't take one of the three brands of SLR lenses I owned already, it was no big deal to buy into a fourth. In fact, the gear-fetishist in me was looking forward to the possibility of even more variety. My major concern at the outset was whether Pentax had something I'd be happy with.

Golden Hour Pears
(28mm, f/2.8)

After a bit of research and considerable help from the photo.net community, I eventually landed a Pentax 50mm f/1.4 from the photo.net classifieds, borrowed an 85mm f/1.8 from a fellow member, and Pentax Canada was kind enough to provide me with a 43mm f/1.9 Limited for this review. Until these transactions were completed, however, I needed something to play around with on the new camera (no kit zoom for this purist), so I picked up an old second-hand M 28mm f/2.8?the (1.5X) conversion/crop to 42mm put the lens within a range I'm quite comfortable with. The construction was solid and the feel of the hefty focusing ring so delightful, I immediately/dangerously forgot all about stuff like recharging batteries (see memory card anecdote in previous section). The photos I shot during these early days seemed just a touch soft but, before the other lenses arrived, I really had no proper reference and, to tell you the truth, it really wasn't anything to lose sleep over.

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