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Visit Camera Enthusiast!While at CP+ he had a chance to stop by the Tamron and Sigma booths, where we asked the representatives of each company a few questions. Here's our interview with Kenji Nakagawa of Tamron.
The Tamron 18-270mm lens was recently made available for Pentax under the Pentax brand (see the SMC Pentax-DA 18-270mm review). While he shares no Pentax-specific lens plans, Nakagawa states that there is demand for Pentax lenses, which is reassuring to those who thought that perhaps Tamron was moving away from Pentax. At the moment, the majority of Tamron lenses are for Canon, Nikon, and Sony, with only a handful also available for Pentax. Tamron's latest high-speed lenses featuring ultrasonic focusing systems are currently not being produced for the Pentax mount.
@Paul the Sunman, the Pentax DA 10-17mm, DA 12-24, DA* 16-50, and DA* 50-135 are all Tokina lenses, just rebranded as Pentax.
Tokina!?? I don't think that ANY of their current lenses are available for Pentax. Pity, wouldn't mind the 11-16.
Looks like Pentax's great white hopes are Sigma and Tokina
It is great to hear a representative from a Japanese company talk English. His answer to the Adaptall question (great question), doesn't make sense to me but other than that I very much appreciated his answers.
Here here for the 180mm macro. I've used it on a Nikon, would buy it in a heartbeat in a PK mount.
Tamron doesn't make the 18-270mm f3.5-6.3 PZD, 24-70mm f2.8 USD, 70-200mm f2.8 USD, 70-300mm f4-5.6 USD, 90mm f2.8 USD Macro, 180mm f3.5 Macro, and 200-500mm f5-6.3 in Pentax mount. Basically, any new lenses are not available for PK.
A modern Adaptall system would put them in a league of their own. It would no doubt require the usage of a SDM/USM/HSM/SWM/PZM Style system though. Simply put, fit the motor inside, then attach electrical contacts to the bodies, with a sort of "Electronic Translator" inside each adapter.(This would result in the adapter being around $100-200, though)
I'd have their 180mm Macro in a heartbeat if it was available in Pentax mount, as I'm sure plenty of others would too.
I find it interesting when I see quotes from the manufacturers about there being no demand to produce their lenses in PK mount, given the amount of threads I read here and elsewhere, and the comments complaining about the latest lesnes NOT being available for PK.
Hum, I heard "we know there is a demand, but we do not have the manpower to support pentax/sony. But look, we do m4/3!".
I know of the 18-270 and 60/2 lenses that are not available for Pentax, are there more?
I'll believe they're still supporting Pentax when they actually start doing it.