[Jool]

I have two Tokina lenses 28-70 2.8 and 80-400. They worked fine with my film camera but not very good with my K-5. I was looking at the Pentax DA*16-50 but decided it's too much money right now and it has had a fair amount of issues. So, now I'm looking at the following lenses which are all under $500:
Pentax 16-45 4.0
Pentax 18-55II (doesn't get very good reviews but it's cheap)
Sigma 17-70 2.8-4.0 (gets okay reviews)
Tamaron 17-50 2.8 (never liked Tamaron in the past but seems to get good reviews)
I'm disappointed in the sharpness of my photos right now, which may be due to the calibration of the lenses I have, but using the in-camera adjustment has not helped a whole lot, so I need something that's sharp.

Also, I saw a post about the Pentax DA*60-250 some time ago that showed a photo of buildings and then had a zoomed in portion on a window washer to show the sharpness from such a long distance away, but I can't find it. If anybody knows the post I'm talking about please let my know the title of it so I can find it again. Thanks

[Marc Sabatella]

I'd start by posting some images you are not happy with. Lots of things can contribute to lack of sharpness, and differences between lens is very low on that list. Chances are pretty good something else would male a bigger difference.

[Jool]

I've never posted images before. First, I'm assuming that I should leave the file as is after importing into lightroom and then export it as a jpeg without any adjustments (although LR automatically adds +25 sharpening). Then I guess I click on the insert image icon above. Should I leave the file uncropped or crop it to 1:1 since it's hard to determine the sharpness otherwise?

[Jool]

Okay, here is my attempt at posting images. The first one was taken with the Tokina 28-70, speed 1/125, f/9.0, ISO 1600, no adjustments made except that Lightroom applies a +25 sharpening, no cropping. The second one was taken with the Tokina 80-400, speed 1/125, f11.0, ISO 100, no adjustments (except +25 sharpening), no cropping. The third one was also taken with the Tokina 28-70, speed 1/125, f2.8, ISO 1600, minimal cropping. Zoom in a bit to see what you think. I usually pick the face or eyes as a focus point. All images were shot Raw DNG and then exported to Jpeg. Tokina did say they could try to recalibrate the lenses but there were no guarantees. The 28-70 will not lock focus at 28mm, I have to zoom in a touch to get it to work.

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