Originally posted by RioRico My story: I own the DA10-17 (the lens that drove me to Pentax), the Tamron 10-24 (now an indispensable piece of my kit) and the Zenitar 16/2.8 (which the Tam has largely supplanted). My original 2-piece kit contained the 10-17 and 18-250; now it's the 10-24 and 18-250. The Zen is very similar to the Tak 17/4 (but faster) and has its special niche for me, shooting dimmer interiors. But unless one's sports shooting includes skateboard closeups, I don't recommend any fisheye for a general-purpose sports-travel 2-piece kit.
In fact, I can't recommend ANY 2-piece kit; they're just too restrictive. The three areas to pursue in building a kit: 1) coverage; 2) speed; 3) character. So a minimal kit would have an UWA and a superzoom, and some selected fast glass, and some specialty glass like a FE.
Funny, my three areas of pursuit in building my kit are 1) size, 2) coverage and 3) quality. My reasoning is that the best equipment for the job if the stuff that gets used the most...I'd rather take 500 photos with a lens or setup with more limitations than take 20 photos with a big, heavy high quality lens. I'd get a lot more keepers and tell a better story with the 500 shots, even if they're not perfect.
I'm not out in the world with the goal of taking photographs...but I do want to document some of my experiences.
I picked up 2nd hand copies of DA21 and DA40 locally, and am testing them out before my trip so see what will work, in the end picking between the 17/4 fisheye, 18-55WR, DA21 and DA40. I think a setup like the K5 with the pancake is pretty amazing...the quality and photographic control of a DSLR that can fit in a tiny travel pack with my passport and wallet. Quiet shutter, high ISO quality and DR, compact body and lens...fast, unobtrusive, perfect! I don't think you can get much smaller without losing the mirror, and I'm not willing to move to a "Q" or a point and shoot just yet.